Cloth Diaper Care

Here’s the continuation of my cloth diaper expertise.  Whatever cloth diaper system your interested in they all need to be washed.  Follow directions.  Many of the covers don’t want to go in the dryer (and if your thrifty like me you don’t want to pay to run the dryer so often).  With Cairn I tossed the soiled diapers in the washer and a few got washed with every load of laundry.  Cerise unfortunately has unhappy reactions to my detergent (I make my own and will post on that soonish) so we have to keep the diapers separate which gets stinky in the hot summer months. 

When washing do not use any softener!  The softeners actually coat the fabric with water resistant stuff to keep it soft and fluffy… you really don’t want water resistant diapers (or towels or dishrags really).  However, every few washings fill the softener container with white vinegar.  The vinegar acts as a softener by stripping any extra soaps off of the fabric.  It’s also naturally antibacterial (vinegar is among my favorite cleansers for every part of the house).


Before washing…  so if its just wet, no problem, but the poop needs to get rinsed off first.  There are diaper sprayers that attach to the toilet.  I just found a DIY tutorial for one here.  Until it got lost I used the little bottle sprayer/ cleanser that I got after delivery (you know… to clean down there…).  You do not want to use a squirt bottle because for every initial contact from any sprayer there is some amount of splatter and squirt bottles are nothing but a series of initial contacts… it makes a speckled mess.  But it really isn’t so bad to just pinch the cleanest corner and swish it around in the toilet… I mean you just wiped it off of the kid’s bum and  that was a lot closer contact.

When you change the diaper and you notice a rash do not use diaper rash cream or Vaseline.  Just like the softeners this stuff is water resistant.  That’s how it works – spread it over the dry rash and it prevents more pee from getting onto the skin there.  Instead, regularly use baby powder (or just cornstarch) to help ensure the area gets completely dry.  Also, there is nothing wrong with nakey-bum time to completely air out everything… just keep rags handy.

And that’s all really… not too much more hassle than it is to change diapers in the first place

Oh... and wipes.  Here's where a squirt bottle comes in handy!  Cut up some t-shirts and spray them with water and you've got cheap wipes.