We live in the kind of home where people spill something and when searching for a paper towel are confused as to why there aren’t any. When I hand them a rag, they tend to blink in confusion before asking me if it’s actually ok if they “ruin” my rag. Ever since my husband and I got married, there’s been cloth in this house. We use cloth napkins I made from fabric scraps lying around from unrealized projects and rags that came from set of jersey sheets. Everything else that we use to clean the house is reusable cotton or microfiber. So when we chose to do cloth diapers, it made the most sense for us. I then went one step further and added cloth wipes to my laundry piles.
Last spring after almost a whole successful year of cloth diapering, I was really getting used to not throwing anything away in the house. We were able to switch to a smaller trash pickup and with the money we saved, I put that into a recycling pick up from our home so that I didn’t have to haul my piles of recyclables to the next town over. Then, I made an investment in plates and cups that we could reuse for all our parties. A few months later, I found myself sewing reusable produce bags and birthday decorations. Successes from both of those endeavors inspired me to try new food preservation ideas, baking more of my foods from scratch and learning to be less wasteful by relying more on myself than on conventional products.
Cloth diapering for me has been just a continuation of a frugal lifestyle. I’m always on the look-out for new, green options for our home and I’m hoping that by keeping them in the forefront of our minds it will always be a part of our lives. I’m proud to raise my children in a home with cloth. Be it wiping up spills, covering a heiny or washing windows, cloth makes my life green and frugal. Just like I like it.
Beyond the Diaper – Inspiration and Resources for Reusables
- Cloth wipes are a perfect addition to your diapering routine. I had a few extra receiving blankets that were worn to the perfect softness and in a mere 10 minutes trimmed those blankets into a pile of wipes. I kept mine super simple and just cut squares out of the fabric, but you can bind the edges with contrasting thread. Simple Organic has a wonderful tutorial on how to make and store your new wipes! Not a lot of time or spare flannel? Head on over to Etsy for a wide range of styles and fabrics.
- If you’re interested in making the leap to cloth wipes for the whole family, Crunchy Chicken is responsible for everything I know about reusable wipes in the bathroom.
- Once I was fully invested in bringing my own bags to the grocery, I thought it was time to cut out the produce bags as well. I found good inspiration and ideas in this post from Mindful Momma, but in the end, wound up making something more like what I found on Etsy. I was able to find cotton mesh fabric and used scraps from a misguided attempt at curtains to make them stand out in my cart.
- There are a lot of tutorials out there for UNpaper towels, but I’m here to tell you it’s as easy as finding some absorbent fabric and cutting to the desired size. You can serge the edges if you’d like or leave them free. In my case, I had a jersey knit sheet set with a giant hole in it thanks to my dog. Instead of throwing the set away, I cut both the sheets and the pillowcases into large squares and have them stashed all over the house in baskets just waiting for a spill.
- If you’re looking for a way to ditch the plastic baggies as you head out on your picnics this summer, here’s a great tutorial for sewing reusable wrappers that will add some fun to your lunches!
