Some Great Links to Share

1. I was watching Good Morning America yesterday, and they did a segment on potty training. They cited a statistic from Pediatrics, the American Academy of Pediatrics journal:
In 1962 (i.e. before disposable diapers) 90% of children were out of diapers by age 2.5.
In 1998, 22% of children were out of diapers by age 2.5.
If this isn't a great reason to switch to cloth, I don't know what is! Any moms out there struggling with potty training who think it's too late to be worth switching to cloth should consider this statistic carefully. In case this isn't enough, the Real Diaper Association has compiled a great list of the health, environmental, rash, and cost benefits of using cloth diapers. If you follow this link and read the benefits, you'll see that cloth diapers blow disposables out of the water across the board! The one that really hit me was at the bottom- it says that if every family in the U.S. switched to cloth diapers, the cost savings would be enough to feed every single child under 6 living in poverty in the entire United States for a year and still have money left over. The list is definitely worth reading- check it out!

2. I found this other great website, Celtic Cloths with instructions/patterns and materials available to make your own diapers. They also have free patterns for a changing pad cover, a pouch sling, and a wet bag. I am thinking of ordering some fabric to make cloth wipes and to make some additional inserts for the g-diapers. We seem to run out of pads before covers, and they charge $27 for a pack of 6. We are using disposable wipes right now, but I've heard that once you're using cloth diapers, it's just as easy to switch to cloth wipes and throw them in with your diaper laundry. I'll keep you posted. Any moms who have made cloth wipes, please comment.

3. Zany Zebra Designs has a list of recipes to make your own wipes solution. It sounds like these are especially great for babies with sensitive skin. I think I'll try the Lavender 'N Tea Tree first.

Happy clicking!
Just for fun, here's a picture from our smiley morning today!

The wet bag

Penny and I have started venturing out of the house more. In fact, we've made it a goal to get out at least once each day. If it's over 45 degrees, we can go for a walk, but we're also exploring some inside activities too. Today we had our first Mommy & Me yoga class. Penny loved it! Amy, Lindsay, and Christena, she would make you proud! Look at these poses- is this child a born yogi or what?!

Side note: please ignore that Penny's g-diapers are on backwards in these pictures! Oh sleep deprivation and paying attention to small details like this just don't mix well!

Some of you may be wondering what we do with wet or dirty cloth diapers when we're not at home. Disposables could just as easily go in anyone's garbage, but there isn't a laundry pail when you're out and about. Well, let me introduce the wet bag! This is the set we have, but they come in wide varieties. Essentially, it's a waterproof bag where you can store your wet/dirty diapers until you get home. When you get home, the bag and contents go straight into your laundry pail or washer. Easy peasy! When Penny gets a little older and doesn't need diapers anymore, we can turn them into pool bags for wet swim suits.

Complete Birth Story Album

Follow this link to see pictures of our birth story courtesy of Emily Goodstein Photography:
Penelope Jane Birth Story
You can read my birth story post here

Making Peace

On Thursday I nursed Penny for 13 hours and 20 minutes, and at the end of the day I decided that enough was enough. Over the last 5 weeks, I have tried everything imaginable to get my milk supply up. I did acupuncture. I was taking a dozen different supplements. The strangest dosage instruction I'd ever seen for a supplement was to take enough fenugreek so that my sweat and urine smelled like maple syrup. This turned out to be 16/day for me! I was pumping around the clock. I nursed on demand. Nothing was really working. Short of taking unapproved prescription medication, I had tried everything, as confirmed by 2 different lactation consultants. I was giving every ounce of myself to trying to feed Penny, and it was making us both miserable. She was hungry. We both were exhausted, and we were getting nowhere. So many people told me that it was okay to supplement, that I had done what could do and it was okay to stop trying, but I didn't want to give up. It was my husband who finally got through to me. He said that every ounce of my energy was going into feeding Penny and that she needs more from me than just food. If I could let go of my goal of exclusive breastfeeding, I would have more energy to give to her in other ways, and he was totally right. I decided to make peace with supplementing, and as soon as I made that choice, our lives fell back into place. Penny is full and happy. She's sleeping better and gaining weight like a champ. I learned that part of being a good mom is being flexible. I also learned that so many more moms go through this than you'd think, and it's so important to talk about it so that we don't feel so alone. I am still breastfeeding every 3-4 hours and giving Penny as much breast milk as I can make- she just happens to get a few extra calories from a bottle, and I am finally okay with it. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. I am pretty good at part 2, but I can see that I will need to work on parts 1 & 3. I am working on it, Penny. Stick with me.

Diapering update!

Finally, a blog post about diapering! Penny's umbilical cord finally fell off last week, so we got to start trying out some different cloth diapers. The forerunners so far are g-diapers, prefolds, and fuzzibunz.
G-diapers are probably our favorites so far. They are the trimmest and they have the least amount of cleanup. They are a hybrid type diaper (See What I know about cloth diapers so far). They consist of an outer shell that you only need to change if the insert leaks (or once a day just to be clean), a plastic liner, and a pad:

When the baby goes to the bathroom, you just change out the pad. It is no more difficult or messy than disposables. They also make flushable inserts you could use if you don't want to wash the pads. The con is that these are not one size fits all, so we will have to buy larger sizes as Penny grows ($27 for two pants, $27 for 6 cloth inserts).

FuzziBunz are an all-in-one that are exactly like using disposables. They have adjustable leg openings, so they do fit Penny right now, but they are fully adjustable and should work through toddlerhood. The con is that you have to wash the whole thing every time. They are also the most expensive diaper ($18-$19 each).

Prefolds are also working for her with extra small covers ($17 for 12, $10 for the cover). We will need to buy new covers as she gets bigger, but the diapers will last.
BumGenius are not working for us right now. Penny is too tiny for them, and the legs are not adjustable. They leak out the leg holes.

If you are contemplating making the switch to cloth, I heard about this 21-day trial that sounds like a great option. You pay $150 and get to try several different kinds of diapers to see what you like and what fits. Then you can return what you want and get all but $10 back. Not much to lose there! Jillian's Drawers Cloth Diaper Trial

So far this experiment is highly successful. Cloth is no harder than using disposables. Laundering is super easy- I just dump the diaper pail contents right into the washer and don't even have to touch the dirty diapers. It's 1-2 extra loads/week. It's actually easier for me to take the diapers to the laundry than the dumpster.