My cloth diapering story...it's only the beginning!

This post is part of the Cloth Diapering Bloggers and Dirty Diaper Laundry hosted Cloth Diaper Carnival that is held every month. Many bloggers get together and write about the same topic. This month is “Where did you first hear about/ see cloth diapers?”

I remember my mom telling me how she cloth diapered all 3 of us and how she loved it. She had 3 kiddos in diapers at one point. And she always said how she saved money doing it, but it was a bit of a pain with the rubber pants and pins. And I remember an ongoing family joke of my Aunt Dolores sticking my older brother Adam with a pin when he was about 2 1/2 and her very vivid account of Adam telling my mom that "'lores suck me". So it was something I heard about but just knew the "old fashioned" kind of cloth diapering.

I got gerber prefolds for Sophie as burp cloths and used disposables on her. I was freecycled some cloth diapers and liners, but they stayed in the attic because I said I'd only use them if I was out of "regular" diapers because it was just too much work. And there they sat for almost 2 years.

When Maddy was born 7 weeks early, and had to be in the NICU for 18 days, my world was turned upside down. I wanted to do anything & everything to protect her from the dangers of the world, germs, chemicals, you name it. I was crazy about the hand washing/sanitizing and we didn't go out in public for months. I had heard a few of my babyfit moms mention at some point that they were cloth diapering, so I checked out the cloth diapering mommy team and learned a lot. Then I googled & found green mountain diapers and how cute those babies looked in their prefolded diapers.

I started asking questions and posting status updates on my facebook about cloth diapers. My friend Jessi was SO encouraging as she started using cloth on her two kids and loved it. She posted such great things that I finally decided I needed to try it out. I soured craigslist for some cheap prefolds to try and got 5 dozen GMD plus a few covers and doublers for $40. I put the first prefold on Maddy and she looked adorable, more comfortable and I was hooked!

I started learning more about the benefits, found the savings calculator on diaper pin, and found diaperswappers which has since become a HUGE addiction. I still mainly use prefolds, because of how easy they are to grab and wipe up something, wash and go. I use pockets at night triple stuffed with hemp doublers and also have a few pockets ready for hubby to change her. I have since added fitteds, bamboo, and AI2's, but LOVE cloth diapers for my baby and future child(ren).

I used them during our 10 day vacation thanks to inspiration from upstatemomof3 and LOVE changing Maddy when we're out and about (yes, you read that right. I love to change her. haha). I hope to inspire a conversation with just one lady that might look into cloth diapers. I always make sure to have the super cute ones in my diaper bag! I helped convert 3 of my friends to cloth and they've helped others see the benefits as well. What a great experience this has been so far. And it's only the beginning! Maddy's only 9 months old (well, technically not until tomorrow) and I still have future little Campbell babies to diaper!

I loved how I know this is something wonderful I can do for my baby. Keeping her precious preemie bottom out of chemicals that are linked to cancer, reusing them and saving us money, and keeping unnecessary trash out of landfills to help make her kids' kids' kids planet a bit better...well, that's alright by me! And I love how I got most of my diapers free or cheap as they're used (and therefore, better for the environment than buying new even!). It started my upward trend toward the crunchy side. lol!

I was getting down on myself after I tried SO hard to nurse Maddy w/little luck, taking medications/herbs/water/oatmeal/you name it, pumping all of the time and still ending up with a very low supply and only lasting 2 months before I dried up. I needed something to fill it's place and that's just about the time I decided to cloth diaper. And I haven't looked back since!