Wet Bag Week: Washing Wednesday

I still remember our first week in cloth. I took my lovely six-week-old daughter (that's right, we didn't initially plan to use cloth, read here for our cloth journey) to lunch at a lovely local place, Ingredient. This was our very first outing in cloth diapers. I dutifully added each dirtied prefold into our Planet Wise Medium Wet/Dry bag. Once we returned home I shook the contents of the bag into our diaper pail, then tossed the bag in as well.

'Brilliant. That was so much easier than I expected.'

Then the next day we started to pack the diaper bag for another day out of the house, quickly realizing a) 'we don't have a clean wet bag' and b) 'huh, now what?' Yup, having a newborn in the house is not compatible with forethought.

So, for those who have a stash of wet bags the above will probably never happen to you But for those who only have a wet bag or two for days out of the house, what to do? Use a plastic bag? Sure, but that kind of negates the environmental aspect of cloth. Disposables? Nope, we'd sworn them off. Not leave the house? Um, after staying home six weeks with a newborn I think I would have clawed my way out. Staying home was simply not an option. So I fished out the wet bag, quickly eyeballed it for any rogue poo, and added it in the diaper bag. And from then on, until we added a second wet bag to our stash, I handwashed.

On Handwashing Wet Bags

• Flip the wet bag inside out
• Using a cloth wipe or a spare rag, add a drop of soap or even just plain water, and wipe down the PUL
• Rinse (the PUL portion only - if the cotton woven gets wet it will take much longer to dry!)
• Hang to dry, or wipe PUL with a towel to speed drying time
• Voila, you are ready to go!

Happy scrubbing!