Road Trip with Cloth

Previously, though I have been cloth diapering my son since his birth, I had not gotten up the courage to use cloth diapers while traveling. I also had not taken a trip longer than two or three days.

Then my mother sent me a birthday card with a post-script that said, "Tues Apr 7th all [of my family] are getting together... for 60th B-days for Dad, Kati + Bruce -- bring Garrett to meet everyone!"

After a brief conversation with my husband I was on the road heading toward home.

Though my diaper stash is respectable, it is by no means huge so I grabbed both of my wet bags, filled the one with every cloth diaper I owned that fit my son (including the prefolds and covers, wool and doublers) and left the other one empty to use as the true "wet bag."

The five and a half hour drive was the longest I'd ever taken by myself with a baby and I was thrilled with how well we did, stopping only three times to nurse and change diapers.

When we arrived at my parents' home we had as fantastic of a time as I could hope for. It was wonderful to meet my niece for the first time and for Garrett's aunts, cousins, great aunts and uncles and old friends to meet him, too.

My sister offered to change Garrett's diaper and later that evening I took off his clothes to find she had put his BumGenius AIO on backwards. It didn't leak and Garrett didn't seem to care so all was well.

The only real hiccup was when it came to washing. My parents have a water softener and I unintentionally used too much detergent in the wash which caused an array or suds and bubbles in the wash that took several rinses to clear. It was good that they have their own well water so I didn't have to feel guilty about doing multiple rinses.

I had a wonderful time and the experience taught me that it's not so scary to take cloth diapers on a trip.

In retrospect I have learned a few things I would like to pass on as advice:

• Unless prefolds and covers are your only and/or favorite means of diapering, leave them at home and take only fitted, one-size or AIO diapers. I found I used the prefolds only as changing pads and as they added bulk to an already overly-bulky luggage I wish I had left them at home. My BumGenius AIOs and Pockets were my go-to diapers for the entire trip as I was always on the go and famiy who offered to change my son's diapers found them easier to manage.
• When washing diapers in an unfamiliar washing machine, with unfamiliar water, start with 1/4 the recommended detergent and go from there. It's a lot easier to rewash a load of diapers than it is to do six rinses to get all of the excess detergent out.
• If you have a night-time system that works well for you don't try to change it while traveling. While in someone else's house, in someone else's bed, is not the time to discover leaks and mishaps in your diapering system.
• If you take wool, make sure it's good and lanolized and clean before you go. Take the minimum for wool cleaning. I didn't have to wash or lanolize any of my wool while I was gone but I was ready if I had needed to.
• Have fun and don't worry. If you discover that cloth diapers are getting in the way of you having a fun time then switch to disposables if you can and enjoy yourself. Agonizing about your baby's diapers is not cunducive to having a good time. A few days or disposables to give you the freedom to enjoy your time with friends, family or in a new place is well worth it.

I won't hesitate to take my cloth on another trip though I will be looking for more AIOs before I do. I had so much fun with my family and I was happy to not have to use a single disposable my entire trip.

Take a chance. Take a trip. Take your cloth!