Posts from — September 2009

Did you know you can use gDiaper inserts with cloth diaper covers?  Since my daughter never seems very comfortable in her gPants (the gDiaper cover), I recently decided to try the disposable gDiaper insert (gRefill) with a Bummis PUL cover.  It worked great and my daughter did not try to remove the diaper like she does her gDiapers.  So, whenever I’ll need to use a disposable I’ll probably use a gRefill with a cloth diaper cover such as Bummis or Thirsties.  I haven’t tried it with wool and fleece covers, but I assume it’ll work just as well.  I do wonder though, what the wool and fleece covers might absorb from the gRefill.

I tried the gRefill with a Bummis cover at night as well and it worked great.  I did use a wide Zorb doubler along with the gRefill because I’ve heard one gDiaper insert is not enough for night-time – whoever said it was right because the doubler was quite wet in the morning.  I could have used two gRefills, but that would create extra waste which I’m not comfortable with.

I ended up using the refills with a PUL cover two nights in a row because we’ve had a hard time getting rid of my daughter’s yeast rash.  Usually, I use bamboo fleece fitteds with wool covers, even when my daughter has rashes.  If she does have a rash, it usually heals quickly thanks to the fitteds and wool, but this rash has been really stubborn.  I wonder if potty training had something to do with it since she hasn’t been wearing very absorbent diapers anymore.  Anyway, I decided to try disposable diapers because I wanted my daughter to be as dry as possible between changes since as you probably know, yeast loves moisture.  Well, it turns out disposables do not help heal yeast rashes, the rashes stay the same or get worse.  So, the next thing I decided to try was the gRefill with a PUL cover that has been neglected for at least a couple of months.  I was happy to discover that her rash did look better in the morning.  I suspect the gRefill and cloth diaper combination is more breathable than a disposable diaper which sped up the healing process.

So, if you do like gRefills, but not the gPants, you can get out your PUL covers and start using those with the disposable refills whenever you can’t (or don’t want to) use a cloth diaper.

Most of you have probably heard by now of the Indonesian woman who gave birth to a 19.2 lb baby.  For those of you out there who are more familiar with kilograms, that’s 8.7 kg!  My daughter was 9 lbs and 4 oz at birth which I thought was quite a bit, but not anymore.  I’ve heard of newborns 10-13 lbs at birth, but I never imagined a human was capable of giving birth to a baby bigger than that.

I’m just really surprised that this woman didn’t have the baby earlier especially since she had diabetes.  I suspect she would’ve had the baby quite a bit earlier if she was living in Canada.  Most doctors here probably would’ve been freaking out if they saw a pregnant woman that big.

Want to know more? You can read the complete story here.

Last week, I decided to try the Nature Clean detergent for washing my daughter’s diapers.  I usually use soapnuts, but I really wanted to find something that I could just throw in and forget about until the wash was done.  I chose Nature Clean because it had been recommended to me by some cloth diapering  moms and because it’s available in my supermarket store.  Well, things didn’t go too well.  My daughter got a diaper rash due to detergent residue which eventually turned into a yeast rash.  I wasn’t impressed, to say the least.

When my daughter was a couple months old, I discovered that most diaper rash creams do not work on yeast rashes.  An anti-fungal cream, which you can get without a prescription in any pharmacy, works well.  I prefer to use natural creams though.  So, this time I used the Substance Nappy Rash Ointment and an Antimicrobial Salve that I just got recently from a wonderful lady at Wildroot Botanicals.  By themselves, the rash ointments didn’t work very well, that’s why I added the antimicrobial salve.  Besides using the creams, I would also use bamboo fleece fitted diapers with or without a wool cover.  I’m happy to say that the rash was almost completely gone within 24 hours!

How have you dealt with diaper rashes?  Do you have any “secret” remedies that you’d like to share?

Northern Baby Fitted Diapers (v. 2)

When my daughter was born we had a package of Pampers Swaddlers ready, and we thought we’d be using disposable diapers until she was potty trained.  We had a couple of packages of cloth diapers, but they were too big for my daughter for the first month or two.  Also, because I didn’t know anything about modern cloth diapers, I wasn’t in a hurry to use them.  I’ve heard some horror stories from my mom about cloth diapering, so I didn’t think I’d ever want to do it.  I later found out that modern diapers are not the same as what my mom used on my sister and me when we were babies.

So, we used disposable diapers for a couple of months until I couldn’t handle the rashes anymore.  My daughter was a lot more sensitive to the chemicals in disposable diapers than my friends’ babies, and there was no cream that would prevent the rashes from coming back every few days.  The constant rashes led me to do some online research.  After reading about the chemicals in disposable diapers, I decided to give cloth diapers a try.  Even though the diapers we had weren’t amazing, I kept using them.  Thanks to more online research, I found out about bumGenius diapers and just had to try one.  Thanks to the bumGenius diaper, I actually enjoyed changing my daughter – a task that I’ve always hated before.  Also, the rashes weren’t as frequent anymore which made me want to stick with cloth diapering.  So, I decided to buy 6 more bumGenius diapers.

Even though my daughter had fewer diaper rashes, she still had some from time to time.  One day while doing more online research on cloth diapers, I discovered that some babies can be sensitive to synthetic fibres.  I knew that the bumGenius pocket diapers had a synthetic lining, so I decided to look for diapers made with natural fibres.  The diapers I decided to purchase next included an AMP hemp fitted diaper, a Sugar Peas hemp fitted diaper and six unbleached Indian cotton prefolds.  I couldn’t believe how fast my daughter’s rashes went away and stayed away after I started using those diapers.

In the first couple of months, I also learned which detergents to use and which not to use with cloth diapers.  However, I still run into detergent issues many months later.  Whenever I use a different washer or want to try a new cloth diaper detergent, I’m running into some issues.  The one thing that’s never given my daughter rashes is soapnuts.  To find out more about the soapnuts I use, please visit the Superior Soapnuts website or the Eco Bebe Boutique.

Today, most of my daughter’s diapers have been made by me.  I’ve tried a lot of other diapers, but there was always something about each diaper that was bothering me.  It took me many months to perfect my diaper pattern, and since I’m a bit of a perfectionist, I’m still not 100% satisfied with it and probably never will.

I’ve never regretted switching to cloth diapers even when the poops got more stinky and detergents almost drove me insane.  To find out exactly why I’ve stuck with cloth diapering, please read one of my previous posts titled, “Things I Love About Cloth Diapers“, if you haven’t already done so.

Before we switched to cloth diapers, my daughter was getting a lot of diaper rashes.  After doing some research on diaper rash creams, I decided to try some natural ones.  Since my daughter had at least a couple of yeast diaper rashes, I decided to try the Motherlove Diaper Rash & Thrush Relief cream.  It was an expensive cream, but it did work well for us.  Once the cream was gone, I decided to go with something a little more readily available.

The diaper rash cream I decided to try next is made by Lunar Eclipse and is available in Loblaws-owned supermarket stores.  It’s the cream I still use from time to time.  It’s not the cheapest diaper rash cream, but you shouldn’t be using a lot of it.  If you find that you do need to use diaper rash creams a lot then something’s definitely not right.  I would either try a different detergent (if using cloth diapers) or a different diaper.  Some rashes that do not want to go away might be something more serious, so please check with your doctor.

Other natural diaper rash creams I’ve used:

• Weleda diaper cream
  It’s not an amazing cream but I still use it from time to time – as a natural sunscreen.  It contains zinc oxide which isn’t recommended for cloth diapers.
• Substance Nappy Rash Ointment
  It smells a little strong because of the essential oil used.  It contains myrrh which is good for yeast rashes.
• Budger Baby Balm
  Quite a strong smell because of the essential oil used.  A little too runny in my opinion.  Might be great for massaging though.

If you need to use something everyday to prevent and protect from rashes, I would recommend using organic extra virgin olive oil and/or organic coconut oil.  Extra virgin olive oil has anti-inflammatory properties and coconut oil is anti-microbial which might be great for killing that stubborn yeast responsible for quite a few diaper rashes.

If you’re wondering why I haven’t been making cloth diapers for sale anymore, you’re not the only one.  I’ve had a lot of wonderful customers contact me asking when I’m going to start making cloth diapers for sale again.  Those of you, who know me in person, know how passionate I am about cloth diapers.  I can talk about cloth diapers and anything related to cloth diapers for hours.  However, when it comes to making them, I prefer to design them rather than to sew them.  I’m always curious about the design of a diaper and will constantly come up with prototypes. Maybe it’s the engineer in me that always wants to know how something works and how it can be improved.

Another reason for wanting to leave diaper making behind is that I miss the field of technology a bit.  I miss some of the challenges I was faced with on a daily basis. Before I became a mother, I was a Software Engineer, so the jump from designing ATM software to designing cloth diapers was a bit much for me. The truth is, I miss working with software.

Most of all, I do not want to make diapers for sale anymore because I want to spend more time with my daughter.  I already missed a lot of valuable time with her because of the crazy amount of hours I had to work.  The past year has gone by in a flash and I find myself wishing I had taken more time to play and relax with her.

So these are the reasons why, and I hope you understand…

I’ve been asked a couple of times where I got my “free” eco diaper trial pack.  Well, I got it at ecobotts, a family owned and operated company in Vancouver, BC.  The trial pack is free, but they do ask that you pay the $2 shipping fee though.

I chose the “Mixed Pack” and got one Moltex and one Nature Babycare diaper in my mail a week or so later.

Today, whenever my daughter has a dirty diaper, I take her to the bathtub and wash her bum well.  Not too long ago though, I used to use cloth wipes and my own cloth wipe solution almost at every diaper change.  The recipe I used for making the wipe solution is as follows:

3-4 cups of boiled water (cooled)
3-4 Tbsp of organic extra virgin olive oil (I like to use quite a lot of it, but you don’t have to.)
1/2 tsp (or less) of baby wash (I use an unscented one by Little Twig.  It’s good for babies with sensitive skin.  Also, the ingredients are supposed to be organic .)
2 drops of tea tree oil (I didn’t always add it, but I think it prevents the solution from going bad too quickly and tea tree is antimicrobial so it might help with diaper rashes.  However, be careful with this one since I’ve heard that some babies can be a bit sensitive to some essential oils.)

Organic Bamboo Velour and Cotton Print Wipes

Everyday, I would pour the solution into a spray bottle and either spray the solution directly on the baby’s bum (making my daughter laugh many times) or on the cloth wipe.  I’ve also used an empty disposable wipes container for my wipes and the solution.  I would place the wipes in the container and then pour some of the solution over the wipes.  This way the wipes would always be ready for use.

I’ve heard that some people cut a roll of Bounty paper towels (not the select-a-size ones) in half and put it in a wipe box (with the core removed), then they pour the solution over the paper towels. You can also rip the towels into separate pieces and then pour the solution over that.  Personally, I prefer to use a spray bottle and cloth wipes. The best thing about the wipe solution is that I know exactly what’s going into it… no guessing… and no skin irritation. For those babies who are VERY sensitive, I would recommend skipping the baby wash and tea tree oil and always use cloth wipes.

Since I really wanted to give gDiapers another chance, I decided to buy the Large size kit and see what happens.  When I first tried them a few months ago, I was very disappointed because my daughter was getting red marks from the snaps in the front and I eventually sold the covers.  Then I ran into some information on gDiapers which made me think I was putting the diapers on my daughter a little too tight.  Maybe that was why she was getting those marks?

So, I bought the kit and decided to give it a try.  The first time I tried the diaper, I got the same result – red marks!  I tried the diaper a few more times and every time I did, my daughter ended up having red marks.  At one point even my husband noticed the marks.  If he noticed the marks then they must have been quite bad.

I started to wonder why some babies were getting those marks and others weren’t.  Well, after playing with the diaper for a couple of minutes, I figured it out.  Basically, it all depends on the size of the baby’s waist.  Babies with bigger waists will most likely get the marks because the snaps are exposed when using a wider waist setting.  The snaps are covered by the fabric for babies with smaller waists.

I still want to use the diapers from time to time (with my cloth inserts), but I really need to fix that snap problem.  I already have a couple of ideas in mind, but finding the time to work on them might be hard :-D