The Great Cloth Diaper Change

As a parent who used to buy disposable diapers for the first 2 months of my son's life, I know how quickly babies can go through them and how costly they are. Not only are they expensive, but they are also extremely rough on our environment piling up in landfills all over the globe. When I first decided to explore the option of using cloth I became excited about all the benefits, (which I wrote about here) but most of all of how much money we would be saving throughout the years our children would be in diapers!
I was also happy to discover that cloth diapers have come a long way in the last 10 years! More people should know about these super-cute, money-saving and environmentally friendly diapers! Luckily a dedicated group of cloth diapering mamas read my mind and created this Guinness World Record event where these amazing diapers will be put on display in honor of Earth Day 2011! This year my son and I, (along with thousands of other parents and babies across the world) will be celebrating Earth Day 2011 with The Great Cloth Diaper Change. The goal of this event is to set the world record for the most cloth diapers changed simultaneously. What a creative way to celebrate being green and also get the word out about how easy and beneficial cloth diapers are to use! You can visit their website through the link above or their Facebook page for information on locations or offer to host a location of your own. Don't shy away either if you don't cloth diaper yet but plan to in the future. I am bringing a friend with me who is doing just that and borrowing one of our diapers so that she can participate with her toddler. Or, maybe you're pregnant and thinking of cloth diapering your baby. Come to an event near you and check out all the great diaper options! The more babies participating the better, so every cloth diapered booty counts! I'm excited to be a part of this epic event and hopefully meet some other cloth diapering mamas in my own community, other than my blogging and long-distance Facebook friends! (So far in my small circle of friends in town I am the only one but I'm sure that soon will change...)
Join us at our local event for the East Bay area on Saturday April 23 at 9am PST. We are being hosted by the lovely Nurture Center in Lafayette, CA. Due to a high number of people interested in this event, it will be taking place at Our Savior Lutheran Church at 1035 Carol Lane, Lafayette CA 94549. 
My son and his baby doll are excited too! He is going with us and will be sporting a cute robot Rumparooz Doll Diaper at the event! Aiden hasn't decided which of his 40 diapers he will be wearing yet but it will be a theme-related one for sure! :)
There are 394 locations world wide and counting! Which location will you be attending? Leave your comment below! We are excited to put cloth diapers on the record books! Watch the short video below for more details and please let me know if you are interested in joining us at our local event here in the East Bay the more the merrier!

Living

Aiden and his cousin on a hike

The other day, a good friend called me up for a chat. She too is a SAHM of a beautiful little 10 month old girl. We got on the subject of making this SAHM-life more memorable with our children and I found myself solidifying some of my own thoughts in my mind as I helped her know the importance of a schedule in my own life and how it has helped me.

Sometimes as a SAHM, it is easy to fall into the black hole of never ending housework, cooking and errands that all are a part of everyday life. It is really easy to fall into a routine of making these not so fun tasks a bigger priority than they really need to be and forgetting that your child is not your sidekick but really the star of the show. I mean, who has earned you the title of the stay at home mommy anyway? So you want the dishes done in the morning before you head out to the park. Or just throw in one load of laundry before I make breakfast. What about my hair? Hmmmmm it would sure look nicer in here if I just made that bed or cleaned up those toys before we head out. Before you know it it's 11:30am, you are still in your pj's and you feel like you haven't even played with your child yet let alone even left the house. I used to have a lot of times like these especially in my son's early months, (0-5 mo.) If you have anal, type A tendencies like myself you know exactly what I am talking about. Or if you tend to fall under the more free-spirited type B personality traits, well then you just think I am a major nut-job. Too many times I have fallen into this trap that makes staying at home a lot less fun and productive than it can be. At times, it can even make you feel like you are so over being a SAHM and you are ready to go back to work! It can also make you wonder, how in the world has that other stay at home mommy of 5 kids made this her whole life for the past 15 years and seemed to LIKE it? If you feel this way more often than not, in my opinion it means you are missing the point of being a stay at home mommy.

creating a masterpiece!

A while back I had come to a point where I had started to feel this way despite the fact that all throughout my life, (pre-marriage) I had imagined how happy I would be when I was married and staying at home with my babies. My sweet husband even saw it. "Don't worry about having a perfect house" he'd say. "Focus more on our son, it's why you are at home after all." As with any job, this one had it's challenging times. The beauty of this job though is that YOU are the boss. YOU are in control of how your days are spent. I've learned that spending them obsessively cleaning my house, doing load after load of laundry and cooking a big meal every single night was NOT the way to go. When I focused too much on the boring stuff, I felt like my days just slipped away from me without many special memories of playing with my son. I realized that I needed to do more living and less of the robotic, everyday chores that make SAHM's return to work too quickly before they've even given this life a fair chance. 

I learned that for us, in our household we needed a schedule. I learned that being the list maker that I am I needed to write it down so that I would actually stick to it. I realized that once my baby was in my mind old enough, (6 months) to get something out of playgroups, library story time, music class, baby gymnastics, ect. that we needed those too. I realized that a mommy support group would be nice too so I joined MOPS and another local mother's club in my city. Suddenly life at home got much more fun and I wasn't focusing as much on the house chores but the memories made inside that house, making connections within a mommy community, and doing activities that were purely child-centered. Once you focus on making memories with your child and truly living, your time at home together will start to become more quality time over quantity. 

throwing rocks in the creek

Here is a glimpse of what "schedule" means to us. Our schedule often changes though for extreme weather or tantrums :), illness, the luxury of changing our minds, or simply "not feeling it today" :) So maybe instead of a schedule, we should call it our weekly goals. I will record it here for a few reasons, 1) To remind myself that sticking with the child-centered activities truly makes my son and I happier, 2) To remember myself what it IS that we do here all week :) and 3) As a tool to educate all my single friends on, "What exactly do you do all day Laura?" when they inquire about my life as a SAHM. :)
How do you spend your time as a SAHM? What are some activities that you enjoy doing with your children?
Leave your comment below with your email. The most creative idea will win a $5 Starbucks giftcard!

Mondays- am- baking project

                       park/outside

                       lunch/nap (house chores, dinner prep)

                 pm- snack/park/free play/read books 

Tuesday-  am- art/music/baby gymnastics

                       lunch/nap

                 pm- park playdate, free play, books or mommy gym-time

Wednesday- am- playdate/run errands

                           park

                          lunch/nap

                     pm- art/free play/books

Thursday-   am- MOPS or Library Storytime

                           lunch/nap

                    pm- snack/park/playdate/books

Friday-        am- playgroup 

                           lunch/nap

                    pm- free play/park/books and or art        

*Free play = mama's doing housework! :) 

Aiden and his cousin decorating birthday cupcakes

Cozy Dumpling Soup

Our neighborhood park across the street from our house

There's a lot you give up when moving from the city to the country, although most would argue that Brentwood California is NOT the country even though it is completely surrounded by farmland, lush green hills, and a mountain!  (Ok and like 50 chains stores, restaurants, golf courses, gated residential communities galore...) There's no more Sephora, only it's frumpier, much older cousin Ulta. There's no more super swanky Nordstrom or unique boutiques, only the bright flourescent lights and obnoxious pre-teeny bopper music coming from Old Navy who carries the exact same style of cardigans that it's been selling since the store first opened in 1994. Don't worry, I still love you Old Lady oooops I mean Old Navy, sometimes I find really cute things there for a great price! :) The point is, that if you're looking for the creme de la creme of well anything besides actual trees, nature and such you will most likely find it in the city. Especially those 5 star restaurants, YUM. Or even the 4 star ones, I'll settle for one of those too. Like PF Chang's... Ohhhhh so yummy! The other night I was craving some PF Chang's but from where I am right now that would require a 40 minute drive through bay area rush hour traffic, an outfit that was NOT my VS Pink mama sweats, a flatiron to my hair and a second income. So I decided that I would stay in our beautiful house wearing my comfy sweats while cooing at my adorable blonde child and create this magical dumpling soup while stopping occasionally to admire the stunning view of Mt. Diablo from my kitchen window while the scent of fresh cut grass wafted into my house. Suburbia at it's best!

Cozy Dumpling Soup
adapted to enhance the yumminess from the December 2010 issue of The Food Network Magazine

4-6 cups of low-sodium chicken broth
1 cup of thick sliced ham or pork diced or sliced (I didn't have ham so I slow-cooked some pork in beef broth, lots of ginger and soy sauce)
2 tablespoons dry sherry or Chinese rice wine
2 tablespoons soy sauce
Fresh, grated ginger to taste
Sliced ginger if you REALLY love it like myself
4 3-inch strips orange zest
Kosher salt, (or sea salt because I'm not Jewish) and freshly ground pepper
2 scallions sliced, white and green parts separated
2 medium carrots thinly sliced
2-3 collard greens leaves thinly sliced
24 frozen Trader Joe's chicken or vegetable dumplings or pot stickers

1. Combine the broth, ham, sherry, soy sauce, ginger, orange zest, 1/2 teaspoon of salt and pepper to taste in a large pot. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Add the scallion whites and carrots. Reduce heat and simmer, uncovered until carrots are crisp-tender about 4 minutes.
2. Add the collard greens, dumplings and scallion greens. Cover and cook until dumplings are soft and heated through, 4-5 minutes. Divide the dumplings and soup among bowls and feast away!

My husband always requests rice with any asian dish but he's not the one trying to work off his mama-gut I always say! But, if you have self-control, (which I do not when it comes to food) and a husband who thinks he's half-Asian, by all means make the rice. But use brown because we all know that, "The whiter the bread, the sooner you'll be dead!" -Michael Pollan author of Food Rules and a designated repository for the nation's food conscience.

Nighttime Cloth Diapering for Toddlers

Somewhere around my son's 16 month birthday,  our cloth diapers began leaking at night. At this point I was only using a regular insert paired with a newborn insert in my pocket diapers and I knew this method wasn't going to last forever.
My first solution was to take a hemp pre-fold such as the Econobum prefold that I once received as my free promotional diaper from Kelly's Closet (click on the icon on my right sidebar!) and fold it in thirds paired with a one-size microterry insert then stuff it into one of my pocket diapers such as my Bum Genius 4.0 or my Happy Heiny One Size Diaper. This worked beautifully and kept my son dry all 12 hours of his nighttime slumber. The only problem was that I only owned one pre fold diaper, (because this isn't 1952 people, we use pocket diapers now) so I either needed to buy a few more just for nighttime use or shop for something similar that would do the job.
I found some Knickernappies Super Do Pre Washed Inserts and they looked like just what I needed to solve the problem. They had 6 layers of hemp terry combined with 2 layers of microfiber. They were all once piece and appeared less bulky than the pre fold I had been using. I ordered 3 to start with. The large size fit perfect into all of my one-size pocket diapers, Bum Genius, Smartipants, Happy Heiny, Fuzzi Bunz and Kissaluvs. They were a lot less bulky than double stuffing the diapers and one insert lasted 11+ hours through the night for my toddler. SCORE!!!

Knickernappies Super Do inserts will fit any of these diapers! 

I am still using them today as my 23 month old son nears his two year old birthday. He is dry and happy all through the night as long as you sing him, "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" first and his three favorite friends are smooshed around his head :)