Where do you you keep your diaper pail and, um…”stuff”?

Nov 4,2010 / By Maria / 12 Comments

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We spend the majority of our time downstairs and consequently, that’s where I change most of my son’s diapers. Our half bath is pretty stark, and I’ve been looking for some wall art or something ever since we moved here. More recently, I’ve been looking at bathroom furniture.

When I change a dirty diaper, I clean it out in the bathroom, then take it to the laundry room (also on the first floor) and store it in my Planet Wise large hanging wet bag. Really, this works for us, but I wish I had some storage space in the bathroom.

The bathroom just has a toilet and pedestal sink, so there’s nowhere to put anything really. My apologies in advance for “too much information” but after more than two years, my “monthly cycle” has returned, and I’m left running upstairs and back down every time I need to “take care of business.”

I really want to try Mama Cloth (don’t point and laugh and call me a sposie user, even though I deserve it!!) but this is the bathroom that my kids, husband, as well as any guests use. I thought about putting a wet bag in here for diapers, but I don’t really have anywhere to put/hang it. I’d love to have a cabinet that goes over the toilet, which would not only fill the empty space and make the room seem cozier, but give me a place to put stuff. I don’t know that I really want to leave a small wet bag for used mama cloth, or clean mama cloth just laying on the floor.

Not only that, but it would give me a place to hang another wet bag for diapers, a place to store a scraper for dirties (I know, I know, I need to buy a sprayer!) and a place for air freshener and spare TP. I’ve been left stranded with an empty tube more than once!

How about you? Do you have a diaper pail or wet bag in the bathroom? If you use mama cloth, where do you keep your stuff?

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Uncategorized

Ever wished you could throw a diaper away?

Nov 3,2010 / By Maria / 15 Comments

>To attempt to make a long(er) story short(er), a few weeks ago, I was totally there. My son had been drinking some juice (side note: before you worry that your child’s dark urine is because of dehydration or a UTI, remember the red food coloring he managed to ingest a few days earlier.)

I was standing over the toilet, diaper in one hand, toilet paper in the other, attempting to scrape the massive, ahem, deposit off of the diaper. Just for a second, my eyes glazed over, and I drifted away…

I was spinning through a field of daisies, pack of disposables in my arms, “So Happy Together” playing in the background. With a smug smile on my face, I tossed the offending diaper in the pail.

Then, the record screeched, and I remembered what it was really like to use disposables. Remember that we used disposable diapers/pull-ups on my daughter for almost 2 1/2 years, and on my son for about 4 months. The terms “fitteds and pockets and snappis” weren’t in my diaper vocabulary, but “blowout” sure was.

We have one single photo of my daughter in her cute baptism gown, and in the photo, my husband is holding her with a horrified look on his face, since the blowout was in process at that very moment. Even when the diapers were on properly, and in the proper size, blowouts were a regular occurrence.

Much of the time, it came right out the back of the diaper, while the diaper itself remained relatively unscathed. I looked down at the diaper in my hand, covered with poop from front to back and side to side, nearly to the edges of the elastic and I knew. I knew there was no way this would have stayed in a disposable diaper.

I may be scraping and washing this diaper, but if it had been a disposable, I would instead be washing a shirt, pants, socks, probably my clothing, any surface nearby, the changing pad, and quite possibly, giving the kid a bath. I saw a post in the cafemom babies group where a Mom cut a onesie off of her daughter after a blowout, knowing there was no way to get it off of her without making a bigger mess!

With cloth, I had one incident where I didn’t have the diaper snug around his leg and breastfed baby poop came out of the leg gap, but other than that, no blowouts. So, yeah. I gladly washed that diaper! I think having used disposables in the past makes me appreciate cloth more!

Aside from the occasional horrifying story of the forgotten poopy cloth diaper that was beyond saving, have you ever wished you could pitch a diaper?

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Abby’s Lane Winner!

Nov 3,2010 / By Maria / No Comment

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120 people entered, with 275 entries. I made a boo-boo and didn’t check the box to make the “favorite item” a mandatory entry on the form. I didn’t even notice since all of you followed my instructions and filled it out! Two 11th hour entries left it blank, which is what made me realize my error. Since it was my mistake, I let it slide. Oops!

Anyway, the winning entry is #74, which is Suki Lotti. Congratulations Suki, I’m emailing you now!

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Mailbox Mondays

Mailbox Mondays 11/1/10

Nov 1,2010 / By Maria / 4 Comments

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Every Monday I will answer user submitted questions. They don’t have to be about cloth diapering! I’ll always answer questions via email, but if you would like your question to be answered in a Mailbox Mondays post, send an email with the subject “Mailbox Mondays” to Maria at change-diapers dot com.

Courtney says:

Hello Maria!

I have a diaper cleaning question. Our diaper sprayer recently broke. Until we can build a new one, I need to find a new way to clean poopy diapers. What is your method? Do you have any pointers? My son is 11 months old, so there is no way we can throw them in the wash without rinsing first!

Thanks!
Courtney

I never got around to buying a diaper sprayer, so I’m all too familiar with this conundrum. When my son first started solids, I was able to get away with just throwing them right into the wash. If they needed a little extra help (still mostly breastmilk poop) I was rinsing them with my laundry room/utility sink sprayer. Then for a few months there, I was able to flip the poop right into the potty. Boy was that nice!

Now here’s where this question gets a little gross. I apologize in advance, there’s just no way to avoid a little grossness with this subject! He went through the stage of the “peanut butter” consistency poop, and now that he’s eating tons of fruit and drinking some juice, diapers are much more messy and I can’t just flip solids off the diaper.

What I do is use 3 or 4 sheets of toilet paper folded up to scrape off as much as I can, then whatever is left goes into the washing machine. I’ve heard of several other similar methods, where people may use a clean popsicle stick or plastic card (great use for the old Blockbuster card if you still have one!) to scrape the diaper. Just keep it in a plastic bag out of sight, perhaps behind the toilet, or under your tissue box if you keep one on top of the tank like I do.

Some people still do the ol’ dunk and swish in the toilet, I’ve even heard of people flushing with the diaper in the toilet (hold on to it tightly!) to take advantage of the self-swish.

I’ve heard more than a few say they just rinse the diapers in the sink or the bathtub (a hand held shower head would be especially handy) and then wiping out the tub/sink with bleach etc. This would be a pain if you have a frequent pooper, but might be handy if you have a child who poops like clockwork once per day.

How about the rest of you? Do you use a diaper sprayer? If not, how you handle the poop?

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