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Hey there!
We LOVE our gDiapers. Before Little G was born I was pretty confused about the logistics of doing gDiapers and took a leap of faith that I would figure it out. Truth is, it is just as easy as a disposable diaper...and (in my opinion) there isn't even a learning curve. Here are a few of my thoughts on them now that we have been using them for over a year:
- When Little G was born, they hadn't yet offered the tiny gDiapers so we had heard that many people used disposables until their baby hit the 8lb mark. As you might know, Little G was 10lbs, 5oz when he was born, so fit was never an issue. However, we did wait until his umbilical cord fell off. For most people that takes a few weeks and I thought that would give me plenty of time to get used to the idea of the gDiapers...but Little G lost his umbilical cord very early by getting it snagged on my shirt as I was picking him up after a sponge bath. Small side note: I totally freaked because I was told even if it was hanging on by a thread to not take it off so the fact that I basically ripped it off with my shirt days before it was ready to come off totally freaked me out...in the end, it was fine. But it did mean that I threw caution to the wind and decided to start on the g's the next day. I think we had about 8 pants, 10 liners and a few packs of inserts since I had no idea how many he would go through in a day.
- Starting on the gDiapers was very easy. I had watched the videos on their website and asked some questions on babycenter.com so I felt pretty confident. However, even though I had shown my husband the video on how to flush them, I should have given him an actual lesson. The first day Little G used gDiapers was the first day I was home alone with him. It went pretty well all things considered. Then my husband came home and took care of a poopy diaper upstairs while I was downstairs in the kitchen. Apparently he forgot the video he had watched and just tossed the entire gDiaper into the toilet without tearing down the sides or anything! Needless to say, THAT clogged the toilet! In fact, it clogged the toilet so badly that it started to back up and apparently there was a very old seal on the toilet which meant it backed up into the floor of the bathroom...also known as the ceiling of the kitchen below it where I was standing wondering why it was all of the sudden raining from our pot lights. Yeah...it was a MESS!!! So...moral to that story is to make sure EVERYONE knows exactly how to flush a gDiaper
- At first, we flushed every single insert wet or poopy because I had never composted before and we had a new baby and the concept of figuring all of that out while figuring out how to take care of a newborn was just, well, more than I could comprehend. However, after about a month, we realized that our water bill was going up tremendously. So for a few months, we disposed of the wet diapers and flushed only the poopy ones. However, even though that was much better than tossing out regular disposables, I still felt like we could do better, so we got a good, sturdy compost bin (the city provides some for about $30, but they aren't too sturdy and we figured if composting was going to become a long-term part of our lives, than we should invest in a good bin and we are very glad we did as the sunniest place on our lot is also right next to where we park and visible to the street so it is nice having it all contained and not looking like a big, messy heap). I'm not sure if you already compost, but if you don't let me just say it is so freaking easy to do I can't believe we didn't do it sooner. Seriously. No maintenance. And the best part is that you are supposed to maintain a 70/30 ratio of 'brown' to 'green' which some people find difficult since most food scraps are considered green and once the fall is over, no one usually has a plethora of brown...except the diapers are considered 'brown' which means even less to worry about! Ok...so we started composting the wet ones and they really do break down quickly, and we flush the poopy ones and the only thing that gets tossed and potentially makes our house smelly are the wipes.
- Leaking - we did (and still do) have some leaking issues. Our first issue came about the time that Little G was growing out of the smalls and into the mediums...I think he was about 2 months old. The issue didn't last too long and we used sheet protectors in his crib so it was never a huge issue to just change that out in the middle of the night if we needed to. The main issue was just that he was between sizes. Our next issue came once he started sleeping from his last feeding at 10 to about 4:30 in the morning. He would pee through the diaper. At that point he was in the mediums, so for a while we would use the medium insert regularly and then we would fold a small insert into thirds and put it towards the front of his diaper. This made a HUGE diaper, but also kept him from leaking through the night. Once he moved into the large diapers, he was sleeping 10-12 hours at night and even the doubling up didn't hold all of it...so we threw in the towel and started using a Huggies Overnight diaper at night. It frustrates me a little, but he doesn't leak any more at night which means better sleep for all of us and in the end, it will be no more than 700 diapers over his lifetime as opposed to thousands more so I have to let it go. The only other issue we have with leaking is sort of specific to Little G's very unique method of getting around and really can't be blamed on the diaper design. Little G doesn't crawl to get where he needs to go, he scoots on his butt. So when he is scooting, the insert tends to bunch up towards his rear leaving no coverage in the front which he definitely needs since he is a boy! Again, everyone who has ever seen him scoot has said they have never seen a kid do that before, so I really can't blame the engineering of the gDiaper for what seems to be our personal issue.
- Wear and tear - I will be honest, our gDiapers have taken a beating, but part of that is how big Little G is. He is the size of a small two year old and has been since he was 10 months old! So we have been in the large gDiapers for a while. The large diapers use the medium liners and inserts, so our liners have also taken a beating and the elastic is starting to go on them. You can order them separately off their website so I guess we will do that someday to supplement. Also, on a few of our pants, the snaps have come off the binding. I could VERY EASILY sew them back on, but I prefer to send them back to gDiapers 1) because then they know that there is a reoccurring issue with the snaps coming off and 2) because you get a new pant with new Velcro. The Velcro hasn't been an issue for us at all, although I know the older versions seemed to get less sticky in the past
- Other thoughts -
We only have a sample of one, so Lord only knows if this is normal or not, but even as a tiny baby, Little G only pooped once a day and we could usually time it based on when he went the day before. I am not sure that I would want to deal with cloth diapers for the poopy ones, but I can imagine that it is rather easy for pee diapers. That said, I think in the future, we may purchase some cloth inserts to use for future children so we are moving even closer to a more environmentally friendly diapering option.
We get all of our inserts from Amazon.com through their subscribe and save feature. gain, I had no idea how many diapers we would or would not need to have in the house at any given time, but with the subscribe and save it isn't an issue at all. Basically you sign up and tell them how often you want a case delivered. I opted for once a month. The program gives you a 15% discount on your diapers and FREE SHIPPING. The best part is that if I need more before the month is up, I can go online and request that they send my next shipment immediately. The best part is I can decide if I want the next shipment to go a month from my new shipment or keep
the original shipment...so for instance, if I am scheduled to have a delivery go out on October 1 but I need them to send them now...I can either opt to have my next shipment go out as scheduled on October 1 or a month from now on October 15. They also have a 30% off subscribe and save offer about four times a year and they automatically honor the discount so you don't have to go in and request it.
I also signed up for the gMum program on the gDiapers website...they send a survey every once in a while and the first people to fill it out get a prize (usually a coupon or a couple of gPants) and they also send out marketing materials every once in a while with a stack of $2.00 coupons to use.
The old gRewards program had you send in 10 proofs of purchase and they would send you a gPant and liner. We used that program to get all of our medium and large gPants which means that we only ever paid for the original 8 small gPants. However, their new program is a bit different. You send in 10 UPCs and they send you a coupon for a certain amount in their store. And as I write this it seems that program ended at the end of July and they haven't announced their new program.
Lastly, we do still have our small and medium gPants that we are saving for the next baby and (depending) the one after that. The gPants wear well, but I can imagine that by the third child they will be pretty worn. We got most of our smalls from Craigslist way back when. I'll bet you can probably find some there. The key is to look outside your area...most people are more than willing to send them to you if you offer to cover the shipping.
Thanks for sharing your g-story! Its like you are writing my life! We have basically done the exact same thing as you- flush the poopies, compost the wet, had problems with leaking, double up the inserts at night which solved that, etc. So funny! :)
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