This is a cross post from www.themahars.com. Sarah is an RDA Volunteer, and she blogs about cloth diapering, family, natural parenting, baby wearing and life in general. She lives in Washington (the state) with her husband Joshua and their children Ainsley (3.5) & Liam (15 months). They are expecting a new baby to cloth diaper in August.

Most of you probably know that we are huge cloth diapering advocates. There are a zillion reasons for this, but I will be talking more about that in future posts. Today, I am simply in awe of cloth wipes.

When we started cloth diapering Ainsley, I didn’t even know that cloth wipes existed. In fact, I have only used them on her once or twice. I heard about them when I was pregnant with Liam. I was intrigued by the idea, and yet admittedly a tiny bit grossed out. Reusing the thing you wipe poop with?!? (It’s not really that gross, by the way. You DO wash them!) Then there was the question of how does one use them anyway. I read. And I read. And I read some more.

I realized that using cloth wipes didn’t have to be hard, I just had to be willing to try. At first I used a spray solution to clean Liam’s bum, but this kid is so sensitive that even that stuff made him red. So now, I just get our handy cloth wipes good and wet & wipe away!

Reusable cloth wipes - for at home and away!

Here are the things I love most about cloth wipes:

• They are multi-taskers. When not using then on bums, they are frequently used to clean hands, noses, windows, etc. Right now over half of our stack is being used to wipe sore, snotty noses.
• They get the job done faster. I use one or two cloth wipes for the same amount of poo clean up that would take at least 4 disposables. Win!
• No red bum. While I have finally found disposable wipes that don’t irritate Liam’s skin, it’s nice to have something that will get him clean without causing pain.
• Less money! Who doesn’t love saving money?! Just like diapers, you have an initial buy in cost, but these suckers are so totally worth it. For the cost of two boxes of Costco disposable wipes or less, you can buy all the cloth wipes you need. You can even make your own from flannel receiving blankets! Plus, they’ll be useful even after your little ones are all done potty learning.
• No laundry sorting. I don’t have to remember to fish out the disposable wipes from the diapers before washing. Everything goes in the same place. Hooray for simplicity!

Seriously, cloth wipes are awesome. I think every home (even with older kiddos) should have some. They just do everything!

- Sarah Mahar, RDA Volunteer

This entry was posted on Friday, January 20th, 2012 at 9:00 am and is filed under keeping it real. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.