BumGenius Review and How to Care for Cloth Diapers

We finally made a decision about what cloth diapers to go with. We have tried about 5 or 6 different brands/types, and decided to go with the BumGenius 3.0 pocket diapers.

Excuse the crying baby here, he gets tired of having his picture taking 24/7!!

So, we chose to go with these diapers because

1. They are easily available (even target.com sells them!)
2. They are easy to use (once stuffed they are just like a disposable)
3. They come in nice colors
4. They are one size, so we should be done with buying diapers until we have a baby girl (I'll want to buy some pink ones, I'm sure)
5. We have never had a leak with except when it was our own fault for not putting it on correctly (to be honest though, we have very few leaks with any cloth diaper)
6. Each diaper comes with a regular insert and a newborn insert
7. If we ever have 2 kids in diapers, I won't have to pack 2 sizes of diapers in the diaper bag

Because we are not into solid food yet, I don't have to rinse or shake the solids into the toilet. The poo right now is water soluble, so everything just goes straight into the machine. I pull out all of the inserts and use a small scoop of Charlie's Soap. Wash on cold/cold. Then I use another small scoop of the soap and wash on hot/cold with a double rinse. I either throw everything in the dryer or hang the diapers to dry with the inserts in the dryer. After they are dry, I stuff all of them and they are ready to go just like disposable!

I keep a Sterelite trashcan from Wal-Mart lined with a laundry pail sized wet bag for the used diapers. I have a spare wet bag and just replace the used one with it when the used one goes into the laundry with the diapers.

Tips:

1. Fasten the laundry tab when you take the diaper off of the baby and out it in the pail.
2. Remove the insert at the same time if you want to save time and mess in the laundry room.
3. DO NOT use fabric softener. It will make the diapers wick (not absorb) and you will have to take time to strip them to save them.

Some people complain that they get a diaper chain when they remove the BG diapers from the dryer with the laundry tabs all sticking together. This doesn't happen to me as long as we firmly fasten the laundry tabs when we take it off of the baby. You could also check the laundry tabs when you are putting them into the machine.

Basically, BG diapers are easy to use, very friendly to people who are not use to cloth since they are similar to disposables, and look cute on the baby. I am really happy with our choice. We bought 24 diapers and we had one at home already so we have 25 right now. This is barely enough for 2 days for us, so we are going to purchase 5 or 6 more and that should ease things somewhat. I prefer to only go 2 days between washing, but during the time the diapers are in the wash we are having to use some of our other kinds of diapers, and I'd like to have enough BG to avoid that.

http://www.bumgenius.com/index.php

I bought my BG at Baby Awearness in Manoa.