Reverse Angel Wing Fold Tutorial

Alert to bloggers who also cloth diaper!

The cloth diaper industry (businesses and consumers alike) needs to work together to effectively counter a bribed blogger initiative designed to promote disposable diapers through mommy bloggers. This is coming directly from the disposable diaper companies. You may have already started to see these posts on some blogs.

As a reference, you can rely on this little tidbit in the Wall Street Journal in an article called "Big Diaper Makers Square Off" published on April 13, 2009.

"Kimberly-Clark plans to ship free samples of its new diapers to about 500
"mommy bloggers," hoping to build buzz among mothers who write about
child-rearing and their readers. Likewise, P&G is hosting about a dozen
mommy bloggers at its Cincinnati headquarters next week to show how Pampers
diapers are developed."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123957295459311805.html

To counter this campaign and positively elevate cloth diapers in the eyes of your readers, please make a concerted effort to focus your blogs around cloth diapers and related issues in the coming weeks.

Thanks to everyone for your help. Please feel free to reference this post on your own blogs. I'd also recommend using other social media (ie: Twitter) to get the word out quickly...

Have a great Memorial Day weekend! :-)

Why do you cloth diaper?

Cloth diapers are all over the news these days - everything from how easy and convenient they are to use to the fact that they are more cost-effective, better for the environment and safer for our babies' bums than disposables.

It is often said "these aren't your grandma's cloth diapers" and that couldn't be a more accurate statement. Sure, prefolds with a diaper cover resemble the diapers we toddled around in, but with amazing diapering systems out there, like bumGenius, cloth diapering breathes a whole new life.

A recent article at thebigmoney.com focuses on the rise in cloth diapering during the current economic downturn and the increasing awareness of making more environmentally friendly choices. Cloth diapering used to be something for the extreme environmentalist, "cloth diapering has long been a countercultural lifestyle choice, reserved largely for deeply committed environmentalists. It became more popular in the past couple of years as green went from crunchy to hip." It is so exciting to watch cloth diapering edge towards becoming mainstream! (By the way, the article also discusses the success of bumGenius and Cotton Babies - and how it all began!)

So, what do you think? Is it the increasing popularity of the "green" movement, the urgency to look for cost-savings in a struggling economy or just the ease and convenience of cloth diapers - or a combination - that is making the cloth diaper industry boom in a time when business elsewhere is far from booming? Why did you choose cloth diapers?

Post your thoughts (or questions) in the comments and if you are on Twitter, be sure to follow @bumgenius and @cottonbabies.

Learn more about this latest craze, check out Cloth Diaper Basics.

Halting Houdini (or at least slowing down little escape artists)

Some babies never try it. Once their diaper is on, they toddle off to resume their normal activities. But some... you never know in what condition you will find their diaper - or if you will ever find it at all. These little engineers have busy fingers and figure out how to take anything and everything apart.

On of my friends had a child like this. When they put her pajamas on they had to put a safety pin in between each of the snaps or they would find her in the middle of the night, buck naked.

My Lily is one of these. Hook and Loop type diapers, like my bumGenius, were just an invitation to trouble. My first mistake was to leave it uncovered. She sat down after a diaper change one day and figured out how to remove the diaper and the game was ON. Streaking through the house giggling - she knew she had a fabulous new trick.

One easy solution is to have them always in a onesie or other snap crotch outfit. This makes it difficult, but the determined child will not be fooled. They know they can unlatch the diaper through their clothes.

One day while going through some of my sewing notions I remembered I had some 1.5 inch hook-side Aplix from a previous project. I cut about a five inch segment and put it over the diaper the next time I fastened it.

Here is a fastened bumGenius with the Aplix next to it.











And here you see it with the Aplix covering the tabs.

I try to make sure the size is right so that the corners of the Aplix are fastened down around the tabs - so you can see they don't cover the tabs entirely.

While this solution worked very well for a while, Lily did eventually find that, with concentration and work, she could still get those corners up and remove her diaper. But when the diaper is covered in a snap crotch situation, the closure is much flatter and she hasn't been able to get it off under her clothes. This wasn't the perfect solution it seemed to be for a few weeks, but it has slowed her down considerably. With clothes on top, I can be pretty confident that I will find her still diapered after a nap.

Aplix can be found for around $1 per yard, which will give you enough "Diaper Locks" to rotate through several diapers or allow you to cut some in different sizes. The 1.5 inch is the perfect size because it matches the Loop on the bumGenius.

An even easier fix can be to put the diaper on backwards. Again, the more covered up you keep the diaper, the more difficult it will be for your little one to decipher the new trick.

What's your bumGenius story?

I love reading and hearing about all the great adventures in cloth diapering - stories ranging from why you picked bumGenius as your cloth diaper of choice to funny stories involving your daily experiences with cloth diapers.

Here are two blog posts that made me smile:

• A video game dad turned cloth diapering fan. (I'm a sucker for the dads that love their bumGenius!)
• An expectant mother's excitement over her first cloth diaper purchase.

So... what is your bumGenius story? Post in the comments or send me an email at kc.cottonbabies AT gmail DOT com.

A Post-partum Review - Nursing A Newborn

Elsie is now almost three months old. We're finally settling into a routine. She is adjusting well to life outside of my uterus. As we suspected, our first weeks with her home were wonderful but rough as my body went through the initial postpartum period. I'm back to work now and learning how to to do life as a company owner with a nursling.

When I posted about her birth, I promised a review of some of my favorite products for the postpartum time period. I'm finally getting a moment this afternoon to write a review of the nursing products that I used and loved.

When Elsie was four days old, she went to the pediatrician. She was born at 8lbs but had dropped 7lbs 4 ounces at that visit. The pediatrician was concerned and sent us home to come back in two days. Two days later, she had dropped to 6lbs 12 ounces. We were told to supplement... I was heartbroken. I didn't want to give her formula. I've never had a milk supply problem before. It just didn't make sense that I would have a supply problem now. A wonderful friend suggested that I start nursing Elsie on one side while I pump the other side. Then I would feed her what I pumped in a bottle. The theory was that she was getting tired trying to nurse two sides.

So, we rented a Medela Symphony breastpump from the Cotton Babies retail store and I started taking an herbal supplement from Motherlove, More Milk Plus. In less than 48 hours, I'd seen a significant increase in my milk supply. Elsie was nursing one side and happily eating what she wanted from what I was able to pump from the other breast. She started gaining weight and within a week, we were back to having her fully on the breast. The More Milk Plus worked better than the teas and faster than any other herbal galactagogue that I've ever tried.

My nipples were also bleeding due to a couple of nursing sessions where Elsie apparently had a bad latch and I didn't know until she was done doing the damage. When Elsie was a few days old, she had her first chiropractic adjustment. While we were at the chiropractor's office, my friend saw how badly my nipples were bleeding and, on the way home, she stopped at Walgreens and bought me some Soothies absorbent, cooling gel pads. This is a product that I would have laughed at before having Elsie. It's not natural. It isn't organic. It isn't even fabric. By the time we pulled into the Walgreens parking lot, I was at the end of my rope and willing to try anything. I was dissolving into tears at the *thought* of having to nurse my baby because it hurt SO bad. I started wearing them right away while also using Nipple Butter from Earth Mama Angel Baby. Literally overnight, my nipples started feeling better. The next day, the cracks were gone and the bleeding stopped. Because of my experience, we sell Soothies at Cotton Babies now. If you are reliving this experience (and I know so many of you can relate), get buy Soothies. Use them in combination with the Nipple Butter. It works.

Below are my suggestions for helpful nursing products to have on hand before your baby is born:

• Soothies
• Nipple Butter
• Medela Lanolin
• Motherlove More Milk Plus
• Nursing pads
• Phone numbers for places near you that rent Medela breastpumps.
• Phone number for a breastfeeding peer counselor or lactation consultant.
• A good, supportive, experienced friend who can encourage you and provide perspective if things get hard!

Will She Notice?

I posted recently that I have had Lily (19months) in disposables while I navigated the stormy waters of morning sickness. I wondered what she would think when I switched her back.

The first cloth diaper I put on her as a bumGenius. I didn't point it out to her that it was any different than her usual disposable diaper, I just did a matter-of-fact diaper change and sent her on her way. She didn't blink an eye and did not seem to notice a difference in any way.

At the next diaper change, I tried something different. I let her pick. I showed her a plain white disposable diaper and then I asked her if she would rather wear the pretty pink bumGenius. Guess which one my girly-girl picked...

The bumGenius of course.

But she also realized she could remove it easier than the disposable, which was not as good. (But I have a little trick for that and I will share it in a future post.)

Then there was a nausea relapse so we had a few more days of disposables in there and then today I tried her in a bulkier set-up: chinese prefold and Bummi's Super Whisper Wrap. She was a lot less happy with that solution, and yanked at her diaper a bit. I loosened it up around her waist and she was a little happier. I need to remember not to put those on as tight as I put the disposables on. She complained once more in the next five minutes and then forgot all about it and ignored it like any other diaper. I am sure she will get used to it again quickly and hopefully this will help her to start feeling it more when she wets. She wore a couple more of that combination today with no protest at all.

Lower the carbon impact of using cloth diapers!

So, I learned something new recently. According to a recent UK study, we can lower the carbon (ie: environmental) impact of using cloth diapers to 40% less (!) than the carbon impact of using disposable diapers.

You can. Here's how:
1. Wash cloth diapers in temperatures under 140 F / 60 C.
2. Line dry cloth diapers.
3. Use your diapers for a second child.

If you need to know what carbon impact is... here's a quick primer:
Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that affects the ozone layer. Lowering greenhouse gas emissions helps address global warming issues. The goal is to lower the level of CO2 (carbon dioxide) that you produce during your daily activities. Some ways to do this might be driving shorter distances, using a hybrid, walking, controlling your overall energy use, etc. If you want to learn more, its helpful to watch Al Gore's documentary called An Inconvenient Truth.

You get to choose.
Interestingly, as cloth diapering parents, we have the ability to choose the carbon impact of our diapering system. If we use disposable diapers, somebody has already made that choice for us.