[For an update on cloth diapers, check out my Green Parenting blog.]
 
Cloth diapers are great! They are cool! They are not that hard - trust me. When I told my Mom I was going to use cloth diapers, she said, "They've made so many advances in diapers, why do you want to go back to that mess?" Aha, but these are not my mother's diapers. There are many websites that go into the ins and outs of cloth diapering, some of which I list below.

Here are just a few factoids, and then a practical rundown of how to make it work in the real world.

* Why on earth would you? For a great in-depth article, check out this great article in Mothering Magazine, Joy of Cloth.  Some highlights:

* 18 billion disposable diapers are thrown in landfills each year, taking as many as 500 years to decompose.
* In Seattle, for example, disposable diapers have increased from 2.5 percent of all residential waste in landfills in 1988-1989 to 3.3 percent in 1994-1995
* 82,000 tons of plastic and 1.3 million tons of wood pulp, or a quarter-million trees, go into the manufacture the disposable diapers that cover the bottoms of 90 percent of the babies born in the US.
* You can save a bunch of money if you invest in cloth diapers rather than buying disposables weekly (unless you decide to use gDiapers, see below.)
* We found that once we switched to gDiapers, Banana began to sleep through the night.

This is what worked best for us – learn from my mistakes! Hope this makes it easy for you. I estimate that I kept more than 2,000 disposable diapers out of the landfill in Banana's first year.

* How to choose: First, you can sign up for a diaper service. There are green ones, but they still use chemicals to get the diapers super clean, and if you have a second child, you don’t get any savings. There’s also an “ick factor” of using other people’s diapers – we decided to go it on our own.
There are several types of diapers – plain cloth, all-in-ones, fitted, pocket and others (see websites below for examples.) For our money, fitted and all-in-ones worked well, the rest were too complicated. Play around with super-sustainable materials: organic cotton, bamboo and hemp! Some friends swear by gDiapers: 

         * gDiapers are a new approach. It’s a system with a breathable cover and snap-in plastic liners. They’ve developed a new kind of flushable liner, which prevents poo and chemicals from going into landfills. They are biodegradable, so if you chose to put them in the garbage, they will break down quickly. The liners do contain sodium polyacrylate, which has been certified safe for the environment and has not been linked to any problems in children. (However, there is debate over their safety, refer to the Mothering article, above.) You can buy them in most stores, now.

* A hybrid solution: If the gDiaper system doesn’t work for you, try using just the flushable liners with a cloth diaper. We found this to be the simplest solution. The benefits of cloth diapers without having to wash poo!

* What not to buy: We didn’t find the liners or doublers particularly helpful – you should experiment here.

* How to begin: Buy about 12-15 diapers to begin. For infants, find a style that snaps down to accommodate the belly button healing. Make sure you wash one or two and try them on your baby and make sure they fit. Most companies will accept unwashed/unused returns or exchanges. "Infant" sized diapers can vary greatly in size.

* What we liked: Kissaluvs cotton diapers, Bummis covers (Banana loved her “Frog pants!”) and Kushies classics and all-in-ones.

* How to clean: Get a bucket for soiled diapers. Some folks have the grit to stick their hands in the toilet and rinse their diapers. Not for me! I throw the soiled diapers in water that has a little Borax dissolved in it. To do this, get a bucket. I found the perfect one at Storables. It has a hinged lid and a plastic insert with handles. When it's laundry time, I wear plastic gloves, transfer these diapers to the washer, and they're off! Then, empty the bucket liner into the toilet, rinse and clean in the tub, fill the bucket 1/3 full with warm water with ¼ cup of Borax dissolved in it. I do not put diapers that are only wet into the Borax bucket, just keep them in a laundry basket (preferably near an open window!) I put all the diapers through a prewash cycle first, then add all the other clothes and do a full load of laundry. We have a low-flow, front load washer that minimizes the amount of water used.

* Line dry. If at all possible, hang your diapers out to dry. My Banana was born in March, so I had the whole summer of line drying and I never had any stains. Over the winter I couldn’t, and they began to look a little dingy.

* Detergent. The manufacturer’s recommend regular detergent, but I stuck with my biodegradable kind without any issues. I put a tablespoon of vinegar in the rinse cycle to cut the suds.

* Good websites: Kelly's Closet and Baby Cotton Bottoms.