My Cloth Diaper History

My mom used cloth diapers. Here you can see me (with my mom, little sister, and my dolly Polly), and there is my cloth diaper.


They were the big cotton flats, 36inches square, layered two or three thick then folded into a trapeziodal shape and pinned on with four pins (one at each hip, one at each leg), and covered with good old gerber plastic pants. They were very bulky. They were all white, and were always soaked in bleach water until laundry day.
I am the oldest of 9 kids, and all of us wore those same cloth diapers (or the same kind at least!), so as you can imagine I had to learn how to change diapers pretty early on. I think I was about 7 when I learned to change a diaper. I had to learn to do it because our babysitters couldn't figure out how to handle the pins. To the best of my memory, I only poked a baby once, but I poked myself a few times.
I hated the pins, I hated the bleach, I hated how bulky they were, I hated the stinky sopping wet diapers (and the idea of the baby feeling wet all the time). I swore I would never ever use cloth diapers.

When I was a newlywed I met some mamas who used new cloth--I think a FuzziBunz may have been my introduction to things like PUL and shaped diapers with elastic (elastic!!! How brilliant!) I thought they were pretty cool--and pretty cute. I saw how trim they were, and the fact that they were all one piece rather than needing those awful plastic pants.
Around the same time I started using cloth pads for myself, and the difference in comfort between cloth and the paper/plastic disposable pads was enormous. It made me consider cloth for the pure comfort of it.
When I was pregnant, I started researching cloth diapers. I learned about dry pails and I was sold. One day I approached my husband about it, and he said "well, let's be honest, you'll probably do most of the changing anyway [since I was a stay-at-home-mom and he worked full time], so if you want to do it let's go for it." I read reviews of various brands and started doing price comparisons, and realized that if I was going to buy them I'd pay $15 each for pocket diapers, but that I could make them for $4 each. So I bought fabric and started sewing my own.

I happened to mention to a friend what I was doing, and she commissioned me to make 6 diapers for her. Then she asked if I could do 6 in the next size... Then (after two months of buying disposables) my sister decided to switch to cloth and hired me to make them for her since she doesn't sew. So I opened shop!

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade lilbees.etsy.com

Giveaways!!

I am sponsoring the "Fluff a Rump on Hump Day" giveaway over at the Etsy Cloth Diaper Team this week (winner drawn on Aug 4). I'm giving away a custom AIO (all-in-one) diaper, with the winner's choice of fabrics, size, and closure (snaps or touchtape). They can choose from something in stock, or I will make a custom diaper.
You can enter at the team blog (link above), and get extra entries for following that blog, following this blog, liking my facebook page, liking the team facebook page, twittering about the giveaway, or blogging about it! A purchase from my shop during this time will earn you FIVE extra entries, just leave a note to the seller (me) when you check out and I'll get your entries put in!

Keep an eye out, because in a couple of weeks I'll be sponsoring another giveaway at 3am Cloth Diapers, No Pins Needed. She is doing a big "Made in the USA" event, with multiple reviews and giveaways of cloth diapers made by work-at-home-moms in the USA. Check it out! (I'll be sure to let you know when the giveaway goes live, but in the meantime, the same kinds of things that are worth extra entries on the other giveaway will be good for this one too--follow her or my FB page, follow our blogs, twitter, blog, etc). ☺

And after both of those, if my facebook page gets up to enough fans, I'll do a third giveaway there--this time for a gift certificate, which would be good for any item in either of my shops (not just cloth diapers).

Beatles inspired diapers

A couple of months ago I made this diaper:

As I looked at it, and tried to decide what to title it in the listing, the thought came to me to call it Strawberry Fields Forever. I admit that I did not know very many Beatles songs before I got married. I knew who the Beatles were of course, but I only knew a few songs, and not well enough to sing along to any of them. Then I met my future husband (who owned every Beatles album) and his three-year-old son (who could sing most of "Hey Jude" even before he knew "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star"). Obviously my life has changed a little since then!
So I decided that a line of Beatles-themed products was in order, and last night I listed the next in the series:

Here Comes the Sun Little Darlin

So, the great question is, what other Beatles' songs are begging to be artistically rendered as diapers?!

Trading Frenzy

I have four (yes FOUR!) trades going on right now.

1) Giving diapers and wetbags ---> from SweethavenArts getting several pairs of knitted socks (she has a sock knitting machine, which may be about the coolest thing I've ever seen!)


2) Giving nursing pads ---> from SevenAcreWoods getting handmade soap and alpaca fiber (from an appaloosa alpaca named Houdini!)


3) Giving a diaper ---> from BananaBottoms getting this diaper (because in a houseful of boys, obviously, I need all things camo!) --------->


4) Giving diapers, covers, and wetbags --->from Silverstarflower getting earrings and silver hair barrette (my earrings are this style but in silver and with a green stone)

Tuesday Tips: Trading on Etsy

A lot of etsians--including myself--like trading. It's fun to swap goods rather than money, and in my view both etsians get a better deal out of a trade than they do from a sale, because there is nothing lost to paypal fees and no 'income' to report, yet you've each gained something you wanted or needed.
When I see an item that I like, I often approach the seller about whether they would be interested in trading. I simply send them a convo and ask. Sometimes they say no, and sometimes they say yes, but no one has ever been rude about it. Sometimes people approach me--and I go and look at their shop and if there's something I like then I trade, and if they don't have anything I want then I say no thanks. Sometimes when I don't trade, a purchase is made (by me or from me), and sometimes it isn't. There is no pressure either way.

Once you have decided to trade, and decided what to trade, there are several ways to carry out the transaction:

A
After agreeing to trade, each person looks through the other shop and selects the item(s) that they want, and then 'buys' them, but does not send any money. (Equal values or specific items are determined via convos.)
Pros: no paypal fees, leave feedback for each item 'bought' and 'sold,' no editing of listings/making new listings, easy to see if your purchases from each other are equal, and if for some reason the other person falls through you can warn others via negative feedback.
Cons: you still pay full 'sale price' etsy fees in spite of not making any money

B
Agree on the items via convo, exchange mailing addresses via convo, then unlist the items and trade "off the books."
Pros: no fees at all (paypal or etsy).
Cons: no feedback (good or bad) for either of you, no official record of the transaction, may require more convos than method A.

C
Agree on the items via convo, then each edit your listings to create reserved listings for each other (it could be one listing per shop or several). Change the price of the listing(s) to be $0.20, which is etsy's minimum price (it covers the listing price, but will not charge any seller fees). Mark the title of each listing as "reserved for trade with ___" so that no one else swipes it. Then each person buys the appropriate listing(s) but does not send any money.
Pros: have official transaction record including addresses, able to leave feedback (good or bad), no paypal fees, only the listing fee on etsy (no sale price fees)--I figure this is fair because etsy helped us find each other, but we didn't make any money, so I'll pay the listing fee but not a sale fee.
Cons: time and effort to edit listings or make special listings


Personally, my preferred method is C, because I want to have the official transaction and the ability to leave feedback, just in case I get burned I feel that this "covers my tail" so to speak. Also, editing a listing only takes a minute or two, and I like saving the fees. ☺


Have you traded on etsy? Do you use one of these methods or do something else? What do you prefer? (Are there other pros or cons that I missed?)

Custom Solarveil Hats

These babies are in demand! I am working on getting more ready-made ones stocked, but in the last three weeks I have had four custom orders for solarveil hats, so I've set up some custom listings that show the fabrics I have available so that people can order directly without having the extra steps of my having to show the photos to everyone individually. (The hat bands are made from scrap fabric mostly, and much of it is already cut out so that I could maximize the available space, so not every print is available in every size.)

In the meantime, I've also started listing plain cotton sun hats, which are a little cheaper.

Tuesday Tip: EtsyHacks Greasemonkey addons

Etsy has a lot of nice features, but many of the tech-savvy etsians out there have thought of additional nice features--things like "copy a listing" which allows you to make a new listing, but starting with a copy of an existing one (so you can just edit photos, change the title, etc...or post a second listing for an identical item!).

There is a wide selection of add-ons, available at EtsyHacks.com. In order to use them, you will first need to download and install Greasemonkey (then close and restart Firefox). Then you can intall whichever add-ons you want. Then you'll need to restart again to get them all to install/take effect. It's that simple.
The add-ons are technically free, although EtsyHacks does request that if you like the product, that you consider making a donation. I would second that--these are some nice add-ons that some nice people have taken time to write up and then been kind enough to share with us, it's only fair that we share a little something in return. (And since I can't write a pretty add-on for them to post on their page, money is the way to go!)

These add-ons will only work with Firefox at the present time, however the EtsyHacks page says they are working on making them compatable with Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, and Opera, so if you're really attached to one of those browsers just wait a little while and then you can have some of these groovy add-ons too.