penn

So, you're having a baby: diapers (and wipes)

One of the earliest things you'll need with your baby are diapers. Well, and a car seat (coming soon!). The hospital will likely provide diapers. Our hospital provided pampers swaddlers, and they were definitely nice in the newborn stage. I really appreciated the cutout for the umbilical cord. They're soft and cozy.

We went with a strategy of "mama inputs" and "daddy outputs," since I was nursing. It was great. I didn't have to change diapers often, especially in the early days.

Many people like to buy diapers in advance in order to stock up during sales. If you've got room, this is a good possible strategy. But pay attention to sensitivities on both sides of your family. Does anyone have sensitive skin? Some friends of ours had kids who broke out in rashes and had to switch to other types of diapers.

Plus, there's actually a myriad of options from cloth to totally not eco-friendly. We chose something in the spectrum of "disposable but fairly eco-friendly" (tho anything you're throwing into a landfill isn't technically fully eco-friendly). Were I a single or stay-at-home mom, I would have cloth diapered. But I am in a partnership with my husband, and his opinion mattered too. I had little luck convincing him to cloth diaper. With our first, I hauled out my couple cloth diapers on the weekend and would occasionally use them. They were fine, and I think cloth diapering isn't a big deal, but it was too much to take on all by myself. With my second, I haven't bothered despite, again, not minding them at all. If you'd like to cloth diaper, email me (lapenn at that ubiquitous email service by google), and I'll send you tips that a friend emailed me.

We chose to go with Earth's Best Diapers. Being chlorine free and made with renewables is important to me. As far as I can tell, there's not much (any?) plastic in them either. We didn't personally like Honest Company diapers, tho many do.

Baby Gear Lab has a really comprehensive article about picking diapers. We've enjoyed the Kirkland Costco ones in the past when being price conscious. Their article has me wanting to check out babyganics and 7th generation again. We found 7th generation to be fine but not perfect with our first, and we've been fairly autopilot with number two. We have also used Target diapers from time to time; again, they're fine, but we prefer Earth's Best.

If you live in a bigger metro area, odds are good that you have a diaper service. If you're interested in cloth diapering, that would be worth checking out.

How to buy diapers

More important than what to buy, almost, is how to buy. This will only work with some options, but it's what we do. We don't mess around with coupons because we don't use a big name brand (though I will check Cartwheel if I have to buy diapers in-store). We use Target's Subscribe & Save. You can also do a similar service through Amazon. We went with Target for two reasons: 1) we have a red card and 2) Amazon's price on items can change depending on supply and demand, and I didn't want to get hit with a random high price for diapers right as we were getting a subscription order.

For subscribe and save through Target, you can pick your size and frequency of shipment. You get 5% off with the red card and another 5% off with S&S, so I would only do this with the red card to get the best discount. They send an email about a week before shipping, so you can delay your shipment or pick a different size when needed. I only did this near the end with our first, and I wish I'd started earlier for the savings; it's not as complicated as I imagined. With our second, we have one case of diapers we have to return because he grew out of them. Otherwise, it's been good, and we have a stockpile of the next size up.

I think we used about 2 cases of size one. We used 3 cases of size 2 for sure. We bought newborn diapers on demand, as our little dude wasn't in them long.

Wipes
I have even stronger opinions about wipes. You want something that cleans without being soapy. I've done a mix of options:

• cloth wipes! I love these for the pee diapers. It was my compromise with not having cloth diapers. I keep a spray bottle of just water only (don't be putting tea tree oil on little boys!) because that's enough to clean. I spray the wipe with water, do the wiping, use a dry corner to dry the baby, and then put into a wet bag to wash later. I really like this because my babies end up with rashes if their skin is left wet too long. This method results in a nice, dry diaper area.
• Target brand wipes are fabulous. Not too soapy and the right compromise between thick and thin. This is usually what we use.
• We did not like Earth's best wipes -- too soapy. And we don't like anything scented, mostly because there's no reason to be putting scented chemicals on your baby's bottom when you have the option not to.

Swim diapers One last thing I feel strongly about: reusable is FABULOUS in the swim diaper range. Disposable swim diapers really just fill up with pool water. Okay, reusable ones do too. But we've had such good luck with reusable ones, and they've saved us money since we like to swim. There's lots of brands out there with snaps and such (worth checking out), but we just went with the option I found at Target when I first realized there were cloth swim diapers. They're swim diapers by iplay. They've held plenty of urine and even poop for us with no leakage of the poop. We wash and then hang-dry to maintain quality. You'll want to check before removing for poop so you can remove carefully, but we've rarely found poop to be an issue.

So, there's my peace about diapers and wipes. Buy Target brand wipes by the case, in bulk, when there's a Cartwheel deal better than 5% off. And put 24 of those flannel reusable wipes on your registry along with a wet bag. Actually, get multiple wet bags (as in, 4-6). They're great for: wet swimsuits post-lesson (and those swim diapers), dirty clothes in the diaper bag, pump parts from work to home, and likely even more. I've used every wet bag we've gotten.

So, you're having a baby: the introduction

A good friend of mine is having a baby. I started to email her some tips, and I soon realized the email was going to be long. Way long. I decided to move to the blog, both for ease of formatting and to break up the information. And, honestly, so I have a more permanent place for this information and can easily share the posts in the future. As I add more posts, I will link up to them at the bottom of this one.

My qualifications: current mom of a three year old and a 7 month old.

First: congrats! You will go through periods of excitement and periods of "what have I done with my life?" If you have any lingering projects that will take in the 5-20 hours neighborhood to complete, I highly recommend getting them done now. Yes, you're tired and worn out from gestating and nesting. But I promise that you won't have this level of personal time for years to come.

second: wear maternity clothes whenever you darn well feel like it. You don't have to be showing to wear them. It's okay to wear them as soon as you feel comfortable. Some people like bridge maternity clothes, which are still fairly form fitting but have some give, and then they move into the full belly panel stuff later. You do you. I held out with my first and had a month or so of discomfort in trying to cram into my old clothes. I moved over sooner with my second and was happier for it. If you don't want to buy bridge clothes, you can also wear a lot of dresses.

For maternity clothes, I first recommend seeking used options. Consignment stores are a great way to do this (and thrift stores to a lesser extent -- maternity clothes are really hit or miss when thrifting depending on the area your thrift store draws from). If you're into online shopping, Bellies to Babies is my favorite. It's based in Minnesota, but you can shop from anywhere.

Some pro-tips with maternity clothes:

• purchase shirts in longer lengths, so they'll cover your belly for longer. You will likely need those long shirts by the end


• Nice to have some options that will work for nursing, but you'll also be so ready to be out of the clothes by the end. We'll cover nursing later


• Buy for comfort

As I continue through this series, I will cover what we've done and what I wish, in hindsight, we had done. There's some things that make a lot more sense to buy with your first so you can enjoy using it for longer periods of time, but it's so hard to justify pricey items when you are outfitting yourself with all the baby gear.

One last thing before I'm out: Baby Gear Lab is a comprehensive resource for comparing baby items, and I highly recommend checking it out.

Other posts in this series:
Diapers and Wipes