tomato woes

I had something truly unfortunate happen to me yesterday when I was watering my roma tomato plant. I have a terrible squirrel problem at my house and we have tried everything to get get rid of them. They are very destructive and for the last four years (ever since I quite smoking and don't go outside every hour) the squirrels will eat up my garden. I used to have beautiful gardens with lovely tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries, and zucchini. So this year I got a topsy turvy! I just started with one plant, a roma tomato plant to see if I could grow in and those pesky squirrels wouldn't get into it. Sure enough it was beautiful and full. I probably had 20 little green tomatoes on there. Until yesterday when I was watering it. It obviously got too heavy and the whole topsy tuvy came down. Not only did it come down but the stock snapped right off! Oh I was so sad. Nic cried really hard (we were growing it together.) I put the remains into water and I'm hoping it can still be saved! Fingers crossed! 

look at those beauties

into a bowl of water

What's left of my plant. I wish I had a before pic to show.

Cloth Diapering Top Fives

There is so much cloth diapering information out there that I thought I could break it down into a couple top five lists.

Five Myths About Cloth Diapering

1. It will make your baby bow legged. What? Definitely No
2. You can only cloth diaper at home, not out and about. Have a wet bag in your purse or diaper bag then when baby needs a change put the diaper and everything else in it. Then you can deal with it when you get home. Plus my diapers are so cute there is no way I'm not going to show them off! 
3. Cloth diapers are so messy. They are no more messy than disposables. And way less messy than potty training. lol
4. You have to be careful not stab the baby with the safety pin. The safety pin and prefold cloth diaper is not used very much anymore. Now you can use a snappi. There is also all-in-ones and pockets. They've come along way.
5. You'll spend all your time doing laundry. One load every two days isn't so bad. I really don't feel like I'm washing all the time.

Five Questions I get about Cloth Diapering

1. What do you do with the poop? I flush it down the toilet. Typically one shake and it falls right off. No biggie.
2. How many do I have to buy? For an older baby (6 months+) you need about 14. 7 each day and you do laundry every other day. There are lots of bundle options out there.You can find good deals on Glow Bug and Thirsties. Now are you going to stop at 14 most likely no way. Cloth diapers are so addictive. I always need one more! haha
3. Is it harder than disposables? Nope, one extra step when you changing and then the extra load of laundry.
4. Can hubby do it too? Of course! Hector said he prefers cloth diapers.
5. Does it stink? Not while you're changing but on day two if you open the diaper pail and put your face over it and smell...yea it stinks! lol Don't do that and you won't smell a thing. lol

Five Things To know About Cloth Diapering

1. You cannot use regular butt creams. Vaseline based creams will clog your fibers and then the diaper won't absorb the liquid. 
2. There are different kinds of cloth diapers and all have pros and cons that just depend on your preference. (all-in-one, pocket, hybrid, prefold, flat... more detail to come)
3. Hook and Loop means Velcro.
4. You cannot use regular detergent. You have to use one with no additives or dyes or perfumes.  The chemicals will clog your fibers and not absorb the liquid. It's really not a big deal anymore because Target carries plenty of choices like Seventh Generation. I've even heard Kirkland has a brand that is safe. Also no softener for the same reason.
5. You do have to change the baby more often than disposables. About every two hours.

Five (well six) Reasons to Cloth Diaper

1. You save a grip of money. One time I put in my information to a cloth diaper calculator and factoring in how I line dry and even with early potty training I will have saved over a 1,000 dollars. Wow!
2. You don't put all those nasty chemicals on your baby's bottom. I was changing Matt and his diaper had exploded (again) and there was these gel like beads all over him. That's when I made just made the change to cloth. 
3. No more diaper explosions. Poop running up your baby's back is one of the grosses things to clean. I have never had a leak or explosion.
4. So much better for the environment. Like no joke better for the environment. Disposables take between 200-500 years to break down. Plus all that untreated waste going into our soil. I'd like to have some usable space left on this planet for my children. 
5. Piece of mind. When I had Nic in disposables I was always worried we'd run out. It was irrational we never got close but how horrible would that be?! I've even heard horror stories about people reusing disposables or letting baby go for long times in them to save on money. Now if I start running low on clean diapes I just do laundry. One less mom thing to worry about.
6. They are so cute!!! There are so many prints and colors I never want to put pants on my little guy. It's summer now and you can believe he won't be wearing anything but his cloth diaper!!!

Cloth diapering for the vintage gal

The more I dive into the green lifestyle the more I see how it also coincides with my retro lifestyle. Cloth diapering, cooking at home, shopping the farmers market are all things of yesteryear that we are starting to do again. Hey even the super fabolous Joan Holloway cloth diapers her little one and every knows Ms. Holloway can do no wrong.

That being said I am going to finally talk about my cloth diapering experiences.  There is so much information and everyone is so curious that I'm dedicating a week to cloth diapering. I'm sure you've heard about how much better for the environment it is. How cloth diapers don't have all the chemicals that disposables have. How they can save you hundreds of dollars. But have you seen the diapers of today they are so cute! We have taken Joan's diaper and revamped them!!

On this first post I'm just going to give you a run down of my routine: 

So you put a clean diaper on your baby just like you would a disposable  little one will wear it until he poops or no longer than two hours with just pee.

When it's time to change LO I take the diaper off shake any poops into the potty. Then stick the dirty diaper into my diaper pail.

Sometimes if the poops kinda of loose I will have to hose it in the sink. The only added thing with that is I will disinfect the sink when I'm done. Then about every two days I take my whole diaper pail and dump everything straight into the washing machine.

You pre-rinse in cold, wash hot water with a cloth diaper safe detergent. (There are many on the market, but the one most recommended in the cloth diapering community is Rocking Green) Lastly you need to do one more cold rinse to get any residue left. Cloth diapering has taught me a lot about my washing machine. lol!! I line dry my diapes because I love to line dry everything except my towels (makes them too crunchy) and living in California I have more days where the weather is perfect for this then not.

And that's it!!! Clean diapes ready to go onto babys butt once again. 

homemade cloth diaper wipes

         When I started cloth diapering I was told that eventually I would want to switch to cloth wipes also. I really didn't believe it. I was so grossed out by the thought of throwing a poop filled piece of cloth into a diaper pail then into the washing machine. During the next three months I kept going back and forth on the idea. Finally I thought I'm going to make my own that way if I don't like it then I'm out no money and I don't feel obligated to use them. So while at my Dad's house for Christmas my Step-mom, Susan pulled out her serger and we got to work.  

         To make it even more cost efficient I used my old flannel receiving blankets for material. I simply cut the material into 8x8 squares the night before. The next day while the kid-o's played with Grandpa, Susan and I took two squares right sides out and serged up each side. It was so much fun and surprisingly rewarding to make them myself. 

           I love using my homemade wipes. And there is no poop filled cloth; that was very dramatic thinking! lol In fact I find them to be less messy than disposable wipes because cloth wipes don't smear the poop around my little guy's bum. I have a diaper wipes warmer so I just roll each wipe up and put them in there. I've been buying California baby wipes solution but my local Target just stopped carrying it . I going to have to find a replacement for that. I still keep some disposable wipes around for outings and faces. But all in all love my cloth wipes. Now the hubby on the other hand still does not like using them. Oh well I do most the changes anyways!