Not Your Grandma's Cloth Diapers

I had never even considered cloth diapering to be an option for me. The idea of trying fold those flimsy white cloths around a squirming baby, then trying not to stab him with those giant, scary fastening pins sounded about as appealing as wearing high heels to my step aerobics class, and with the same amount of unnecessary discomfort. Plus, then I would have to hire one of those diaper services to clean them, and wern't they expensive? Not to mention the fact that those cloth diapers must be a leaky mess, and their bulky-ness would simply detract from the fabulous wardrobe my infant son had already amassed. No, cloth diapers were not for me.

Then I found out that I didn't know poop about today's cloth diapers. They have snaps and Velcro®! They are already structured to fit right onto baby! They are fashionable! You can wash them at home!

And I'm not the only mommy having this epiphany. Linda Byerline, CEO of Happy Heiny's, a cloth diaper manufacturer, tells me that her business triples in size every year. The entire cloth diaper industry is hitting a growth spurt in sales- reported to be up 25- 50% in the last few years¹- as more and more women are finding that the new and improved products can be user-, wallet-, and Eco-friendly.

Green Factor: According to cloth diaper manufacturer, Fuzzi Bunz, eighteen billion disposable diapers are thrown in landfills each year. It is estimated that it may take as many as 500 years for the plastic in these diapers to decompose. I couldn't help but think, as I tossed each disposable diaper away, that I was adding to the environmental problems that my children, and even their children, will have to clean up some day.