This Ain’t Your Grandma’s Cloth Diapering

• January 5, 2017
• Parenthood

When my brother and I were kids we would hurl dried up horse manure, hard dusty brown wads about the size of golf balls baked in the sun, at each other. The battles were our own rural South Florida version of a snowball fight. There is no room for squeamishness on farms and not much grosses me out- including getting hit in the back of the head with horse poop.

There are only three things in this world that make me cringe and gag: Rancid leftovers forgotten in the back of the fridge, cold dirty water in a sink full of dinner dishes left to sit overnight, and baby poop.

I am so averse to baby poop that the one and only time Ellie Jo has had a blow-out diaper and it got on her clothes, I threw them away. She pooped in a re-useable swim diaper and I tossed it too. Derek, because he loves me, blessedly handled it when she pooped in the bath.

So when Anna Apostolides, the mom behind Nerdy Mommas cloth diaper company, asked us if we would try out her line of cloth diapers and then blog about it I enthusiastically said yes (what a fun idea!) and then panicked. The box of them hadn’t even arrived yet and I was already trying to figure out a way to back out. Cloth diapers? What the hell was I thinking? That is intentionally getting poop on something I can’t throw away! No joke, I had a slew of excuses ready for why we couldn’t actually do this including, but not limited to, having to flee the country and not having extra space for cloth diapers.
Fortunately, Anna gave me a pretty good pep talk (ok, several pep talks) and assured me she would send some disposable liners which are basically really soft tissue paper thin inserts that go inside the diapers and catch the poop. Then the liner and the poop go into the toilet. I am on board with poop in the toilet!

We decided to test the diapers for a week over our holiday break. We went all in and totally switched to cloth to be able to really see how different it really is from disposables- including a day trip to the Florida Aquarium a few hours away so we could test them on the go. Ya’ll, I was losing my mind over nothing.

In our box of cloth diaper goodies Anna included a diaper pail liner that is basically a plastic lined cloth trash bag that we put into the trash can we currently use for diapers. When we change Ellie Jo the wet diapers get dropped right into it. She also included a roll of disposable liners, all-in-one (AIO) diapers where the cloth liners are sewn into them, pocket diapers where the liners come in and out, some liners for the pocket diapers including three hemp liners to use overnight (they’re super absorbent), and a wet bag for travel. When it is time to wash the diapers I just dump the diapers out of the bag into the washing machine, throw the bag in with them, and set it going. Anna sent clear instructions for washing (basically use free and clear detergent, do a cold rinse cycle first, make sure it agitates for 30-45 minutes with hot water, and then clean rinse again) and drying (no heat, tumble dry) so that isn’t complicated either. Contrary to what I expected, it has been easy.

(For more details on the diapers themselves and how they work, check out the Nerdy Mommas FAQ page.)

Now, let’s talk about what our diapering routine has been and what it costs us…

We use Honest Company diapers. We love everything about them except the price. When we first brought Ellie Jo home we tried a variety of generic store brand diapers, Huggies, Luvs, and Pampers. Every single one caused her little baby bum to turn red and break out almost immediately so we switched to Honest Co. In ten months of wearing them she has never had a diaper rash. They are gentle on sensitive skin and they’re more than 80% biodegradable which makes me feel better about how many we dump into the trash every day. They also come in super adorable prints and I will pay for cuteness, my friends! Seriously, we love them- all but their $0.38/diaper average price point.

Currently Ellie Jo goes through an average of nine diapers a day.

Cloth diapers are a fixed cost, but the disposable liners do cost something. The slightly more expensive sensitive skin kind I plan on ordering cost $0.05 per liner. So let’s talk numbers.

Full-Time Disposable (Honest Co) Diaper Costs:
Daily: $3.42
Weekly: $23.94
Monthly: $103.73
Annually: $1,244.88

Full-Time Cloth (Nerdy Mommas) Diaper With Disposable Inserts Costs:
Daily: $0.45
Weekly: $3.15
Monthly: $13.65
Annually: $163.80

Switching to cloth full time would save:
$2.97 per day
$20.79 per week
$90.09 per month
$1,081.08 per year

In addition to the substantial monetary savings, switching to cloth would keep 3,168 disposable diapers out of the landfill which is almost more awesome than saving over a thousand dollars a year.

One of the best things about the Nerdy Momma diapers is that Anna has designed them with a snap system that grows with the child so theoretically they’ll fit your kiddo from size newborn to size four. Assuming kids wear diapers for three years that is potentially $3,243.24 in savings. Plus, if you have a second kid, you can use them all again!

Now, this is great- but if you are like us and your daycare will only use disposable diapers, is it still worth it? We think so.

Most days Ellie Jo doesn’t spend all day at daycare so she averages three diapers at daycare and six at home during the week, plus what she uses at home on the weekends. So if we switch to cloth only while she is home with us it will save us 48 diapers per week. That adds up to $18.24 per week. Plus, there are two weeks of vacation in the winter and at least two in the summer when she is home rather than in daycare so those weeks would have the full $23.94 per week savings.

Annually switching to cloth part time with this schedule would still save us an average of $80.94 per month or $971.28 per year. (Plus, keep 2,496 diapers out of the landfill!)

She is ten months old now so if we assume that she has two more years in diapers, I anticipate our savings to somewhere around $1,942. 

These are all averages, of course. If you worked this out using Pampers diapers as the example your savings would be just about half because they cost half as much as Honest Company diapers. As Ellie Jo gets older my understanding is she will go through fewer diapers in a day, which I didn’t account for. (She went through more when she was younger so my hope is it averages out.) Plus I didn’t account for electricity used to do an extra eight loads of laundry per month because that seemed minimal.

We need 25 cloth diapers to be able to get by only doing two loads of washing per week and they cost $14.99 per diaper- plus we love the wet bag which costs $14.99. That comes to $389.74. We would make our money back in savings in less than six months.  

Now that we have established cloth diapers are good for the earth and your wallet, I want to introduce you to Anna and share some of what she told me about the diapers themselves and her business.

She is a stay-at-home mom and massage therapist who lives in South Florida with her husband Jimmy, their adorable nearly three year old daughter Stavroula (Stav) and their dog, Athena. As you might have already guessed, they are a self-described “nerdy family” who play video games and read comic books- but Anna has a wild side and also does fire spinning which looks totally badass and I would never try because I would accidentally light myself on fire. Her philosophy on parenting is rooted in respect, for both ourselves as mamas and for our children. She stresses the importance of modeling responsible behavior, including teaching sustainable behavior and respect for the environment. When prodded she told me she doesn’t feel qualified to give out parenting advice, but that our only jobs are to raise good people, make informed decisions for our kids, and teach them to use their blinker when they change lanes which seems like awfully good advice to me!

Here are her responses to a few questions about her company:

Question: You told me the liners in your diapers are to your “snooty specifications” which I love, but what about them makes them better than alternative cloth diapers? The inserts that are attached to the AIO diapers and the single insert that goes inside of the pocket diapers are unique to Nerdy Mommas. Each insert is made with bamboo terrycloth as the outer layer with two layers of bamboo and cotton blend on the inside totaling in four layers. The terrycloth overlay is soft and gentle against the skin and wicks away moisture quickly. Blending cotton with bamboo creates a core that absorbs faster than bamboo alone. Since we do not use microfiber in our inserts, we wanted to maintain the speed of moisture absorption without having to use non-natural fibers.

Question: What made you decide to cloth diaper as a new mom? We made the switch after five months of disposables. After Stav developed a rash to even the expensive hypoallergenic brand, I decided to try cloth. And after finding it to be pretty straightforward and easy, I got used to the not having to spend the money on diapers and didn’t want to go back!

Question: How did you end up starting your own line of cloth diapers? Starting Nerdy Mommas was a reoccurring “what if” scenario that my husband and I would throw around. I wanted a diaper that had all the good qualities of other brands that I had tried. I also wanted to create a more easily accessible source for diapers that feature “nerdy” or off beat designs while still staying within a fairly reasonable budget. Some custom pocket diapers cost well over $30 each. And while anything that is handmade is definitely deserving of that price, instead of focusing on the diaper itself being handmade, I wanted to make the designs of the diapers the focus. Each design is digitally drawn or hand drawn by a small group of other moms. As we progress I plan to expand the team and everything is inspired by fandoms that we love.
My review: The diapers are fantastic and easy.

They’re made well, they’re a smart design, they didn’t leak even when we were traveling or Ellie Jo was climbing the furniture, plus they’re cute and colorful. (Admittedly I don’t get most of the “nerdy” fandom references, however I still think the patterns are cute.) But what I love most is that the company was founded by a mom working with a team of other moms, for moms like me. I want the best for my baby and Anna provides that. She determined what would make the best cloth diaper and then she made it, but more than that she found a niche in the market to fill with her nerdy theme, she engaged other women in doing the design work, and she kept her product affordable at the same time. I am excited about saving money and making an environmentally conscious choice but I am even more excited about supporting an entrepreneurial woman who started a business while being a full time mom.

This is girl power in action and ya’ll it makes my momma-of-a-girl heart awful happy.

Check out all of the Nerdy Mommas products on their site: Nerdy Mommas (For the diaper pail bag, hemp overnight inserts, and disposable liners check out amazon or any number of large cloth diapering companies.)

PLUS for a limited time, Anna has generously offered special discount codes to Spilled Milk Love readers!

For 20% off your purchase order, use SPILLEDMILK at check out.

For free shipping on all order $50 or more, use FREESHIPPING at check out

*Disclaimer: I wasn’t paid for this product review and all of the opinions are 100% my own.*

Do it all with love.