Too Late For Cloth Diapers? LemonCadet Guest Posts!

Well, I could not be more excited. I threw a random challenge at one of my favorite Etsy crafters a little while ago (What? You don't fall in love with the people who make your kids' clothes? And then pepper them with questions? Maybe you should be shopping on etsy!).

LemonCadet? I asked, should I bother to switch my almost-two-year-old-boy to cloth diapers? I figure lots of folks out there already do the comparisons (like I did) back when they are pregnant, but who's out there doing the math for us late bloomers (heh, heh)? I won't bore you with our tale of switching from a diaper service to the 7th Generation whole wheat diapers and now on to the theoretically compostable Nature BabyCare diapers (for the moment). If there's anyone out there on the fence like me on the cloth scene, check out the LemonCadet wisdom on the washable nappies. And if you live in DC, you've got to check out her a-dorable stuff at the CraftyBastards fair in Adams Morgan on Sunday, Sept. 28th. See you there!

LemonCadet: "Since I have recently become absolutely obsessed with cloth diapers, MamaBird here asked me if it was too late to start using cloth on her 21-month old son. Always up for a challenge, I got started on the research --and the math.

There are many reasons to use cloth. Many mamas use cloth because of the environmental impact (I've read that one baby's disposables take up as much space in a landfill as a car!). Others choose cloth because their children are allergic to the chemicals in the "sposies." One of the most common reasons to use cloth is that it's just plain cheaper (well, it can be). MamaBird will spend almost $500 on disposable diapers for the few months left until potty training using only 3 - 4 diapers per day (the average age of potty training for boys is 31 months, longer for kids not in day care). It will be devastating for her if we add up just how much she has spent on sposies so far so we'll leave it up to the imagination while remembering that newborns go through at least 12 diapers a day for the first few weeks. My 5-month old is still using about 8 - 9 dipes a day. And how many times have you put on a clean diaper only to have the kid pee on it before you get the tabs closed?

I personally use cloth because I hate throwing stuff away. We recycle, we compost, we use dishtowels to dry our hands and hankies to blow our noses. It only made sense to use cloth diapers. We have a washer/dryer in our basement and a clothesline in the yard. Hanging up the wet diapers on a sunny day has become a routine that I look forward to. I enjoy stuffing my clean pocket dipes in the evening after the baby's in bed. It's one of the few mindless things I get to do.

At the bare minimum, I would suggest that MamaBird buy about 15 pocket diapers and at least 20 inserts. This is an easy combination allowing for fewer trips to the washing machine and little to no dryer use. Pocket diapers (the most popular brands are bumGenius for their one-size diaper and FuzziBunz for their sized diapers) have an inner layer of a polyester fabric that wicks wetness away from the baby. The outer shell is PUL, a waterproof material that keeps the clothes from getting wet. Inside the pocket there's room to stuff an insert.

I prefer FuzziBunz because they have snaps that are harder for babies to remove than velcro. They also dry really fast --and that's the key in this experiment. Inserts take longer to dry; that's why I recommend having more of those on hand. Most people get by with one microfiber insert, heavy wetters may need two. Plain microfiber doesn't take too long to dry but hemp and bamboo do take a while. Many mamas opt for an insert that combines layers of microfiber and hemp for maximum absorbency without a lot of bulk.

Sadly, I recommend that she stick with sposies at night because I have yet to find a good nighttime option that I feel comfortable sharing. This may soon change.

The goods: I found seconds at the FuzziBunz site for only $12 each! Several websites sell packs of inserts at a discount so 20 microfiber inserts would run about $50 (you would need more of these because of drying times). That's a total of $230; a whole lot less than will be spent on sposies. And just think about the value if you plan to use them on more than one kid. If not, you can always give them away, donate them, or resell them. Another option is to buy used. I have bought FuzziBunz with inserts in excellent condition for only $15 each.

Of course there are hidden costs. I read on my favorite cloth diapering forum, The Diaper Pin, that it costs about $5 a week to wash and dry cloth. That's even less if you line dry. You can put a drying rack in your tub or hang the diapers with hangers from your shower curtain bar if you don't have easy access to a clothesline. If you want to go out for the day, you need a wetbag to haul your diapers home with you ($15) although you could reuse plastic shopping bags. We use a washable pail liner and a laundry hamper to store our dirty diapers at home. These cost $15 - $20 but you could always repurpose a plastic bucket with a lid. You could buy some cloth wipes or cut up your own from old t-shirts and towels. You could buy wipe solution or make your own.

So let's add about $45 to this to be generous for a revised total of $275 --still almost 50% less than what would be spent on disposables. And this is just what I recommend. Everyone has their own favorite brands. This is just a suggestion that I think will work for someone who doesn't have the best access to her washing machine.

On the other hand, you could spend hundreds and hundreds on fancy organic diapers and matching covers but cloth can be done easily and cheaply. Either way, you will get addicted."

Thank you, LemonCadet! What more could I need, personal researcher?! You rock and I can't wait to see your new yetis on Sunday! My little guy already sleeps with two "monnies" (that's monster to you and me) so I have a feeling a little more furry love may be in our future.



P.S. The gorgeous pictures are all from LemonCadet: of the beautiful cloth diapers and wipes she sewed, as well as her darling baby girl, Zadie! Check out Zadie's beautiful nursery (the Flickr set is amazing) if you dig LemonCadet's artistic vision as much as

Saving...

I do. The room is lovely without being sappy. Kind of like LC. Read more!

First Compost Complete

Hey! I am so excited. We got to use finished compost for the first time, to start some fall seeds and to replenish our soil in the community garden plot. It was pretty interesting sifting through the lumpy contents of our tumbler so I thought I'd share our successes and failures. We have a tumbler that you can rotate by flipping it over. I will confess that we were erratic about rotating it, and I can vouchsafe that our pile was probably not as piping hot as compost piles get. Still, for a beginner, I'm pretty happy with the results -- we made compost! Compost that we can use! That won't go to the landfill! Wooooo hoooooo!

What did break down?

• lint
• bread
• veggie and fruit scraps galore
• dog hair
• leaves
• bagasse plates and cups from a block party -- I would definitely use these again
  
• corrugated cardboard
• cotton cloth

What didn't break down?

• a metal grapefruit spoon
• produce stickers
• pine cones
• sticks
• theoretically compostable utensils
• rocks
• a rubber band
• small bits of plastic (plant markers, packaging waste)
• thread

Fascinating to see the process from start to finish, and I am thrilled to be composting our scraps once again. Now, if Worms Eat My Garbage would just come in to my local library -- I actually cleared a couple shelves in my laundry room so I am definitely heading down the wriggler path.

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Protein-Packed Granola Recipe

We lurve granola in our house. Crunchy people, crunchy breakfast, right? But, really, what's a girl to do when Whole Paycheck's bulk bins have stale granola in 'em and I'm too lazy to get myself all the way over to the People's Republic of Takoma Park to their commie co-op nirvana of bulky goodness? Make my own cereal, of course. And, since I am even lazier than that, I had to shake down my interweb friends for recipes. So a huge thanks and shout-out to Jodifur, GreenBeanDreams, and BurbanMom for their amalgamated recipe(s). I also ripped off parts of a granola recipe from my Vegetarian Times Cookbook, btw. Since I grew up in the same house as a man I'll affectionately call Pumpkin Head (not to have gross insensitivity to people who suffer from life-threatening allergies, but, well, to have gross insensitivity in all honesty?), we avoid nuts in our home. Tree nuts, peanuts, you name it. I do, however, love the crunch and protein power packed in those yummy seeds. So consider this doctored recipe my paeon to crunchy, nut-free granola goodness.

MamaBird's Granola

7 cups rolled oats (not quick cook)
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 cup millet
1 cup (uncooked) oat bran cereal
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup honey
1 cup olive oil
1 tsp kosher salt
1 cup pumpkin seeds
1 cup sunflower seeds
1/2 cup flaxseeds (I used toasted ones)
1/4 cup maple syrup
5 egg whites
1 cup apricots + 1 cup diced dried plums OR 1 cup dried cranberries + 1 cup dried blueberries

I know you're not going to believe this from a kid who used to ask her mom if we could find yogurts with no sugar or artificial sweeteners, just fruit in them, but I really don't think this recipe is sweet enough. It's pretty good, but I think I will up the maple syrup and brown sugar to a full cup each.

Stir it all together, and bake at 300F for 30-45 minutes. Till it's as crunchy and golden as you like it! Mmmmmmmmm....

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Back to School: Waste-Free Lunches

So, this post isn't about getting your kid a water bottle and reusable lunch bag or even saving money and skipping packaging by buying in bulk. It's about getting your whole school community to act together to do those things, and reduce the overall footprint of your kid's lunchtime fun.

A bunch of us are meeting with the principal of EGirl's school today to talk over just this kind of a program, and since I have been in a researching whirlwind, combing the web and emailing local people who've started similar programs, I figured I would offer up these resources to the wide interweb. As I said when I begged for info on Waste-Free Lunch Programs over at DC Urban Moms, why reinvent the wheel? I know folks have had programs in place for years at some schools.

Here are online resources many kind folks offered up when I put out the plea for info:

EPA Waste-Free Lunch Program resources
Waste Free Lunches (a site maintained by the creators of Laptop Lunches which are neat bento-style lunchbags regrettably filled with small plastic containers - has links to lots of California school programs that are by now well-established)
Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance's tips on packing wasteless lunches
A CA school successfully composting courtesy of Green Bean Dreams

And here's what the generous eco parents in our area had to share about their efforts:

Taylor’s Waste-Free Lunch Program

Goal: The goal of this lesson is for students to see how waste adds up and to learn that that small changes, like packing a waste-free lunch, can make big difference in improving our environment.

Description : The 20-minute lesson provides students with information on reducing school lunch waste and an activity. The student learns to pack a waste-free lunch by bringing reusable containers and utensils, recycling any eligible material, and composting fresh fruits and veggie leftovers from lunch at school.

The first grade lesson was created and led by a first-grade parent using an EPA poster (http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/education/lunch.htm), some lunch materials, and 3-4 parent helpers. The lesson began with a short review of where our trash goes (incinerated in Alexandria, then transported and buried in an ash monofill in Lorton). Then she reviewed how making less trash improves the environment (less energy and pollution from making single-use packaging, less greenhouse gas emissions, less climate impact, more resources and land available for the future). Lastly, she explained how students can make a big difference by packing waste-free lunches. The students then break into small group and pack their own waste-free lunch. (All food is prepackaged or put in tupperware, so there is no food being handled by the students and therefore no worries about food allergies.)

The Amount of Lunch Waste – “Before”

As part of the program, we weighed the amount of material each grade threw away as lunch waste. Here are the results of the lunch waste weigh-in on November 30, 2007:

* K- 24 pounds (41.1 pounds per student per year)
* 1st - 28 pounds (53.6 pounds per student per year)
* 2nd - 29 pounds (58.6 pounds per student per year)
* 3rd - 22 pounds (43.5 pounds per student per year)
* 4th - 35 pounds (55.2 pounds per student per year)
* 5th - 38 pounds (72.7 pounds per student per year)

This may not seem like much at first glance, but it adds up to 176 pounds per day and there are 180 school days per year. So you end up with 31,680 pounds or just shy of 16 tons per year of lunch waste, which translates to:

* 8 average sized US cars
* 4 elephants
* 54 pounds per student per year (589 students eat at school)

Waste-Free Lunch Day – “After”

We are hoping that students can see that little changes really add up by offering the program to all grades then letting the students have a waste-free lunch week where we would weigh their waste again that Friday and give an award to the grade with the lowest amount of lunch waste per student that day. The blurb below summarizes the results for January 2008:

Feeling Eight Tons Lighter During Waste-Free Lunch Week

Congratulations to Taylor students for learning how to go waste-free at lunch and reducing their lunch trash for Waste-Free Lunch Week. For the week of January 22-25, students cut their lunch waste in half which would translate into an annual reduction of eight tons per year for the school. They did this by using reusable containers, recycling, packing or buying only what they plan to eat, and composting fruits and vegetable scraps. The grade with the least lunch waste was the first grade whose trash would translate into only 19 pounds per student per year earning themselves an ice cream party. The "most improved" grade was the fifth grade who reduced their lunch waste by a whopping 66% earning themselves certificates for free ice cream cones. Many thanks to (parent volunteer) for teaching the students why and how to go waste-free at lunch. Keep up the good work throughout the year!

Curriculum Connections

(I left this in so you will be able to note the need to connect lessons to your community standards and assessment.)

* Science Resources K.10, 1.8, 2.8, 3.10, 3.11, 4.8.
* Health 1.7 Community Health and Wellness (how student decisions contribute to a healthy environment; includes the proper disposal of trash; the prevention of water pollution; the effects of pollution on drinking water and marine life).
* Health 2.3 Knowledge and Skills (influences and factors that impact health and well-being; including the environment).
* Health 4.6 Community Health and Wellness (personal responsibility for healthy practices; the benefits of volunteerism).
* Health 5.5 Community Health and Wellness (work together to build a healthy community; collaborative support for environmental issues).
* History and Social Sciences 1.10 Civics (being a good citizen by taking responsibility for one's own actions).
* History and Social Sciences 2.10 Civics (the responsibilities of a good citizen, actions that can improve the school and community)

Logistics / Misc.

How did you best weigh refuse before and after trying to reduce waste? We “secretly” weighed each grade’s trash before they received the lesson.

Seems a fun opportunity for students to work out the maths of how much waste they could reduce over a year at school. We made a bulletin board with the EPA poster, a sample waste-free and disposable lunch items, and made a bar graph of how the grades were doing “before.”

Did you aim for a reduced waste lunch on one day or did you do them for a whole week? We did a whole week program with a bulletin board in the cafeteria and then weighed each grade’s trash on Friday.

Did you try composting food waste and sorting out litter? Or is that just too messy on a large-scale? We composted fresh fruits and vegetables for the entire week. We also reviewed what can be recycled at school.

Anyone tried keeping worms to work on the compost? Or did you just take it to someone's compost bin each day? We just took it straight to the compost bin outside each day.

What strategies worked best for both school lunch buyers and for students that bring lunch? Only get or bring what you will eat. Take leftovers home so your parents see what and how much you eat. Tell your parents if you do not like something rather than throwing it out. Help your parents pick food that is tasty and healthy. Recycle and compost to the full extent.

What did staff tell the students before lunch and afterwards? Does it fit best with one part of curriculum or another? It fits with the resource strand of the science SOLs and the other Health and Social Studies SOLs listed above.

How did you advertise the event to parents? In our weekly PTA email and one a small bookmark sized take-home paper.

How many parents required to help facilitate each lunch? On Friday, we had two parents to weigh each grade’s trash and remind students what can be recycled and composted. We found some students wanting to pack their trash in their lunch so that it is not weighed, so you may want to remind students to play fair and help collect trash before they zip up their lunch boxes.

How are cafeteria staff and cleaning staff with it? We told cafeteria staff, lunch aides, and custodians that the event was going on, and that parents would do everything.

Talking points for Waste-Free Lunch Announcement

Congratulations everyone for doing their best to reduce waste during Taylor’s Waste-Free Lunch Week!

By using reusable containers, eating your food, recycling, and composting, Taylor Elementary slashed its lunch waste in half. We brought our lunch waste from 16 tons per year down to 8 tons per year! That is two elephants or four cars less trash.

Keep up the good work. Less trash = less pollution = healthier planet and people.

Who gets the ice cream party for creating the smallest amount of lunch waste per student per year? That prize goes to the grade that generates only 19 pounds of lunch waste per student per year…..the 1^st grade!

Who gets certificates for a free ice cream cone for the most improved grade? That prize goes to the grade that reduced their lunch waste by a whopping 66% or two-thirds less trash…..the 5th grade!

Thanks so much to Taylor parent Mrs. X for helping us learn how to go waste free at lunch!

**

From the Key School Green Committee in Arlington, VA --

We experimented with holding a "Trash Free Lunch" one Wednesday before the winter holidays. In early January we launched a weekly trash free lunch. Success has been mixed. Signage and regular announcements from teachers and principal have helped make it work. But without constant reminders, the effort loses momentum. Several parents have told me they now only pack trash free lunches, having made the transition to reuseable plastic containers, Klean Kanteen water bottles, etc. The main point of this effort has been to raise awareness with kids and families, to become more cognizant of how much we throw away each day.

We had a waste free lunch week at Key School in Arlington last spring. It was a week that culminated with a weekend trash to treasure drive we co-hosted with another elementary school.

Basically, we received a lot of our know-how from parents at Taylor Elementary School who had done it last fall. They do far more recycling and environmentally-oriented activities than we do at the moment....

Anyway, I weighed each grade's trash first, before the waste-free/reduced trash week to get a benchmark. I brought in my bathroom scale and weighed myself so that I could subtract that weight from the trash + me weight.

Our student council met and wrote a play about reducing their lunch waste which we filmed and played twice at school on our Friday morning TV program. There were announcements made the week before on the loud speaker, book marks that went home the week before announcing the endeavor along with the trash to treasure drive. Student Council made posters for inside and outside the school advertising both events. I asked teachers to talk up the events in their classrooms.

In the lunch room the week before, I posted a graph that showed each grade's lunch trash weight. I also made a display of items that students could use to reduce their trash such as reusable water/drink bottles, recycled butter tubs for sandwiches, cloth napkin, reusable fork, etc. They were prominent. Over each table, I hung mini posters with trash facts relating their trash weight to the weights of cars, animals (elephants).

During reduced trash week, parents attended each lunch, reminding students to reduce their trash and to have conversations with students about the importance to the earth. They also showed students where to put their fresh fruits and veggie wastes for composting in our schoolyard compost tumbler (it's too small to use it every day, every week).

Even with all of these efforts, we did not get the results we were looking for. The day we weighed the "reduced" trash, some kids hid their trash or threw it away in the bathroom. It is so important to watch for that. I didn't know about it and that class was awarded pens with environmental messages on them. When we learned of the outcome through some vigilant students, their teachers handled it well, making it a character issue. Runners up received the pens.

Taylor parents did more by going into each classroom and giving 20 minute lessons.

**

Hope this info helps someone else out there who's in the information-gathering stage. I'd be more than happy to talk with you as you plan your own program so shoot me an email if you're just getting started yourself.

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