First lets start with a little disclaimer: I have never actually cloth diapered a real baby, yet! This is just some of the stuff I’ve learned through the last several months of researching cloth diapering, and I’m going to share it with you. Basically, I want to show you the different types of cloth diapers that are available because I promise you, it’s probably not what you’re picturing! When I started looking into all of this I was amazed at the options available. This is just a very small amount of information, so I encourage you to do some research if this post sparks your interest – and hopefully it does!

Okay lets start out with the cheapest way to cloth diaper your baby – prefolds and covers. Prefolds are pieces of cotton fabric sewn to have extra absorbency in the middle where it’s needed the most. They are called “prefolds” because although they require some folding, they don’t require a lot of folding to get the thickness in the middle, they have been “pre-folded”.  This is probably what you think of when you think of cloth diapers. These types of diapers can be folded and either pinned or snappied, or simply folded in thirds and placed inside a cover. These diapers are not waterproof on their own and require the use of a diaper cover to keep moisture inside. There are tons of choices now for diaper covers. Used to be, back in the good ol days, babies wore ugly plastic pants. Not anymore! Diaper covers have come a very long way since my mother was cloth diapering! I’m going to show you two types of diaper covers. There are many others out there that would require an entire website to tell you about!

These are prefolds. You can get prefolds for around $20-$30 per dozen depending on the size and if you choose organic or non-organic.

These are two different types of diaper covers both from Thirsties.

The first is a sized cover (about $10.95 each) which can give you a better fit, but you have to buy more covers as your baby outgrows each size. The second is a one size diaper cover (about $12.25 each). These have snaps that adjust to the size of your baby and will fit most babies from birth to potty training! Like I said before, these are just two options available, there are plenty of others that vary greatly in price. I’ve been told, and have read, depending on how much laundry you want to do you can get by with about 2 dozen prefolds and 6-8 covers. These two particular covers can be wiped clean between diaper changes and reused before being put in the laundry (because if you’re changing often enough they will only get a very small amount of moisture on them, if any at all).

Prefolds and covers is the system I plan on using the majority of the time. After lots of research, these are the covers (I’ve chosen the one size) that I’m going to try first. I also have my eye on some other “fancier” covers but that’s a whole different blog post all together!

Next is fitted diapers and covers. Personally, I don’t see the point in these other than they can come in come really cute prints (and I’ll admit… some of them are very tempting!) and they are super simple to use, but they still require a cover. So that really cute $35 fitted diaper you paid for is just going to get covered up! But, there are plenty of people out there that swear by fitteds. They also vary greatly in price. Basically these go on just like a disposable diaper. No pinning, no folding. Then you simply put on any diaper cover. Very daddy and babysitter friendly! The one below is also from Thirsties and runs about $13.95 each, although I’ve heard rumor this particular one from this company is being discontinued. But that only means something better will replace it!

Now we move on to some really fun stuff – pocket diapers! How a pocket diaper works is like this – you have the “shell” which is waterproof and has a “pocket” on the inside for you to stuff a cloth insert or a tri-folded prefold. After stuffing the diaper, you simply put it on baby the same way as a disposable. You can pre-stuff your diapers after washing so all you need to do is grab one and put it on your lil punkin’ making this a very daddy and babysitter friendly option as well. They can come in either sized or one size. The one size option has snaps that adjust to fit your baby from birth to toddler. Lots of people swear by pocket diapers, and I can definitely see why. For myself personally, I don’t like the sound of this option for a couple of reasons. First of all there are many different brands of pocket diapers and many different price ranges. This particular diaper I’m showing you is from BumGenius and will run you about $17.95 per diaper. Depending on how often you want to do laundry, you will need about 12-24 or more of this type of diaper. Second, you have to stuff the diaper. Stuffing diapers doesn’t sound like something I want to spend a lot of time doing. There are a lot of great things about this type of diaper though, and it’s completely a personal decision! Much like almost anything when it comes to parenting.

Next up is the all in one diaper, commonly called AIO Diapers. This is exactly what it sounds like, it’s all in one! No folding, no pinning, no stuffing. Everything is all sewn together. Just put it on your munchkin the same as a disposable and you’re ready to go! Obviously these are probably the most daddy and babysitter friendly. Again there are many different brands and price ranges. The one below is from BumGenius and will run you about $24.95 each. These also come in sized or one size. You would need the same amount of these diapers as you would the pocket diapers, making this the most expensive cloth diapering option. But if you want convenience, this is your best bet. Although I have heard they take quite a while to dry. That’s the only complaint I’ve seen on these other than the price.

Finally we have what is called hybrid diapers. I haven’t looked into these much myself, but they are out there if you are interested. Basically a hybrid diaper is a diaper cover with a disposable insert. So, you’re still throwing some kind of diaper waste away, but the disposable liners are supposedly more land fill friendly than typical disposable diapers. You can also buy the hybrid diaper covers and use cloth inserts, and I’ve heard lots of good things about the covers that are intended for hybrid systems.

So there you have it. This is the very basic cast of characters in the cloth diapering world! You will find many different brands, prices, etc but all diapers are going to fit into one of these categories I’ve outlined above. Allow me to answer a couple of questions you might have after reading this. Maybe you’re wondering if cloth diapers would really save you money? If you go all out on the most expensive options, then it might not. But if you stick to the tried and true basics, it most definitely will!!! It’s all a personal preference, and when you do the math, in most cases cloth diapering could save you hundreds of dollars. Not to mention that cloth diapers an be reused for future babies! Double the savings! You also might be wondering, what do you do with the poop? Contrary to what you have heard, you do not have to dunk a diaper in the toilet to get the waste off. There is a fantastic thing called a diaper sprayer that you can hook to the water line of your toilet and simply rinse the diaper off before putting it in the diaper pail. Then it’s off to the wash! After baby is eating solids it’s even easier to discard waste. So don’t be thinking it’s all super nasty, because really it doesn’t have to be.

Alright well there ya go! I might do a few more posts on cloth diapering before my little man arrives. I have so much information packed into my brain about cloth diapering it’s ridiculous. And even more ridiculous is how excited I am to cloth diaper! Who would have thought you could be excited about diapering?! If you aren’t convinced to use cloth diapers just by the savings and the impact on the environment, consider how completely adorable a baby looks in a nice cloth diaper as opposed to paper pants!

AWWWWWWWWWWW!

*All images are copyright to their respective owners. I found all these images through google image search.*

P.S. Jillians Drawers is my favorite online store because of their variety and prices. And feel free to buy us some diapers if you’re feeling generous.

Posted at 12:19 am | Filed Under Baby #3, General, Parenting Twins | 3 Comments

TEN weeks left until our baby boy is here. I suppose it could technically be less than that… but definitely no more than that! Do you realize people, that is like NOTHING. TEN WEEKS. I can’t remember if I mentioned it (pregnancy brain) but I decided to go with the repeat c-section. It was a very hard decision to make, but that’s what I decided. So, little Mr. Preston Caid or Preston Wyatt will be here on (or before) October 7th! Which means I’m spending my 26th birthday (October 9th) in the hospital. What a great birthday present, a new baby boy! The c-section is scheduled for 7:30am but I have to be at the hospital at 5:30am, which means, I’m getting up really early if I even end up sleeping at all. We live 60 miles from my OB and the hospital, so I’m getting up at oh…. 3am? BLEH. Actually Preston mentioned staying in a hotel the night before so we don’t have to get up so early, so maybe we’ll do that. I’m so excited, my Mommy is going to come down for the delivery!

And can I just tell you that for some reason I am leaning toward Caid. We’ll see when he gets here, but lately he just “feels like” a Caid. Which is funny because when Preston told me the name Caid the first thing I said was, “You mean like, Medicaid?”. But it’s grown on me and I really like it.

We made our very first baby purchases yesterday. I’m amazed that I’ve gone this long without spending a single dime on baby stuff! When I was pregnant with the girls, I started shopping the day I found out they were girls! I guess when you’re a brand new mom you go overboard. This time I’m definitely not going overboard, there are several things I learned the first time around that I don’t really need. I know for a fact that the girls didn’t even get a chance to wear half the clothes I bought them in the first few months. And can I just say that I think baby bath tubs are completely worthless? Oh and wipe warmers, and bottle warmers. I used to really dread bathing the girls because the baby bath tub felt so limiting, and I really sucked at bathing them in that thing. Bath time was very frustrating. That was until Preston’s sister told me to fold up a towel and put it on the floor of the tub, add a tiny bit of water and lay the baby on the towel. GENIUS! It worked perfect, especially since the bath tub is ever so slightly sloped. And when I started that bath times became simple and fun. Oh and to each there own – no offense here – but you will never catch me bathing my baby in my kitchen sink.

Anyway, we got several outfits for little mister. Poor Preston had to hear, “Awww that’s so cute!” all day long. Emma and Ava said that probably 624 times each yesterday while we were shopping. Miss Ashton found two super adorable outfits on a clearance rack that I didn’t even see. That girl is a good bargain shopper! She’s officially my new shopping buddy. I better get a move on with baby shopping because time is running out! I’ve been putting it off because I don’t have anywhere to put all his stuff yet, and I don’t want it just sitting around in my bedroom, it has to have a place. I guess I’m odd like that. But, we are making progress with removing the texturing on the walls up here so his room will be coming together in the next few weeks. Oh and by the way, sanding all this awful texture off might be “easy” (as in, it comes off pretty easy considering) but it’s tedious and time consuming, and frustrating. I’d like to write the previous owners of this house a strongly worded letter about their ridiculous choice of wall texture.

Anyway, time for dinner which means I’m doomed for heart burn the rest of the night. No matter what I eat, never fails. It’s coming up to the “really not so fun anymore” stretch of pregnancy. But hey, it’s worth it!

P.S. I know I said my next post would be a continuation of cloth diapering, I’m working on that one. Check back!

Posted at 6:14 pm | Filed Under Baby #3 | 2 Comments

So, the other theme wasn’t working out. It wasn’t clean enough, I love clean, I have to have clean. I did this in about a hour and a half so if you find anything funky and not working, kindly let me know. Goodnight!

Posted at 1:08 am | Filed Under Site Related | 7 Comments

I’ve never really been the person that buys into all the “we’re destroying the earth!” hype. You know, like global warming. Things like that. I do however know that we could do some things a lot better when it comes to using resources and treating the earth in the best way possible. I like to be “green” to a degree, but I’m not a fanatic about it, know what I mean?

One of the most horrific moments of my life was the time Preston took me to a landfill. We were moving and had too much moving type trash/junk to leave for our local pickup, so we took it to the landfill. Until that day, I’ll admit I was naive and thought that you threw away trash and then that’s it. It’s gone. I mean, I knew it went somewhere, such as a landfill, but I didn’t really put much thought into it. Who really sits around thinking about where all the trash goes once the trash truck picks it up? You know it goes somewhere, but you never actually see it again. And if you do happen to see the “public friendly” side of a landfill, it most likely resembles happy rolling hills of beautiful green grass. At least, that’s what the landfill I grew up near looked like.

So we went to the landfill to drop of this stuff. We passed by happy rolling green hills and I figured this wasn’t going to be so bad. Oh no, it was bad. It wasn’t like you just stop by and hand junk off to some workers and be on your way. No, we actually had to back our truck up to this HUMONGOUS mountain of trash that was being moved and smashed all around by several of these bulldozer type things. Do you know how big a bulldozer is? Okay well they looked like tiny match box trucks on top of a huge mountain. And the trucks were covered in trash. I don’t even really know how the guys got in and out of them with all the trash packed into the sides. And who would even voluntarily take a job like that anyway? EW. To make the scene even more wonderful, this huge mountain of trash was covered by thousands of seagulls. I sat in the truck staring at mountains of trash as far as I could see while Preston and couple of guys added our junk to the pile. I was in complete shock.

I was in complete shock because it was a huge wake up call for me. I don’t think I can even accurately describe how awful this was, but all I could think about was that this was one landfill, in one town and it had that much trash. Think about how many people there are, how many towns and cities there are, how many landfills there are.

This really does have something to do with cloth diapers.

Think about how many diapers the average baby goes through before they are potty trained. I really had no clue how many diapers that was until I had TWO babies. I think one would have gotten the picture across to me but two definitely drilled it into my head that babies require a lot of diapers. Despite my landfill horror, I used disposable diapers with my twins anyway because really I didn’t know any better at the time, I was a new mom and you use disposable diapers, that’s just what you do, right? Cloth diapers were some foreign old school thing that was disgusting and probably didn’t have any better of an impact on the environment than disposables, considering how much water and such it would take to clean the cloth diapers, etc. Well, I was wrong. Very, very, very, wrong!

Not only will you save a significant amount of money using cloth diapers (the proof is in the math), it’s far, far better for the environment. Did you know, the average baby is in disposable diapers for two to three years and uses between 8,000 to 10,000 diapers before they are potty trained? Now think about this, taken from diapernet.org:

An estimated 18 billion single-use diapers are thrown in landfills each year, taking as many as 500 years to decompose, and commonly contain raw, untreated sewage. Disposable diapers make up the third largest source of solid waste in landfills, after newspapers and food and beverage containers. It takes upwards of 82,000 tons of plastic and 1.3 million tons of wood pulp, or a quarter-million trees, to manufacture the disposable diapers that cover the bottoms of 90 percent of the babies born in the US.

The negative impact of single-use diapers on the environment goes far beyond the disposal problem. A study prepared by The Landbank Consultancy for The Women’s Environmental Network shows that single-use diapers use 3.5 times as much energy, 8 times as much non-regenerable raw materials, and 90 times as much renewable material as cloth diapers.

If disposable diapers make up the third largest source of solid waste in landfills, imagine how much of an impact could be made if everyone used cloth diapers. Not to mention the first two largest sources of solid waste are newspapers and beverage containers – both of which are recyclable!!! It really is just disgusting and mind blowing, and completely depressing.

So, we’re using cloth diapers this time around. And I would encourage any expecting parents or even parents of children still in diapers, to consider making the switch to cloth diapers. Even with the increase in laundry, which equals a very small increase in water usage/cost, it can save you thousands of dollars. You have to foot the bill up front for cloth diapers, but then you never have to worry about buying diapers again and you can rest easy know that you’re making a big impact on the environment, not to mention you’ll never have to make a late night diaper run again, or budget the cost of diapers into your monthly expenses!

Cloth diapers have come a long way since the cloth diapering days your grandma remembers. There are so many great options out there that range from extremely inexpensive to expensive. If cost isn’t an issue for you, there are some awesome diapers out there now that go on just the same as a disposable, but don’t end up in the landfill for the next 500 years or so. And if cost is a concern for you, as it is for me – I love to save money – there are some very inexpensive options that work just as well and are actually super easy to use!

And guess what? I’m going to tell you all about the different types of cloth diapers in my next blog post. It’s become somewhat of an obsession of mine. Just ask my husband. Speaking of husband, I have a movie date with him soooo… stay tuned for more useful information on cloth diapers next time!

Posted at 10:40 pm | Filed Under Baby #3, General, Parenting Twins | 4 Comments

When we found out we were having a boy, I told Preston he could choose the theme for the nursery. I already knew what he would pick – airplanes. It’s been difficult to find crib bedding with an airplane theme, but just the other day I found this fantastic set at Target. It’s absolutely perfect. I was going to have my mom make our crib bedding because I couldn’t find anything I liked, but after I found this and saw the great price ($99 for the 4 piece set!), I couldn’t pass it up. Having to buy the fabric for the bedding would have been at least twice the price of this set. The furniture is going to be a dark color like in this photo also.

I don’t prefer “busy” rooms so the rest of the room is going to be calm and relaxing. We’re thinking of something like this for the walls:

I can’t wait to get started! We have been going back and forth on which area of the house to start on first. We had originally decided to start down stairs with the master bedroom and then the living room, but we’ve since decided it would be better to finish out the upstairs first since this is where we spend most of our time, and the kids will be spending most of their time as well. That way we can work slowly on the downstairs which needs the most work. The people who were here before us did an awful texturing job on the walls up here, I can’t even describe it… they just took a ton of joint compound and a putty knife and made these wavy things all over. It’s odd. And they did this texture on the entire upstairs, minus one of the bedrooms. I guess they decided to do “regular” texturing in that room for some reason. So we are going to sand the texture down and re-texture the entire upstairs. Preston assures me that sanding joint compound down is “easy”. Then we are going to repaint, add trim and moulding, etc. Right now the living room and hall way walls are an awkward gray-ish color and the biggest room is a weird gray-blue. The bathroom is sky blue and the room the girls are in, which will be the baby’s room, is purple. And then there’s the other bedroom that has no texture or paint yet. So I guess they didn’t do the “entire” upstairs all crappy like this. Luckily that is a cheap starting point since Preston already has all the tools needed to texture and redo the walls. It’s just a matter of doing it, which I’m not looking forward to. In the largest room upstairs (what we are in now, but will be the girls bedroom very soon) they even did this awful texture on the ceiling. That should be interesting to sand down.

I’m hoping we will get started on the walls this weekend… stay tuned for before and after photos!

Posted at 10:31 pm | Filed Under Baby #3, Our House | 1 Comments

I had my 28 week checkup today – everything is still looking great! I’m starting to have checkups every two weeks now, which makes me realize I’m reaching the end of my pregnancy already! It’s going by so fast, I can’t imagine what these next 11 weeks are going to be like. It feels like only a couple of weeks ago I told Preston that I was pregnant again…

He was at school and I was supposed to be leaving to pick him up. I couldn’t remember when my period was supposed to be due… it seemed like it should be coming any day. We had been trying to get pregnant several months prior but it never happened, so we decided to quit trying since I wanted to remain in school full time anyway, it probably wouldn’t be the best timing. It’s funny how things work out when you stop trying to be the one in control of everything. I took a pregnancy test on a whim, because they’re fun (yes, I’m weird) and to my shock it was actually positive. I wasn’t even going to hang around long enough to see the test result but it came up so fast it was pretty hard to not see it! Preston was definitely as surprised as I was, but we were both very excited and happy about the news. Since it was such a surprise, I probably should have told him a little easier… I sent him a text saying “I’m pregnant”. LOL Poor guy.

It’s been interesting so far how different things are with a subsequent pregnancy. Not only because of the fact that it’s not twins this time, but because I actually know what I’m doing and what to expect this time. It does take some of the excitement away because nothing seems all that “new”, it’s more like “been there, done that”. I think the biggest difference this time around is that I can feel this baby move so much more than I ever felt the girls. Way more. It’s not surprising since the girls were so squished. I absolutely love laying in bed at night and in the mornings with Preston while we feel and watch our baby boy move all around. His kicks are so strong! We joke that he’s in there training to be a cage fighter. Just the other day I felt his hiccups for the first time.

We are both so anxious to have him here already, but we’re also not ready yet. I’ve been trying to imagine what it will be like having him here with us… and it’s hard to picture. I’m so used to it being me and Preston, and the girls (who I still usually refer to as “the babies” even though they are so not babies anymore ). I’m finding myself thinking about how much I absolutely love my girls, so much so that I can’t even explain it, and I often wonder how I’m going to love another child as much as I love them. I know I will, but it’s so weird to think about, how can you love so much? I guess that’s just how we are created. Then I go on to thinking about how completely amazing it is that we made these precious little girls and it’s so fascinating to watch them grow and develop into their own little personalities. I can’t wait to see what our little boy is like. Preston has always wanted a boy so badly, it’s unexplainable how it feels to have taken part in giving him something like this that he’s always wanted. I can’t wait to see how he is with his son. He’s the most amazing father to the girls, and I know that sounds cliche but it’s true, he is. I couldn’t have asked for a better Daddy or Hubby.

In addition to all the lovey-dovey feelings, I do have my freak out moments where I think what the heck did I get myself into?!!? TWO three year olds, a new born, a house, a husband, AND college full time? Forget about me time, I won’t even know what that is. I must be freaking insane. But, I know we’ll make it just fine, more than fine. Thank God for technology allowing me to take classes online. School would be out the window this semester if that weren’t an option. I’m planning on using some of my left over financial aid to purchase a lap top so I don’t have to be confined to my desk all the time. I really think that will help maintain my sanity. Or not. We’ll find out won’t we?!

Posted at 10:29 pm | Filed Under Baby #3, Daily Life, Family | 2 Comments

Hi, I’m alive and well. Here’s some random things for you today:

1. I’ve become obsessed with cloth diapers. More on this later…
2. No matter how many Fritos I eat, I’m still craving Fritos.
3. Little Preston is getting so big, he gets into practicing his cage fighting skills about 5 times a day and it looks like he’s going to kick right out of my belly! The girls were never this active! I guess probably because they were so cramped.
4. It’s been raining for days but I want it to rain more. I love the rain.
5. The girls are potty trained! YEEEEHAW!!!! They still wear a pull up at night, but hey that doesn’t count!
6. The girls favorite thing to say right now is “Hey Mommy….” over and over.
7. I’m starting a new website. It’s top secret right now.
8. I’m obsessed with Frontierville on Facebook.

Okay well, more later. I think I’m going to work on a new wordpress theme tonight because this one is feeling quite old. And I’d like to say that I’m going to post in my blog more often but you never know. I know you miss me though, right???

EDIT: Wow look a new theme!

Posted at 7:40 pm | Filed Under Daily Life | 4 Comments