If at first you don't succeed... Part Two

If you haven't seen it yet, you might want to read my previous post about why cloth diapering didn't work for me the first time around. It's a sad, sad tale of fifteen fabulous fluffy diapers that went unused for a long time.

Don't worry, this tale has a happy ending.

I don't remember exactly what prompted me to pull out the pile of fluffy goodness again when the Peanut was about four months old. It had been about a year and a half since I'd used cloth on the Pumpkin, but once again I think I'd gotten into a pretty good routine and was looking to try something new. Using cloth on the Peanut was new! Probably because she was so much smaller than the Pumpkin had been, I immediately got a great fit with our BumGenius diapers, and I don't recall having any leaks. I also discovered that cloth diapers do a wayyyy better job of containing little-baby poopsplosions than disposables do. Encouraged, I quickly got into the routine of using cloth full-time.

With a family of four (plus a big messy dog), laundry was pretty much a daily event in our house already, so working in diapers wasn't a challenge. It also helped that my washing machine now had an automatic "second rinse" feature that saved me the step of resetting it manually. (We'd moved into a new house the previous year.)

Then - bam! Routine interruptus. I broke my foot, and I couldn't walk down to the basement where our laundry was. Two very kind and helpful grandmoms immediately stepped in to help take care of us, but I didn't want to burden them with an additional work, so we went back to disposables during my recuperation.

But as every misfortune should, mine had a silver lining. When my foot healed, and I could walk, carry a baby and (joy of joys!) do my own laundry again (okay, it wasn't really a joy, but trust me I was glad I could do it), I was almost overwhelmed by how EASY cloth diapering suddenly seemed. I'd spent the last two months practically housebound and relying on strategically timed orders from diapers.com to keep stocked with diapering essentials. Being able to walk to the basement and just toss some diapers in the wash seemed blissfully simple.

That, I think, was when I really fell in love with cloth diapers.

Naturally I pursued my love around the clock, and since I'd only been able to shop for cloth diapers online (I'd recently added a few Flip Organic Cotton Diapers to my stash), imagine my happiness when I found a diaper store - an actual brick and mortar, stuffed-to-the-roof-with-fluff, cloth diaper store - just an hour away. I packed up the kids, and headed up to the big city. I was the proverbial kid in a candy store. (What? There isn't a proverb about candy stores? Whatever. You get the idea.) This was my first time seeing, touching, talking to an actual live human being about diapering options. So exciting. I worked up the courage to buy a pack of prefolds and an irresistably cute Bummis Super Whisper Wrap, plus a bamboo fitted diaper.

My newly expanded stash of diapers helped me to realize that for any time of day, any place, any outfit - any baby - there is a perfect cloth diapering solution out there. It just takes a little effort to find it sometimes.

Hopefully this blog will help some other cloth-lovers find their perfect diapers too! Tell me. Have you tried cloth? If so - what's been your favorite diapering moment? If not - what's holding you back from trying cloth?

One-Size Diapers and the Incredible Shrinking Baby

A big portion of my diaper stash consists of BumGenius 3.0s. I have maybe a dozen of them. They were my first cloth diapers - my gateway diapers, I call them because they started my addiction. My BG's are the one-size pocket diapers, and I love them for a bunch of reasons - the super-soft stay-dry suedecloth (fleece) lining inside, the fact that I can completely customize the absorbency with different inserts, and the way they hold in the absolute messiest of messes. And today I found another reason to love them: My baby shrank and they still fit perfectly!

Okay, she didn't actually shrink. She's 16 months old and growing like a weed, but her super-chubby baby thighs are quickly becoming kinda-chubby toddler thighs, and I was starting to notice gaps between her legs and the diaper elastic. Since these are my main overnight diapers, leaks from those gaps would really, really suck.

Peanut has been on the highest rise setting on these diapers since she was five months old, and I assumed that - like my son who used them before her - would just keep growing up and out. So imagine my surprise when I snapped the diapers down a size and found that they again fit her perfectly! The rise comes up just below her belly button, and the elastic is snug but not tight around her legs. There's a tiny bit more effort required to keep the front flat when fastening the velcro, but overall, the fit is great, and I am reminded why I love one-size diapers!

Moral of the story: Babies grow in weird ways, and it's great to have some diapers that can grow (or shrink) along with them!

Night-weaning, NPR and trying not to screw up my kids

My Peanut is sixteen months old now.* She's still nursing. A lot. At night. And I'm tired. Very, very tired. Her road to solid food and cow's milk has been bumpy because she has food allergies, so we've been super-cautious about introducing new foods to her, which means it took a while for her to have a food diet adequate for weaning at night. That, and I am a total softy who can't bear to make my baby cry. And when she doesn't get her "mook" she cries that heartbreaking cry that sounds a lot more like a baby than a toddler. Did I mention that I'm a softy?

Well, I am. I nurse and sleep with my babies. I hate to be away from them, especially at night when they're sleepy and snuggly and all that good stuff. The Pumpkin's not a baby anymore, but he got a full 22 months of nursing and nighttime snuggling before he was weaned and shipped off to his own room. The Pumpkin, of course, was a preemie, and those of you who've endured time as a NICU parent will understand without me explaining why I wasn't willing to let my heart-monitor-free baby sleep more than four inches away from me.

The Peanut, born full term and a second baby, hasn't a snowball's chance of making it to 22 months in my bed. I mean, let's be honest. A lot of the indulgences we give to a first baby simply can not be repeated when you're managing more than one kid and trying to maintain some small segment of your own sanity.

I fret over this. I fret that I am failing my baby because she doesn't get enough sleep because she won't sleep alone. On the other hand, I fret that if I force her to sleep alone the Peanut will cry herself to sleep, convinced that I don't love her, and eventually turn to a life of drugs and crime.

I also fret that I'm shortchanging the Pumpkin, who never gets a morning alone with mommy, or a chance to climb into my bed and snuggle without a nursing toddler between us. Naturally I see the possibility that these circumstances could also lead to a life of drugs and crime.

And I fret that Mr. Indulgent, so named for his willingness to indulge my whims - up to and including 40 (and counting) months of baby bed-sharing, is perhaps getting a little tired of this particular whim and - you guessed it - contemplating how much more sleep he'd get if only he lived a life of drugs and crime.

So here I am, fretting away about these things while I listen to the second hour of On Point on NPR, which is always devoted to some random artsy-literary work. Today it's an interview with Poser: My Life in 23 Poses author Claire Dederer. Ms. Dederer also was prone to excessive fretting, until she discovered yoga.

I've already discovered yoga, and what I discovered was that I really suck at yoga.

But what Ms. Dederer (oh, heck, let's call her Claire) discovered while discovering yoga is the "nobody's perfect" cliche applies perfectly to yoga. And to motherhood. And to strive to do either just right is to push away the satisfaction and even the joy that comes from each.

So.

(A little dramatic, yes? Likening night-weaning and moving my toddler to her own cozy little crib to an interruption in my quest for parental perfection... Stick with me here.)

Here's what I got and what I needed from listening to Claire: Not just permission, but a mandate to risk failure now and again. Hey, maybe the Peanut will turn to drugs and crime as a result of abrupt night-weaning at the tender age of eighteen months! But dammit, at least she won't be blaming her Stepford-wife, striving-for-endless-perfection mommy for it.

Eh, I know, it's a reach. Sometimes I just need a reminder that all this stuff that seems so big and important really is not going to screw up my kids. Any more than kids should be screwed up, that is.

*Okay, she's now almost 18 months. I edited this post for two months. I told you I'm tired!