Hippies

Today I'm blogging at Mile High Mamas. I may not be talking about the royal wedding but can be caught talking about taming a certain royal mess.

Love you guys!

Celebrate our Earth! Wet Bag GIVEAWAY from Recycle Fashionably!-CLOSED

Winner: Trisha Grimes, I sent an email your way. You have 48 hours to respond. I love you all! Thanks for being so nice to our earth!

Tomorrow is EARTH DAY!!!

Hi Earth, how you doin'?

Did you know in the past 50 years, humans have consumed more resources than in ALL previous history? * Eeek! Even one small change in our routine makes a difference and those changes and those people add up!

In celebration, Recycle Fashionably is giving one of my readers a wet bag, The Baby Mate. Yeah!




Isn't it cute? I totally want one!

The Baby Mate is PERFECT for all your gross and non-dry needs! That poo explosion? Throw it in the Baby Mate! Potty training accident while at the grocery store? Throw that outfit in the Baby Mate! Do you cloth diaper? Throw the dirty diapers in the baby mate! Out with your friends for happy hour and they made you laugh so hard you peed your cute underwear? Babymate! See, it really works in all situations!

My friend Aurora started Recycle Fashionably and her mission is to keep plastic bags out of landfills. Her bags are adorable and if you saw how cute Aurora is you would totally get why her bags really ARE so fashionable! Aurora, will you be my personal stylist and teach me how to dress cute? Along with this adorable wet bag, you can view her grocery bags (Environ Mate) and gym bags (Sweat Mate). These bags are very well made and THICK. I'm pretty sure I could curl into a ball inside the Environ Mate and my husband could tote me around without even stressing the bag (We won't talk about the damage I would do to his back, will we?! HA!). The point-her bags are hard core! Being super business woman and crazy talented, Aurora just opened up Fabric Bliss in Denver. She sells super cute fabric, her bags and all sorts of local goods including my headbands. If you are in Denver, you should go in there and ask her for the business woman special. Aurora, you need a business woman special!

Want to win a Baby Mate???


MANDATORY

Head over to Recycle Fashionably facebook and fan her page. Easy peasy! Come back here and leave me a comment telling me you are a fan of her facebook page! Make sure to include your email so I can get a hold of you if you win.


EXTRA ENTRIES (Leave a separate comment on this post for each entry you completed below.)

1. Follow Aurora's blog.
2. Follow my blog.
3. Fan Fabric Bliss on facebook.
4. Follow Recycle Fashionably on Twitter.
5. Tweet this giveaway. One tweet per day. Leave me the link in a comment.
6. Tell me what YOU do to be green. Limited to ONE comment!
7. Tell me what event you are attending for Earth Day!


EVENTS!

Check out the Earth Day website, A Billion Acts of Green for a list of events!
Cloth diaper? Join me at The Great Cloth Diaper Change! (I'll be with Eco-POLITAN.)


*For that fact and more including sources, visit Ecocycle.org.


Giveaway ends May 19th at midnight. Winner will be notified by email and has 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be selected. All winners selected through random number generator.

A big thanks to Recycle Fashionably and Happy almost Earth Day!!!

The Great Cloth Diaper Change and Helpful Cloth Diapering Tips

I know, I'm totally obsessed with diapers. I think I'll have to go to weekly meetings once my kids are both potty trained to get over the pain of not diapering them in total cuteness. The recent discovery of an amazing cloth diaper store is just fanning the flames. It's crazy to really love the things my children poop in but I do, I love cloth diapers!



The other day I walked into Eco-POLITAN. It's a green baby store in Lakewood, CO but if you aren't local, they have an amazing website. Yay! Robin (Owner and mommy.) was in the store and she totally SCHOOLED me on diapers... and I loved every second of it! Eco-POLITAN is one of the locations for The Great Cloth Diaper Change and you can sign up through their site or a location closer to you. There are 400 locations around the world and they are going for a Guiness World Record in celebration of Earth Day. Join me!!!



I'm really excited to show you the new diapers in the Strebel household. I never really understood why anyone would not want a super easy all in one diaper but now I get it. I GET IT!! I see the light! I'm going to show you the diapers in later posts so look out for those. I'm a happy mommy right now!

First, a few things I learned that might help you if you cloth diaper:

Diaper pails: With disposables, these are a must. We went without a diaper pail for the first year of Sawyer's life but the smell was terrible. Diapers smell... bad. I had NO IDEA that I was suppose to flush all poop down the toilet when using disposables. The smell drove me to actually purchase a diaper pail. Now that we are on cloth, a reusable bag for the diaper pail just made more sense. The cloth bag IN the pail prevents the lid from closing and sealing. It's amazing to me that most of the time our diaper pail is not sealed and it's NOT smelly because we dump all poop down the toilet. Long story longer, as my friends would say, I wasn't sure if I was using my diaper pail wrong or bought the wrong type of wet bag. The answer? I'm not an idiot and I wasn't using it wrong. Phew! Obviously cloth wet bags are thicker than trash bags and the diaper pails really aren't built for the thicker material. If you are going to cloth diaper, get a wet bag and use the type of trash can you would have in your kitchen. They also have wet/dry bags that seal. Hang those from the back of your door. Clean diapers in front, dirty diapers in back. Brilliant!

Image here.


Inserts: Yeah, yeah, we all know that you throw an insert into a pocket diaper but for some reason it never occurred to me that I can stuff an insert into my all in one diapers for night time diapering. The next problem would be choosing an insert, there are MANY to choose from! My next lesson, materials! Microfiber absorbs FAST and pulls moisture away from the skin. Hemp doesn't absorb as fast but absorbs MORE so what you want is microfiber near that tushy and hemp behind the microfiber. I had NO idea WHERE you put the insert mattered. Hi lightbulb in head!

Image here.
Knickernappies are a popular insert and they are sewn in a loop so they dry quicker. LOVE the fast drying time!


Bleach and Detergent: I've heard bleach was a major no-no with cloth but the last shipment of Bum Genius diapers specified washing diapers with bleach once a month... and I was sooo confused. Robin informed me that most diapers will say NOT to wash with bleach and some diaper companies warn bleach will completely void your warranty but Bum Genius may have made their lining in such a way that it holds up to bleach. Unless I'm only washing my bum genius in a load, I'm going to guess it's wise to avoid bleach all together. And speaking of washing, I learned that everyone is pushing less detergent but sometimes that really isn't the case. You can't get a really dirty load clean on a tabespoon of detergent so use more if needed. If the diapers smell dirty, you need more detergent, if they smell like soap, you need another rinse. If they smell like NOTHING you did good job... unless your detergent is scented. Really it's about figuring our your machine, your detergent and just a little trial and error! I promise, it's not any more difficult than figuring out how you need to rinse your dishes before putting them in the dishwasher to get the best results from your machine.

Charlie's Soap has the strictest instructions: Wash out your machine first with Charlie's Soap and old rags. After that, use Charlie's Soap on EVERYTHING to prevent any buildup on your machine that will get on your diapers. I had a friend tell me the same thing once and thought it might be overkill. From OUR experience she was right, Charlie's Soap instructions are dead on. Whatever soap works for your cloth diapers should be used for EVERYTHING. If you change up your soap, go back and wash out your machine with the cloth detergent and rags. I found washing all of our clothes in the same detergent as the cloth was huge in preventing rashes and keeping our diapers pee thirsty! Mmmmm.


And if you are on disposables... just dump that poop in the toilet! Easy peasy!



Love you guys and a huge thanks to Eco-POLITAN. Join us April 23, 2011 for The Great Cloth Diaper Change!

The Cloth Diaper Try-Outs: And I thought AIO was a type of gun.

I'm SWITCHING and I wish I did this sooner but really I didn't even receive the diapers yet so who am I fooling? I have a fantasy world in my head and everything is going smoothly. We are all in cloth diapers riding ferris wheels eating cotton candy filled with fiber. Never head of fiber-filled cotton candy? Welcome to my dream land. Welcome.

I looked into cloth before I had Sawyer and read the cons of cloth and disposable are about the same: they both kinda suck the life out of our land (landfill versus water and electricity use) so I bought Pampers and called it a day.

Except I have to buy Pampers over and over and over again and after paying $80 for diapers that will be crapped in and graciously given to the trash peeps each Friday I decided in front of a Target cashier

I.

WAS.

DONE.

We go through easily about $100 each month on diapers and wipes. Ugh. I also hate when I'm on the last diaper and know I have to drive down to the store to purchase more when really I had other things planned.

Like read your blogs while eating dried mango. See, now you are on my side, EMARITE (Am I right? Don't worry grams, I got your back!)?

But seriously, since everyone is being all green lately, there are soooo many choices when it comes to cloth diapers and I was like WHAT?!?! I CAN'T MAKE A DECISION!

You know when a restaurant has too little options and you settle and it sucks but then another restaurant has WAY too many meal options and your meal still sucks because you alway wonder what if the other meal you were thinking about was better?!?! Cloth diapering is like that restaurant with way too many options!

And I had no idea what was going on. Let me tell you where I'm at now: a tiny more educated than before but no promises.

POCKET DIAPERS

There are pocket diapers. I thought this was pretty awesome because Sawyer LOVES to put things in his pockets. Cute little pockets on the side of his diapers? How fun!

But no! NOT pockets for you to put your hands when they are cold... or toys you are trying to hide from your sister. I learned pockets are in the CROTCH of the diaper and you stuff stuffing in there. Kind of like if you were on your period, that is where you would stuff your pad. Get it? With pockets you have to buy the diaper and the stuff to stuff in the pocket. I also just like to say stuff to stuff.


AIO

I seriously thought this was some type of rifle and it was printed on the cloth diaper page by accident. I thought, where the hell is the editor?! I was wrong. AIO means all in one.

From what I understand it is like a disposable except you reuse it. You don't put anything in pockets. You put the diaper on, you take it off, wash and repeat. Okay, I can handle this!


AI2

The new and updated rifle? NO! This means all in TWO. I still don't really get this one but hope to keep you guys updated soon. I think it means it's like an all in one but you have to snap in the padding stuff and can take it out and wash if they pee or poop without getting the shell dirty. Not sure how this is different than a shell and folding. I don't know about this one...

PREFOLDS

Okay I think this is where I got really confused. I thought a prefold was a type of diaper but really it's the STUFFING! It is what you would think of when thinking old school cloth diapers. I currently use prefolds as burp cloths and didn't know it. So you can fold this and pin or snap on the sides of your baby and use it as a diaper but will need to buy a pee proof cover. So this isn't really a system like I expected but the CLOTH STUFFING you can turn into a diaper and cover or fold it and use it as extra stuffing in another diaper.


And there is more but what I gather, I will need something to soak my babies pee up and something over the soaker to make sure the pee doesn't soak my cute outfit.

So I said, SELF, don't be all confused, just buy the first thing you see on one of your discount sites you are addicted to.

And I listened.


Image here.

My first GO at cloth diapers will be Cutey Baby cloth diapers. My biggest concern is people say this diaper runs big so I don't think it will even fit Charlotte though I bought the girl pack. The cloth diaper try-outs will start with Sawyer- contestant number one.

Sawyer, come on out in your pink diapers and wave, wave to the crowd... then pee, pee lots.