Home-made nappies

I know that I made the big statement last weekend that I would be finishing FIVE WIP. It was never going to happen, but I tend to often make big plans like that to help motivate me to do more than I should. Anyway, I have managed to get (or nearly get) the biggest WIP that I had off my table (or nearly off).

Towards the end of my pregnancy with the girl-child I discovered the "new" cloth nappies. I hadn't seen them when the boy-child was a babe and I was intrigued by a cloth nappy that didn't have all the drawbacks of the old style ones - in particular the folding, inability to wick moisture away from said-babies bum and the stuffing around with pins etc. These new all-in-one nappies seemed to be about $17 a pop, so they were never really a cheap option...given that I figured we would need about 20.

Then I found a few online places that sold the special fabrics and gave a call-out to Georgie who happily passed on her nappy knowledge to me. She gave me some great advice, pointed me in the direction of some Australian suppliers and showed me the ropes...and I was off. Or so I thought.

I bought my special Snap machine, agonised over fabric, finally purchased it and then it sat - AGAIN! So last week, sick of paying about $17 a week for disposals I bit the bullet. Decided not to buy any more nappies, and basically sewed nappies just out-pacing the girl-child's requirements.

So to the particulars, the outside is Poly PUL. The inside fabric (closest to babies skin) is suede cloth which wicks the moisture away nicely and is not too bulky. For the insert I used bamboo and some old towels (again thanks Georgie) which I overlocked together to make a pad shape. These are stuffed inside the nappy, and after Georgie's advice are the best option for places like Canberra in winter where the washing takes a really long time to dry. I'm thrilled at the result. I'm not adding to landfill with 6 to 8 disposals every day and I'm loving saving money (I estimate about $800 a year)...and I think they look pretty too!
I got about 7 nappies from each metre of PUL and suedecloth, which when combined with the cost of the bamboo insert came to $5.45 a nappy. OK so I had to buy the snap machine, but I'm sewing bibs like a storm and have many other plans for using it...stay tuned for more.