Newborn Baby Portraits (Photo credit: kristaguenin)
You may ask why cloth diapering a newborn is different than diapering an older baby. It is different for a number of reasons. Newborns have thinner thighs, affecting the fit. Newborns have runnier stools, which can be a leak issue. New babies have umbilical cord stumps which can get in the way of the diaper. Newborn babies also eliminate very often. If your newborn baby is your first, then you will also be in the process of learning how to diaper.
We are happy to try to help with tips and information that will help your venture into cloth diapering successful from the start!
Fit tips:
You will want to choose a diaper that fits a newborn well, otherwise you will have leaking. You can expect a newborn to weigh between 6-10 lbs. The diaper will need to fall below the belly button until the belly button heals. You may want to choose a diaper with an umbilical cord cutout, or you will have to fold the diaper and/or cover down to fit which will create extra bulk. Newborns typically have skinny thighs, and it is important that the diapers be snug at the leg openings as well as the waist.
Note: Generally, one size diapers do not fit newborns!
What if your baby is premature?
If your baby is a preemie, then you will need to purchase preemie diapers. Fitted diapers or fastened prefolds will be your best leak-proof options, especially when dealing with liquid breast fed stools. Many people choose to use disposables until the baby fits into newborn diapers, but there are cloth options.
How many diapers?
You will need about 12 diapers a day for a newborn, sometimes more. We recommend that you wash every other day, meaning you will need 24 + diapers in rotation. If you choose to use a two piece system such as prefolds/covers or fitteds/covers, you will also need about 8 covers. If you plan on fastening prefolds, you will need to buy a few fasteners such as a Snappi.
How do I know what kind of diaper to choose?
We suggest a trial program to find out what type of diaper will work for you before buying a whole stash. You can also try prefolds and covers if you sign up for a diaper service. You can find a list of Thirsties retailers that offer our diapers in a trial here.
Note: Please keep in mind, you will have leaking once in a while no matter what diaper you are using!
Nighttime diapering
You will want to make sure that the diaper you use at nighttime is absorbent enough to last 3+ hours between feedings. What you use in the daytime for 1/5 hours or 2 hours may not last for extended periods at nighttime. You do not want to intentionally wake the baby up to change the diapers, unless they are soiled. Newborns do not go a lot at once, but go very often. Fitted diapers and prefold diapers are good nighttime options.
Practice!
You can practice on a doll or teddy bear before the baby is actually born. That way, you will not be so nervous when your new bundle arrives! If using a two piece system, you will want to make sure that the diaper is tucked into the cover to avoid wicking (liquid leaking onto the cover). You will want to make sure that there are no gaps around the waist or legs. You can see a great article on how to change diapers here.
Diaper Changes
Give yourself some extra time at diaper changes, and keep extra diapers, wipes, and wipe spray within reach. Always have a towel/diaper handy at the changing station to “block” any explosions or sudden leaks – newborn babies are notorious for going again after you have wiped them! Newborns also produce a lot of gas, and this makes their bowel movements more explosive. It is a wise idea to lay a prefold diaper or towel over the diaper area while changing.
How do I wash the diapers?
We recommend washing your cloth diapers every 2 days. You will avoid a lot of headaches if you follow the manufacturers’ washing instructions to wash the diapers. You can print out a copy from the website to keep by your washer until you get the hang of it. Use a cloth diaper safe detergent. If you have a High Efficiency machine, be sure to use the HE instructions. If you want to cloth diaper but do not want to wash the diapers, you can enlist the help of a diaper service.
What do you do with the poo?
Newborns have liquid stools until they start eating solids. Babies who are exclusively breast fed have stools that are water soluble, and thus it is not necessary to rinse the soil off before washing. If that makes you cringe, then there are diaper sprayers that you can hook onto the toilet’s water supply. If using a diaper sprayer, you simply take the soiled diaper, hold over the toilet, and spray the soil into the toilet. You then put the diaper in the diaper pail until wash day.
Babies who are formula fed do not have stools that are water soluble. You will need to scrape or rinse off the soil from the diaper. To scrape, some use a spatula and dispose in the toilet. Or, you can use a diaper sprayer as outlined above.
Many parents stay away from cloth diapering because of “The Ick Factor”. The truth is, having a baby has its icky moments whether you cloth diaper or not! Icky, sticky, dirty, gross, funny, precious, innocent, heart-warming… it all comes in one package. Cloth diapering is one way to care for your baby in the most natural way possible.
Enjoy that little bundle of joy – this stage does not last long!
Please send any questions you may have to support@thirstiesbaby.com.
~Sonya
I didn’t know there was a diaper sprayer I might have to look into getting one.
My little guy is 5 weeks old now and our cloth diaper stash was a combination of prefold with duo wraps and duo pocket diapers. He was pretty tiny when we brought him home so we started with disposables until the cloth would fit a little better. He finally started fitting in them this past week and we’re loving using cloth for our heavy wetting newborn! We have less leaks with cloth even though he’s on the small end just because they absorb so well!
For my newborn, we didn’t worry about night diapering since she woke up to eat every few hours. We just changed her then!
We only needed one Snappi, just reused it every time.
We have a diaper sprayer, but didn’t use it for newborn breastfed poop – I’m not sure it would have been worth the trouble!
I definitely agree on trying different kinds before fully stashing up! I tried both Duo Diapers and Fuzzibunz for night when we did need night diapers, but the Duos are the only ones that actually fit my long, skinny baby!
I was under the impression that just a 3 pack of snappies should suffice for a single newborn…One bedside, one in the bag to go, and one for safekeeping
Is this ok?
Thank you for this article! I have been wondering a lot about the newborn stage of cloth diapering because everything looks so big and bulky!
I had no idea I’d need so many diapers for a newborn. I’m so excited to start a collection before she’s here in a few months.
Thank you!! Thank you!! Thank you!!! I am currently cloth diapering my toddler but have never been through the newborn phase of diapering and want to with number 2 that is due in March. Great information in the article!
I made the mistake of putting all of my eggs in one basket with a single brand of OS diapers. The fit her poorly when she was a newborn and pee ran out the back and soaked her whenever she was down for a nap! It was awful.
This is a good article. Simple and to the point. I wish there were more of these around when I started cloth diapering 9 years ago, or even 5 years ago when I CD’d my last baby. It’s nice this time around knowing what I’m doing with my 9 week old baby girl.
I wish someone had told me 5 years ago that the small stash of one-size diapers I’d bought for my baby would not fit her for a few months. I ended up having to buy some newborn prefolds and small covers till they could fit and I didn’t even start with cloth till she was 6 weeks old. I wouldn’t have been able to do that this time around because at this point it can be a diapers-or-groceries situation around here so that would’ve been really bad.
I do have to agree with another comment above- my newborns wake up every couple of hours anyway, so newborn night time diapering isn’t much different for me. It’s only become an issue recently now that she’s sleeping up to 4 or 5 hours at a stretch some night and she’s 9 weeks old.
I like your suggestion to practice on a stuffed animal. It toes take a little bit of a different technique to cloth diaper so that’s a good idea.
I forgot to say I also like what you said about “the ick-factor” people (my sister especially) sometimes tell me they could never cloth diaper because it’s too gross. (Not her exact words, she’s much kinder.lol) But I think it’s much less icky to cloth diaper. I mean, you’re gonna touch poop no matter what unless you have a nanny changing all the diapers for you or something like that. I’d much rather wash cloth diapers than deal with the frequent disposable diaper-induced poop blow-outs. Particularly when we’re in public. I hate having to change those messes and then clean out the car-seat. It’s happened with all my disposable diapered babies. It’s such a relief when I finally feel well enough after my c-sections and can switch to cloth and do my own diaper laundry.
Thanks for the great info… I am preparing to cloth diaper my newborn when she arrives in February. I am making sure I am all prepared just now and this post will be very helpful.
cornett, 2 snappi’s will work (we only had 3) but it might be a little tight if you are exclusively prefold diapering — we have prefolds but also others.
Probably matters how organize you are
Thank you for this post. We are going to be having our first baby any day now and our goal is to cloth diaper. This information might seem basic to most cloth diapering families but it was great information for us:)
We didn’t start cloth diapering until my second son was 4 months old, even though a bit late, I am so glad I made the switch from disposables! I am planning on having another baby and not 100% how cloth diapering will go with a newborn. Thanks for all the info.
Thank you soooooo much for this post! We started cloth diapering our first child at 7 weeks because we simply didn’t have the money for the rest of our stash until then…. but now we have plenty of pockets (all OS), and we are expecting next July. I want to CD from the start next time!
I didn’t start cloth diapering my daughter until she was older, so I cannot wait to have a newborn to cloth diaper. All the tiny little diapers are adorable! Does meconium stain diapers?
Thank you for the wonderful tips. We are getting ready to cloth diaper a newborn again and can’t wait to get the small fluff out!
thanks for the great info! I have been wondering how diapering is going to work for the newborn stage! I bought OS diaps thinking I would be covered, but realized they are gonna be way to big when they arrived!
Thanks for this. Baby boy is coming in 2 days and I think I have everything I need. Hubby is hooking up the diaper sprayer today. I think it will come in hand for myself postpartum!
I started cloth at around 5 months with my first and from the beginning with my second. We love the duo wraps with prefolds. The size 1 with snaps were a little big on my daughter when she was first born, even though she was 8.5 pounds, but I managed to make them work by putting the snaps right next to each other instead of skipping one (don’t know if that makes sense). Maybe you could modify the snap diapers so that we could overlap the flaps.
I loved that there were fewer blowouts. My first could easily go through 3-5 outfits a day, but with my second she could wear one a day. Not that I minded playing dress-up with my newborns, but the poop does stain clothes, which is not fun.
Thank you for this article! My little one will be here any day now and even though I already have my stash, I didn’t know if I should just use prefolds for him as a newborn or if using prefolds and pockets would work. Prefolds it is until he’s a little bigger!
Hi Bekah, Yes, meconium will stain, as will all baby stools. I recommend spraying it off if you can, and pretreat with liquid detergent if you are worried about stains.
~Sonya
Thanks ladies, I changed “several” fasteners to “a few”. I recommend having at least two or three, just in case one is lost or dirty.
~Sonya
Good tips, thanks! I started cloth diapering my first child at 17 months, so I’m going to feel like a newbie again the next time around!
Thank you for this post. My son is due in April, and I was very hesitant about using cloth diapers with a newborn. I still may wait a few days to get used to having a baby in the house and recover a bit, but I am excited to use cloth now…it doesn’t seem as intimidating now
I have purchased the AIO diapers, ointment, liners and diaper sprayer for my daughter. She is ready to have the baby within a couple weeks.
I may have to buy a few extra Snappis than I originally planned on. Knowing me I’ll misplace them or get them stuck to my clothes or something.
As my husband and I hopefully welcome a baby in 2013 (ttc now)ive been doing ALOT of research on cloth diapering and this was very helpful!
I am very interested in trying prefolds this time. Last time I only used aio’s and since they weren’t newborn they didn’t fit very well. I can’t wait to get more Thirsties covers
I so hope to be able to cloth diaper a newborn again. Thanks for all the reminders!
Great post…Thanks! Every question I had about cloth diapering a newborn has been answered!we didn’t use cloth on our first child until she was about 6 months, and still then it was part time. With our second I had three small pockets and two thirsties fitteds/one cover for the early days. This time I am ready…and you bet thirsties is part of that!
Oh very helpful, we usually start cloth at 4 months but this time we’re starting right away!
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