Cloth Diapers on a budget

​I am a seasoned cloth diaper user and I have to say the worst thing you could possibly do when you are just starting out is join a Facebook cloth diaper group. If you do please take what you read with a course grain of salt. You will meet people, addicted to cloth diapers, who have collected hundreds, you will meet the cloth diaper snob who thinks their way is the only way, and you will likely meet the green mom who says it’s all or nothing. The key is to do what makes sense for your family and like all things balance. 

Now if you purchase a whole stash of top of the line aio diapers you probably won’t be saving any money. There are still benefits to using this type of diaper for instance it’s better for the environment and it exposes baby to far less chemicals. How ever if your biggest concern is cost, you can still do this. All the trolls will tell you do not use the birdseye flats you can purchase at most stores. However for my third and final child I almost exclusively used these. I hand two older children who had an array of pockets and all in ones but our third child was a surprise and we found out about her arrival days after I donated all of our baby gear , clothes and diapers! Talk about timing… knowing that she was definitely our last child I didn’t want to invest in a whole new stash. I purchased 3 covers and 36 flats. Some people may prefer prefolds but for me they were always so bulky on my 5-6lb babies. Everyone will tell you these flats do not hold anything and that you will have leaks galore, don’t believe them! The key is you have to prep them. Some claim to wash and dry three or four times before baby arrives , but I prefer 6 times drying in between wash cycles. To create extra soft diapers dry with dryer balls  or tennis balls. I always used the origami fold fastened with a snappi in side a cover. My daughter was a heavy wetter and wore these by them selves until she was approximately 8 months old and with a booster from 8-16 months at which time she was fully potty trained. My whole set up cost less than $60 from birth to potty training. Yes you can spend and astronomical amount cloth diapering your child but if minimalist is your thing or you are on a tight budget is absolutely possible. Good luck!