Cloth Diaper Peripherals

While perhaps not essential some of these items will make your cloth diapering days much happier!

-Wetbag (for carrying dirty diapers when you are out. ew.)
-Pail or Large wetbag for dirty diapers at home.
-Dryer Balls
-Flushable Liners (to line diapers when you use any creams or to make clean up easy)
-Appropriate Laundry Detergent
-Drying Rack

In Other News

Lately due to a raspy throat J sounds like a Pterodactyl when she cries.

Other words that start with a P that shouldn't:
Phlegm
Psycho
Pneumonia
Psalm
Pseudo

Other Sites I Visit Often

My sisters blog.

Elizabeth Halford

Entertainment sans Cable

Horray for Ikea

DPS

Shameless Plug

Steals and Deals

Daily deals for babies.

Weekly deals at one of my fav stores.

Outdoor Gear Steals

Bargain. Moose. Say no more.

Weekly deals for little ones. 

A Purchase

I bought a new bright green soft change pad this weekend at a craft sale. Minky. Mmm. Soft.

I also ordered a large hanging wetbag from A Lovely Start. It will be this fabric or this fabric.

A Prize

I can no longer say I don't win anything. I entered a contest at Tiny Treehugger for a free KnickerNappies diaper and won! It arrived yesterday

1 Small Knickernappies 2G c/w loopydoo insert

It is soft and green and cute.
I am diaper junkie.

A Gift

I was given a few more diapers to add to my stash (Thanks Kirsty)

• 4 Small Thirsties Fab Fitteds
• 1 Small Happy Heinys
• 1 Small Bumgenius AIO
• 1 Small Bummis Superbrite

I already had 2 Small Superbrites that I was not using yet. This makes it so I don't have to do laundry every night.

On my wish list:

• A hanging Wetbag to replace my diaper pail
  

Diaper Bag

Incase you were wondering:

2-4 Recieving blankets
2 Outfits
2 Sleepers
4 Cloth Diapers
'Wet Bag' for dirty cloth diapers
About 10 disposable diapers
Wipes
Grocery Bag for dirty Clothes
Quilt
Little pad of paper and pen
Soother (though they never really take it)
Bag of Spit cloths
Nursing Cover

I probably forgot sometime, I usually do.

Edit:
What I forgot

-Change Pad
-Water Bottle

There you are!

In the last couple days my girls have found each other. Before then it seemed like they never even looked at each other but all of a sudden their sister is fascinating and entertaining. It is the sweetest thing to watch.

X3

Vaccinations were last week, they give these little girls so 6 needles, 2 sore babies and one sad Mommy later the first round of vaccinations are done. While the girls usually sleep about 8 or 9 hours they woke up in the middle of that fir three nights after their shots. They were not their usual happy selves and would make achy little cries. By today, a week later, they are back to normal and once again sleeping though the night. Yay.

Success!

I felt a little silly running four washes just for two diapers and just hoped it would be worth it. After washing the Applecheeks 4 times in hot water without any soap I tried them once more and they did not leak! So there you have it folks, if your diapers leak don't give up on them right away, there is hope!

Now that I like Applecheeks again I will tell you one nice thing about their design. The opening for the covers is in the middle instead of the back where it usually is this allows the insert to agitate itself out in the wash so you don't have to remove it before washing. Clever.

Difference

My girls have very similar personalities. They sleep for a similar amount of time, they enjoy similar things, follow the same schedule but there is one thing that they have very differing opinions on; bottles. In the evenings they each get one bottle. J takes them easily, occasionally fussing a little bit, but she generally finishes her 100mil bottle no problem. K on the other hand does not cooperate. She cries and spits the bottle out or spits the milk out or both. We are usually happy when she takes 30mil and who knows how much of that she spit out.

There are a couple things we can do to help her take it:
-Hold her so she feels like she is nursing
-Let her suck on a finger then sneak the bottle in
-Work quickly, go from cuddling bottle in her mouth before she can freak out
-Get her bottle ready before she is too hungry and mad already
-Distract her with something to look at
-Try to reason with her that it is for her own good

A couple times she has managed to not take any bottle in an evening but usually we manage to get some into her.

Leaky Cheeks

I am ready to give up on my Applecheeks diapers because they always end up leaking. I started reading on their website to see if there was anything I could do and I learnt about stripping. Even when using the proper amount and type of detergent cloth diapers can get some build up which causes them to repel instead of absorb. By washing them in hot water without detergent a few times in a row you can 'strip' them and they will be back to their usual useful selves. At least that is what they say. So here is hoping, stay tuned for the result.

Applebumcheeksgenius

Today I bought 4 more Bumgenius diapers as well as inserts for my AppleCheeks covers so I can use them again.

Stash:
7 Blueberry Bamboo Deluxe One Size Pocket Diapers
7 Bumgenius 4.0 One size Pocket Diapers
2 Applecheeks size 1 Envelope covers c/w bumgenius inserts

Stains & Laundry

The Blueberry Bamboo Diapers have arrived and I love the fun patterns. They fit really well and have not leaked yet. After the first time being worn and washed they looked very stained while the Bumgenius diapers came out looking clean. My washer does not have a rinse cycle so my diapers get washed once quickly in cold water then again for a full wash with Country Save detergent in hot water with an extra rinse. I dry the liners and hang the covers. Since there are not alot of detergents that are safe for cloth diapers I decided to try out the magical bleaching power of the sun. I dried my blueberries inside where the sun was shining and PRESTO! by the time they were dry the stains were faded considerably. Magical. It is still a little annoying that I need to bleach them every wash so I am a big fan of the un-stained Bumgenius!

Bumgenius

Today the girls are wearing their bumgenius 4.0 diapers for the first time. I thought that they may be very bulky but they fit them really well. I only own three right now, I want to get some of the new artist series patterns so I am holding out.

Q&A

Yes, they are identical

I can tell them apart, they look different and they have different birthmarks

A few times during the first weeks at home I would mix them up at night but always figured out who I had pretty quick.

There are a few twins somewhere in the family but identical twins are not genetic, identicals occur 1 in every 250 pregnancies.

Two babies, two hands. Yes, my hands are full.

It's awesome having twins, what is it like to have one baby?

Moving

We moved this weekend. Babies make everything more of an adventure. Thankfully we had lots of help. The girls room is now set up and, once we get unpacked and settled in, no longer needs to double as a storage room.

Today we met with a bunch of families from our twin prenatal class for a reunion of sorts. I have rarely been in a room with so many babies! There was a baby for every adult there.

Blueberry

I just ordered 7 Blueberry Bamboo Diapers.

Happy Nappy

Since we have shared laundry in our suite we were not able to wash our own cloth diapers. There are alot of great reasons to use cloth diapers including the large amount of waste that it creates. Happy Nappy is the only diaper service in Calgary. They drop off a bag of clean diapers and pick up a bag of dirty diapers a week later. If you read on their website they have a cost compassion for cloth vs. disposable showing how much money you are saving by using the service however their disposable prices are higher then what we have found.

Disposables can be found for 17 cents a diaper at costco.

17cents x 10 changes x 2 babies x 7 days = $23.80
Happy Nappy Diaper service for 2 = $29.96

Unfortunately newborn size diapers cannot be bought in large packs
NB diapers 30 cents x 10 changes x 2 babies x 7 days = $42.00

Happy Nappy wins for newborn size.

Since the girls were 4 weeks early they were in newborn size for quite a while so we used Happy Nappy for about a month. I was so glad to have them out of disposables, especially since Kaylyn's rash was persistent. Happy Nappy diapers require a cover. I bought 4 Newborn Size Bummis Super Brites and and 2 Small AppleCheeks Covers. Both types of covers worked really well for the girls. The Bummis leaked a bit more than the Applecheeks if they were left on for a long time so we generally used them at night.

Once the girls would fit into size one we stopped using Happy Nappy because of the price difference.

I love cloth and really enjoyed using it.
Happy Nappy is not cheaper than disposables.
Diaper service is a great way to start with cloth.

Cloth Wipes

The nurses used cloth wipes in the hospital but when we got home I started using disposables. Kaylyn quickly developed a diaper rash so we decided to switch to using cloth at home. I made some flannel wipes by cutting up a large piece of flannel into squares. These worked pretty well but as they grew they seemed like they were too small and did not wipe up really well. My Mother-in-Law made us some new wipes out of terry by running them through the serger. Cloth wipes are super easy to use, I get them wet with warm water then throw them in a bucket beside the change table, with each load of laundry I first put the dirty wipes through a prewash and then add the rest of the girl's laundry.

Welcome

Welcome to my baby blog.

I have twin girls.
I like cloth diapers.

Enjoy