Cloth Diapering:Care and Washing Instructions

from www.inhabitots.com 

Prepare Cloth Diapers For First-Time Use

It is important to wash cloth diapers before use - mainly, to remove the chemical residues left behind from manufacturing.

Generally, you need to wash the cloth diapers once, with half the recommended detergent. However, natural fibers (like hemp and cotton) need extra TLC:

• Wash 3-5 times in hot water using proper amount of detergent.
• Dry in between wash to ensure shrinkage and proper absorbency.
• Avoid pre-washing with polyester products. The natural oils in hemp and cotton may stick to the micro fleece and cause repelling.

For my very first set of cloth diapers (CDs), I followed the recommendations in the Modern Cloth Nappying Pinays (MCNP) Facebook group:

• For shells and anything with PUL: Soak overnight in COLD water. Wash once with a little detergent. Line-dry under the sun. 
• For inserts, soakers, boosters: Soak overnight in HOT water, especially natural materials like bamboo or hemp. Wash once with a little detergent. Line-dry under the sun.

However, after that, we no longer soaked the new nappies overnight. We just machine wash them. So far, no issues encountered.

General Care And Washing Instructions

There are different methods of washing cloth diapers. For general instructions, this is a good place to start.

At home, this is what we normally do:

• Shake (or sometimes, scrape) off the solids into the toilet. Wash the remaining poo with running water. If you have a diaper sprayer, that would make things a lot easier.
• If you are using pockets, remove the inserts before placing them inside the diaper pail.
• If it's soiled with poop,  I would soak the diaper in warm water with detergent for an hour. Otherwise, I just rinse it with water before tossing it to the diaper pail. A little warning though: soaking it overnight is not recommended.
• Load the diapers into the washer. I normally place covers inside laundry mesh bags. Make sure that velcro tabs are fastened to avoid diaper chains.
• If the diapers stink after washing, try an extra rinse.
• If possible, line dry the diapers under the sun - this is an effective way of removing stains.

Here are other things to remember:

• You can wash the diapers every day or every other day.
• Use the recommended detergent. These are some of the detergent we used and recommended by other moms*:
• Cycles
• Smart Steps
• D-Nee Liquid Detergent
• Charlie's Soap
• Tide Original*
• Champion Original*
• Human Heart Nature Liquid Detergent*
• Do not use natural soaps, bleach and fabric softeners. These can affect the absorbency of the cloth diapers.
• If you're not certain if a diaper rash cream is cloth diaper friendly, use a liner.

Trouble Shooting Tips

• It's leaking!
• If it's a new diaper, chances are, you need additional washes to improve absorbency.
• You could also try a "booster". We normally use flat diapers (gauze lampin) instead of other more expensive brands.
• Check the fit. If using OSFM (one size fits most), you can adjust the snaps.
• This could also be attributed to build up of products like creams or detergent. If this the case, you would need to strip the cloth diapers.
• Got stains?
• Stains are best treated by hanging it in the sun to dry.
• For stubborn stains, we would treat it with the following stain removers:
• Cycles Stain Soaker
• Oxiclean Baby
• Does it stink?
• Sometimes, the diaper smells like Ammonia. This may be caused by the combination of detergent residue and urine. You may run an extra rinse cycle. Or, you could also strip it.

Stripping

This term would generally elicit a smile from my husband. Unfortunately for him, this sort of stripping is rated GP.

image from www.momsmilkboutique.com 

Stripping is a process meant to remove or "strip" build ups from the cloth diapers. This is generally done when you encounter repelling issues. In our case, we have not encountered any issues yet, but I have done this twice within a  span of one year. There are several ways to do this, but the most convenient by far, is using RLR. I just follow instructions on the label:

• Simply open the package and empty full contents of the packet (no matter what type of machine you have) directly on dry or wet (already clean!) laundry in your washing machine. Wash as usual, along with a proper amount of cloth diaper safe detergent in your normal hot wash cycle. Run several rinse cycles after washing, until no suds remain in the final rinse.

For more information, you may also check out the files under the MCNP Facebook group.

Happy cloth diapering!