After 6 days of handwashing flats, I’m getting in a groove! I washing today’s load in about 35 minutes from start to finish (including putting JD to bed while they soaked!)
I realized I haven’t outline our handwashing routine, so here we go: Once JD is in his PJs and nighttime diaper, I take all the diapers (in a 5 gallon pail) to the tub, fill the bucket with warm water, and give it a few swirls with an old gdiaper swish stick. I dump that (nasty!) water and shake open all the flats. I fill the bucket again with hot water and a 1/2 tsp of Tide. I return all the wet diapers and covers to the pail. Before I put in the pockets, I scrub the suedecloth with a nail brush and a little paste of Tide soap and water. After the stink we had day 4, I want to make sure the pockets are clean!
Once everything is in, I hand agitate everything for about 2-3 minutes. Then I leave it to soak while I put JD to bed (usually 20 minutes). After the soak, I dump it all and rinse each piece individually under running water. Then I fill the bucket again with warm water and agitate them again for about a minute to make sure they are rinsed. I then wring them out, roll the covers in a towel to get out all the extra water, and hang to dry. I was hanging them on the shower curtain rod, but after washing 13 flats on Day 4, I needed more room! I now use our HUGE drying rack that I moved from basement to the dining room so it can dry under the ceiling fan. My only laundry problem now is getting the diaper cream off the fleece liners….any thoughts from the blogesphere?
I know this week is about learning, so I tried an origami fold on JD today….it didn’t leak, but it wasn’t pretty! I also tried a Boingo for the first time. This fold was hard to fasten with 2 Boingos, so I ended up using just one on the side. Of course, I didn’t get a picture until I was changing it so it’s wet here:
Even though it worked, I think I’m going to stick with pad folded flats in pockets and the occasional Flip cover. I did hear about a Jo fold, which looked pretty easy. I might try that tomorrow – the LAST day of the challenge. Before this challenge, I would never have thought to use flats in Bumgenius Pocket diapers, but I think I’m starting to like them more than the microfiber! No stink, they’re trim, they dry fast, and cheap!
Find out what are other people talking about today:
We just finished Day 6 of the Dirty Diaper Laundry Flats and Handwashing Challenge. I can see the light! Our family is ONLY using flat cloth diapers this week and have to ditch the washer and dryer in favor of good ol’ fashioned handwashing. There are close to 500 participants this year and many are blogging their journey. You can find their posts linked at the end.