Now that we have washed our cloth diapers, it’s time to dry them!

OK, remember I *used* to line dry everything?  When I quit line drying EVERYTHING, I still line dried my diapers…for a while.  Now, I only line dry every now and then, usually to get stains out or try to combat a lingering odor.  But, for the most part, I machine dry EVERYTHING (including my covers! *gasp*)

But, IF I was going to line dry, I would hang them out and then finish them in the dryer so they wouldn’t be quite as crunchy.  You can also use vinegar in your rinse water to help combat crunchiness.

For machine drying, you simply pop them in the dryer – NO DRYER SHEET – and call it good.  You can keep your covers out and dry them in your laundry room or outside (PUL dries VERY quickly), and that is supposed to extend the life of your covers, but I’ve been drying mine in the dryer for several years and they are still going strong.

Real quick as to why you should not use a dryer sheet or fabric softener of any kind…

Fabric softener repels liquids.  It works like scotch guard does on your furniture.  Liquids repelling off your diapers is NOT a good thing.  Let me just leave it at that.

After the diapers are dry, I make a huge pile on the couch and separate out all the different pieces.  I make a pile for the FuzziBunz covers, a pile for the FuzziBunz stuffers, a pile of prefolds, a pile of covers, and a pile of wipes.  My children help me sort and then help put away as I stuff the pocket diapers.  I separate them out Mediums and Larges so I can just point to a stack and tell them which shelf it goes on.

And that is our diaper washing routine start to finish!

It’s the question every cloth diapering mama wants to know…

How do you wash these things?!?

I’m going to tell you right now, there are a million and one ways to do this and every cloth diapering mama out there has her own groove.  This is mine.

You’ll remember from my video that I have a poopy pail and a not-so-poopy pail.  I dump both of those into the washer, along with the liners, spray out the pails with antibacterial spray and wipe clean with paper towels.  From there, washing goes like this:

Rinse, highest setting, Heavy duty, COLD

Long wash, highest setting, Heavy duty, HOT, with approx. 2 TBSP detergent

Rinse, highest setting, Normal, COLD

And lately, because I think it needs it, another

Rinse, on appropriate setting for # of dipes, Normal, COLD

Now, the method behind the madness (this is the place where you can stop reading if all you care about is the HOW and don’t need to know the WHY. )

Your first rinse is to obviously rinse out the leftover poo and such from the diapers.  You set it on the highest setting to give it the largest amount of agitating room.

Your wash is hot because hot cleans better.  You only use a small amount of detergent because diapers that don’t get the detergent fully rinsed out of them smell.  BAD.

Let me stop here for just a second and tell you a story…

When I first started cloth diapering, I lived in a house where the hot water going into the washer was broken.  I washed diapers in COLD.  And it worked!  However, I think the success of this was due largely, in part, to my DRYING routine. (more on that later!)

Next, is another rinse in cold and yes, on the highest setting.  Your goal here is to thoroughly rinse out the detergent.

If you’ve been noticing a smell or rashes, this is where you should choose to do yet another rinse.  This time you can lower the water setting if need be to accommodate the number of diapers, rather than keep it on the highest setting.

From there, you can line dry or machine dry.  I’ll explain my drying routine in the next post.

Oh, and a quick caveat…

If you are using wool covers/longies/shorties/skirties, these washing instructions ARE NOT FOR YOU!  I’m not much of a wool gal, so you’ll have to look elsewhere for that information.

And, if you feel like something is really wrong with your diapers smell-wise or leak-wise, check out my friend, Lauren’s post on stripping diapers.

Helpful post on detergents: Diaper Jungle Detergent Chart

Now that we are settled in to our new home, I’ve gotten back into my cloth diapering routine.  Because of that, I thought it would be a good time to talk more about cloth diapers.

Today, I wanted to show you our diaper changing station and talk a little more about making diaper changes as uncomplicated as possible when it comes to using cloth.

Let’s kick it off with a bit vlogging, shall we?  Go easy on us this first time of vlogging–my poor daughter couldn’t find the OFF button! (if you cannot see the video in your reader or email, click on this link: Diaper Changing Station )

Here is a photo of the changing table so you can have a longer look at it:

I mention in the video that we use mostly FuzziBunz for daytime diapering, but we used to use Mother-ease One-Size diapers along with Mother-ease Air Flow covers.  These were a great starter diaper for us!  I still use the Air Flows over our prefolds. (if prefolds scare you, read this)  But, for some reason, I’ve left my ME’s behind.  It might be because they are old…insanely old.  Many are threadbare.  But, if you are afraid of prefolds (and my post doesn’t convince you otherwise), then Mother-ease diapers might be for you.  They are workhorse diapers that last and last.  Most of my MEs have been through 6-7 children, and even being threadbare, they keep going strong.  And you cannot find a better, more versatile diaper cover than the Air Flows.  They cover ANY diaper.

I mentioned diaper cream as well.  If you read my post on creating a nursing mama basket, you’ll remember I use a natural diaper cream from HardLotion.com.  In the video, you more than likely also saw another cream called Penaten.  It is German made and was sent to me by a dear friend when she heard we were battling terrible rashes following Emily’s surgeries.  However, Penaten IS NOT safe for cloth diapers.  I ONLY use it with disposables.

The wipes you saw were made by my daughter using the instructions I wrote about in my post on making your diaper wipes for cheap.  They were made from a couple of t-shirts that had gotten stained and a pair of Micah’s old cotton sweatpants that had holes in them.

One other thing I want to mention is that ideally, baby’s clothes are in the same vicinity as well.  Garin’s are not.  It is a pain.  The only reason I don’t remedy that is because as I said, at some point, I’ll be moving the changing table into our room where Garin’s clothes are.  I’m thinking I’ll go ahead and put a few outfits near the changing table for those inevitable moments when it isn’t just the baby’s diaper that needs changing!

Next week I’ll be talking about our diaper washing and drying routine, so stay tuned!