That Time I Took Our Cloth Diapers on Vacation

That's right! I packed up our FuzziBunz and took them on vacation to Maui with us. I know my cloth diapering friends are all curious to see how that all went...so that's what I'm going to tell you!

Since Braden had his own seat, he was allowed to check his own back, which was 1/2 full of cloth diapering supplies. This is what I packed:

• ~20 FuzziBunz perfect size medium diapers
• 3 Bamboozle fitted diapers
• 3 Londonware fleece diaper covers
• Rockin Green Soap sample packs
• Rockin Green Soap laundry scoop
• Rumparooz pail liner
• PlanetWise wet/dry hanging bag
• travel size wet bag
• fleece liners

I found packing as many diapers as I could, worked to my advantage. The more diapers have, the less often you have to do laundry - bonus! Who wants to do more laundry than necessary on vacation? I washed his diapers 4 times and our trip was 11 days which means washing every 2.75 days :) So what was my washing routine like, outside the comfort of my own home and front loading washing machine that I've got a perfect routine with?

I wanted to make sure I had the proper amount of soap, so I brought my scoop. You weren't allowed to have more than 1/4 cup of soap in the washer anyway so I wanted to be extra cautious!

And to save more money...I line dried! It took a long time with the humidity in Maui to dry, so a sunny/windy day worked best. This is another advantage of taking as many diapers with you as possible - giving the clean diapers a chance to dry!

Speaking of "taking a long time to dry"...we had baked something in the oven the night after the first time I washed the diapers. It was taking forever for the oven to cool off, and my diapers still weren't dry from just hanging in the room or on the deck. My MIL said, "why don't you put them in the oven to dry off?" WHY NOT!?

...so I did! It was only my hemp and bamboo that were being stubborn and not drying in the humidity. Hey - don't bash it til you try it - it totally worked!

Did my diapers get as clean as I wanted? Nope.

Did they still get clean enough to use again and again on vacation? Yes!

I knew that they wouldn't be as fresh as they do at home when I use the cycles that I've found work best. But I also knew that when I got home I would wash them with the last of my funk rock, add an extra scoop of soap, do my usual wash cycle with an extra rinse at the end. And you know what? They were as good as ever after that!

Wouldn't it have been easier to just buy disposables? I am cheap people! I did not want to pay for disposables on vacation. I ended up spending about $7.50 washing my diapers on vacation. I don't even know how much disposables cost, but I guarantee you it's more than that! I have to be honest, I don't know if I would have been as keen if I knew before hand that I would have had to haul my laundry all the way to the laundry room by the parking lot. I thought each condo had it's own washer/dryer...but I'm really glad I vacationed with cloth! I even said to my mother-in-law, "I brought them all the way here, I'm using them dammit!" :)

What about the poop? I brought fleece liners and used them with every diaper. He is a pretty predictable pooper, so this made clean up much easier. I did the dunk and swirl in the toilet, and that was enough! But if you want, there are also disposable liners that I've heard work really well!

Did you use everything cloth diaper friendly? Nope. I'm not ashamed to admit that I used disposable wipes. It's easier to me, plus you can use them to wipe up messes and clean faces and such!

If you have any more questions, please comment and ask!!

You better believe we used MonkeyDoodlez swim diapers on the beach too!

My last bit of advice and summary:

• Change your child's diaper right before boarding the plane
• Use an extra absorbent insert or booster so you don't have to change them as often
• You will probably still find yourself changing a diaper more often as they're sitting and constantly compressing their diaper which can increase your chance of leaks
• Take only as many as you think you'll need on the plane
• The airplane change tables are small & cramped, and quite frankly suck! Master the art of changing a diaper whilst they are standing, or lay them down if they are small enough on the airplane seat (this might be frowned upon...but I don't care!)
• Use liners with every diaper to save yourself poop mess
• Take 2 big wet bags/pail liners so you always have a clean one
• The more diapers the better - less washing, more time to dry

That's about all I can think of. I hope you enjoyed this post and thanks for reading! Please check out my cloth diapering page on this blog for more info.