Using Cloth Diapers – All the Info You Need About Pocket Diapers

Diapers are something that our babies will be wearing pretty much all the time, day and night so it was important to us to avoid toxins when it comes to diapers.

Before my son was born I researched every type of cloth diaper for months! I looked into all-in-ones, all-in-twos, pockets, prefolds, fitteds, flats, wool covers, disposable liners, hemp inserts, microfiber inserts, cotton inserts, and every other combination you can think of.

We settled on pocket diapers because they were the best fit for our need. Easy to use and put on like a disposable diaper, fast and easy to dry since the insert comes out, affordable, and dryer safe (on low) which is a must because we’re busy.

If you’re looking for info about newborn pocket diapers see our post about that here.

What is a pocket diaper

A pocket diaper is a waterproof outer cover with a pocket on the inside where you put an absorbent insert. The insert just looks like a long rectangle and slides right in. It can be made from cotton, hemp, microfiber, bamboo, or a combination. Then the pocket diaper snaps on in a very similar way to how a disposable diaper goes on. They come in the cutest prints too! So much more adorable than disposable diapers in my opinion.

This is our favorite type of diaper because they’re simple to put on, easy to wash, fast and easy to dry, and affordable. They’re also customizable because you can use any insert in the pocket. You can adjust the size of the diaper just with the snaps so as our son grows we just adjust the snaps (which really only happens every couple of months). You don’t need to unsnap the settings when you wash or dry them, so they’re ready to use straight out of the dryer! Just put an insert in the pocket and you’re ready to go.

Our Favorite Diapers and Inserts

My favorite cloth diaper brands for pocket diapers are Cedar Valley Cloth and Cutie Caboose. There are probably a ton of other great brands out there too that we just haven’t tried because we’re happy with these.

These ones are lined with AWJ (Athletic Wicking Jersey) which pulls the wetness away from the skin. We love this feature and probably wouldn’t choose anything else.

One thing to be aware of is that the outer layer of the the diapers are PUL, which is a synthetic material and the inner AWJ liner is also a synthetic material. While we don’t love synthetic materials, these diapers were the best combination of being functional, comfortable, easy, and affordable for us. There are definitely more natural diaper materials you could look into, such as unbleached cotton diapers and wool covers, but we are happy with these pocket diapers for our needs.

Our favorite diaper inserts are the 6 Layer Hemp and Bamboo Terry Inserts from Greener Odyssey. You will need to wash and dry these 2-5 times before you use them because each wash and dry cycle makes them more absorbent.

Using Pocket Diapers – Full Overview of the Process

1. Before using the diapers make sure to wash them and the inserts a few times so that they are more absorbent. This is especially important for the inserts because they’re made from natural materials (hemp cotton and bamboo) and washing and drying helps to remove the natural oils to get to the maximum absorbency.
2. When you’re ready to use them for the first time you’ll need to figure out the settings for the snaps. This can be confusing the first few times, but once you get the fit right it’s super easy. There are rise snaps, that adjust how high up the diaper is and how big the leg holes are. Then there are the hip snaps that you snap when putting the diaper on your baby (just like how the velcro works on a disposable diaper).
3. To do a diaper change just grab a diaper, put an insert in, and put it on your baby (it’s seriously just as easy as using a disposable diaper)
4. When you take off a dirty diaper if it’s just pee or breastfed poop (more info on that below), just pull out the insert to separate it from the diaper cover and throw both in the wet bag.
5. If it’s a poop diaper from anything besides breastmilk it’s not water soluble, so you need to rinse off the poop into the toilet first, then throw it in the wet bag.
6. Every 1-3 days just dump all the dirty covers and inserts, plus the wet bag into the washer. Go through your wash routine (more on that below) and throw them in the dryer on low, or out on the line.
7. That’s it!

What’s the Deal with Poop?

If your baby is EBF (exclusively breastfed) their poop will be water soluble so there’s nothing you need to do different from a pee diaper. Just throw the dirty diaper in the wet bag.

If your baby drinks any formula or has started eating solids you will need to clean the poop off the diaper before throwing it in the wet bag. It sounds way harder than it really is though. With the right tools it makes it so much easier.

We use a sprayer hooked to our toilet and a spray shield that sits on the toilet bowl.

Here’s how we handle a poop diaper using the sprayer and spray shield:

1. Pull the insert out and put it in the dirty diaper pail/wet bag
2. Clip the diaper to the spray shield (with the pocket opening down, otherwise the water gets stuck inside the pocket of the diaper)
3. Spray the diaper (downward) until everything solid is off the diaper
4. Throw the diaper in the dirty diaper pail/bag
5. Spray off the spray shield and set it back on the drip tray
6. Flush the toilet
7. (optional) you can spray your spray shield with sanitizer, although we honestly don’t do that all the time, only when we’re cleaning the bathroom. (This is the non-toxic sanitizer we use for everything including the spray shield and diaper pail)

How Do You Store Dirty Diapers so They Don’t Stink?

We love this Dekor Plus diaper pail. We’ve been using it since my son was born with their cloth diaper bags and we’ve never had any problems with it. You just throw the dirty diapers in and it contains the smell. Then on wash day you pull the whole bag out and wash it along with the diapers. The cloth diaper bags come as a set of 2 so you always have one to put in the diaper pail while the other one is in the wash.

Can You Use Diaper Cream/Balm with Cloth Diapers?

Yes! There are many that are safe to use with cloth diapers but we only use the Earth Mama Diaper Balm and it is cloth diaper safe. It works so well that it’s all we use. Any time my son has started to get any slight rash we use this and it’s totally gone by the next day.

Anything with petroleum or zinc can’t be used with cloth diapers or they will permanently stain. This has never been a problem for us because we avoid petroleum based skincare products anyways and haven’t found the need to ever use diaper cream with zinc.

We also love the Redmond Bentonite Clay Baby Powder and that is also safe for cloth diapers.

How Long Can Dirty Diapers Sit?

We try to wash them every other day but sometimes they’ve sat for 3-4 days and we’ve never had a problem. I think any longer than that and you may be risking your diapers. There can be bacterial growth and ammonia build up in the fabric. The stains and smell can also set it in and be harder to get out.

Consider your climate too, if you live in a more humid environment you may want to aim for every 1-2 days since bacteria grows more in those conditions.

The great thing about the Dekor Diaper Pail we use, is that it only fits about 2 days worth of diapers so that’s our sign to throw it in the wash and switch it for a clean bag.

What is Our Wash Routine?

We do a cycle on “Heavy Duty – Hot” with one cap of laundry detergent and set it to do 3 extra rinses to make sure there’s no soap residue left. Then we repeat that. When it comes out we throw everything in the dryer on low.

This has worked great for us however I know there can be a lot of variation on what works best for people depending on water hardness and how big your load of diapers is. I used the wash worksheet from Cloth Diapers for Beginners when we were first starting out to figure out our first wash routine.

What Type of Laundry Detergent Can Be Used?

There’s so much conflicting information out there and in pretty much every cloth diaper group I’ve ever joined they say you need to use something toxic like Tide. Through more research though, I found out that the detergent you use should have a surfactant (versus just being a soap).

We use the Attitude unscented baby detergent. It lists two types of surfactants in the ingredients and has worked really well for us in the 11 months we’ve been cloth diapering.

Make sure you don’t use fabric softener or dryer sheets, both because they leave a coating on your diapers that will make them less absorbent and also because they’re typically full of pretty toxic ingredients.

What About Enzymes in Laundry Detergent?

The detergent we use does not have enzymes. Enzymes are not required for washing cloth diapers. Some people argue about this and insist that they are needed, but I can’t find any evidence that it is required. Enzymes are typically used for stain removal, so while it may remove stains better, it’s not necessary for washing cloth diapers.

Can Other NonToxic Laundry Detergents be Used?

I think you can use pretty much any laundry detergent you want as long as it contains surfactants and is not just a laundry soap.

What’s the Best Way to Remove Stains?

The sun! Seriously, if you have some stains on your diapers or inserts just set them outside on a sunny day and the stains come right out. It works better than any other stain treatment we’ve tried.

Do Cloth Diapers Really Save Money?

The quick answer is cloth costs around $16 per month while the average cost for a disposable based on the brands below is about $ per month

For us this was a fair comparison because we were never going to choose pampers or huggies to use as our full time diapers, we would have researched disposable brands to find the best option between being non-toxic and affordable.

Currently, (at around 10 months old) my son uses about 6-8 diapers a day. That’s between 180 and 240 diapers per month. Here’s the cost per month for each diaper brand at the time of writing this based on a size 3 diaper.

For cloth, I based the cost per month on a stash of 24 pocket diapers for $11 each and 24 Inserts for $108 based on their current prices. I estimated that the diapers would be used for 2 years (which is probably a very low estimate).

Brand	Cost per Diaper	Cost Per Month (6 per day)	Cost per Month (8 per Day)
Honest	$0.42	$75.60	$100.80
Coterie	$0.54	$97.20	$129.60
Millie Moon	$0.28	$50.40	$67.20
Attitude Eco	$0.67	$120.60	$160.80
Healthy Baby	$0.53	$95.40	$127.20
Dyper	$0.59	$106.20	$141.60
Hello Bello	$0.46	$82.80	$110.40
Thrive Market	$0.32	$57.60	$76.80
Average of Disposables	$0.49	$88.20	$117.60
Cloth Pockets + Inserts	$15.50	$15.50	$15.50

Disposable Diapers We Use

We currently use disposable diapers for overnight (although I’m looking into cloth options), camping, and when we’ll be traveling in the car for a while. We have used Honest (and Honest Overnight), Dyper, and Coterie and have been happy with all of them. Every type of diaper has its pros and cons and it seems you can find something that could be toxic in every solution however, these are the disposable diapers we’ve personally used and our son has not had any reactions to them.

Summary

We highly suggest pocket diapers if you’re looking for the easiest most straightforward and affordable way to start cloth diapering.

We prefer the AWJ (athletic wicking jersey) liners in the pocket diaper to wick away moisture from baby’s skin paired with the hemp cotton/bamboo inserts because they’re super absorbent and don’t leak unless you leave them on for too long (over 2-3 hours).

Washing is easy once you figure out your wash routine, you just throw them in for however many cycles you decide and then put them in the dryer on low (or hang out on the line).

For EBF (exclusively breastfed) babies you can just throw poop diapers straight in the wet bag/pail to wash. For babies eating formula or solids you rinse them off in the toilet first, and we highly suggest a sprayer and spray shield for that. I honestly don’t know how we would do it without those.

Some people may tell you you need a strong toxic laundry detergent, but so far the Attitude baby detergent we use has worked great. As long as yours is a detergent (not just a soap) and contains surfactants it should work fine!

The money you will save by using cloth diapers is huge! Just be careful, I’ve seen people get hooked on buying all of the new diaper prints as they come out because they are just so cute. There’s nothing wrong with that, but if you’re trying to save money, make sure you only buy what you need or it can start adding up quickly.

Do you cloth diaper? Do you have any other tips I missed? Let us know in the comments!