Recycling Cloth Diapers

The cloth diapers you’ve been using for the past 2 years are having issues. The PUL is coming apart, they are wearing thin and don’t absorb like they used to, your little one has grown out of them, or they just don’t get as much love as they used to and have made their way to the bottom of the pile where they stay. I recently had this dilemma, two of my one size diapers had delaminated.

I did get replacements, but I still had these two useless diapers left over. Being a green person and not one to just toss anything into the garbage, I asked myself, “What can I do with these diapers?” A couple of weeks went by and then one day while I was babysitting D, my 7 year old niece, watching as she dragged my toddler around with her everywhere, it suddenly hit me. I asked D to bring her “baby” over to the couch because I had a surprise for her. Eagerly she brought the cabbage patch doll over to me and I laid her down on the couch. I then said, “Your baby is missing something! She’s going to go potty all over the place, so we need to put this diaper on her!” D’s eyes lit up and I could see how excited she was to put the cloth diaper, just like Aunt G uses, on her baby. I must say, I have never seen a little girl so happy about something as simple as a “broken” diaper.I showed her how to size the diaper down to fit her baby, and also showed her how to change it when the time came. We put the other broken diaper on a teddy bear so she could really see how the diapers fit every shape and size.     From that moment on she didn’t put her baby down. She did however put the teddy bear in the swing, on the play mat, and tossed him up in the air. I almost wished I waited until her birthday to give the diapers to her, but I had no idea they would be such a huge hit! Yet another reason cloth diapering is the way to go. They’re not only comfortable for babies and better for the environment, they can also be recycled to give older children something to play with and learn from without spending more money on toys they will outgrow in a month. Plus, I like that I’m already helping another generation follow the cloth diapering movement.