Monday, November 15, 2010

Baby Things

This past week we've been moving our house around making room for Hazel to have a room all to herself and for the baby to have a nursery when the time comes for him/her to move out of the bassinet in our room. Its taken a lot of rearranging, squeezing and really deciding what we need to have in the house as opposed to whats there just as decoration. Its coming along nicely and I'm glad that we've started this early because its taking a little more time than we were expecting. 

I wanted to share a few things with you about some fun and helpful baby items.

First of all, I would like to share with you a shop that I found on Etsy that makes custom car seat covers. Its called, Your Car Seat Cover, and she specializes in making replacement Graco infant car seat covers. These aren't a generic cover that will fit any car seat or something that's lose and moves around. She has taken a Graco car seat cover, taken it apart, and used it as a pattern to make you a whole new cover that fits like the original.


When we were pregnant with our first baby I found a travel system, which is the car seat, base, and stroller, at a garage sale for $50 and I just couldn't pass it up since they cost more than $100 new. It was definitely a boy set since it was in all navy blue, but I decided we would make due with that even if we did have a girl. We used it just fine, but I decided I would like to find a cover that was a little more gender neutral. I searched around online and all the covers that I could find were $60-$100. No Way! I might as well just go buy a new car seat for that price. So I decided to look up patterns for a generic car seat cover that I could sew myself. There were some, but I wasn't impressed so I looked on Etsy and I found this lady.

You send her the fabric of your choice and she whips them up in a couple of weeks. To have her just make the cover it only cost me $35. To have her make a replacement cover, canopy, and infant head cushion it only costs $45. WOW! She'll even make strap cover set ($7), handle cover($3), or a winter cover ($12) to match. Her sewing abilities are amazing. This cover looks like it'll stand up to quite a few kids and many washings along the way. I can't wait to use it!


Next on the list is cloth diapers. Now don't run from the room screaming. I know they sound a little intimidating, but cloth diapers these days aren't you're grandma's or even your mom's cloth diapers. These are some fancy, quick and convienient new updates. Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever thought that I would even consider cloth diapers as an option when my kids came along. My MIL suggested them since she had used them on her little ones, but I still wasn't too sure.

I did a little searching around on the internet and was blown away at all the new options out there. It wasn't just pre-fold diapers with pins and covers. You can even find plenty of sewing patterns out there to make your own diapers and covers if you're up to it. The website that really helped me with explaining all the differences between an All-in-One, Fitted, Pre-fold, Pocket diaper and so on was, Diaper Junction. After talking it over with the hubs, we decided that we were going to give it a try and order a set of the pre-fold diapers just to give it a try. We used those on Hazel during the day for the first six months, then we switched over to the disposable diapers for a couple of months. Let me tell you what, it was a real eye opener to all of the sudden be spending $20-$40 a month on diapers.


I wasn't so crazy about the pre-fold diapers due to the bulk, pins, and trying to fold them to the right size on a squiggling baby so I went back to the website and decided that we would give the fitted diapers a try.

Diaper cover and Fitted diaper



Inside the diaper. Super absorbent.

I love them! They're already shaped like a disposable diaper, they have elastic in the legs, and an adjustable Velcro waist band so its just like using a disposable diaper. However, with the fitted diapers you still have to use a cover over them so you're still getting some bulk in the pants. These are also great for you little one to wear all by themselves to help air out a rash or even to just run around in while playing in the yard on hot days so their bottoms can breathe.

I know that these aren't for everyone but I just want to encourage you to take a look at some of the websites out there and think about it. These days we use mainly disposables, but I have a couple of the larger sizes around just in case we run out since we live an hour away from town. They're definitely worth the investment!

5 comments:

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Hint of Grace said...

Hey Jaimi- That car seat cover is ADORABLE. Good idea! So cute, and you don't have exactly what everyone else has either. They hardly even make gender neutral car seats it seems. I'm also gonna give cloth diapers a try, just thinking about how much $$ we'll save is incentive enough! :)

Cheyenne said...

AH! I was just thinking of you this morning! Was wondering how you were...

Love that car seat cover. It's so beautiful!

That is actually really smart to have a few cloth diapers on hand, I'm always in a panic and sometimes have phoned neighbours to see if they are going to town to pick up diapers. Isn't that terrible. Really smart...I'm going to have to have a peek into this stuff.

Hoping you are doing WELL!

Oh, and it always takes longer than we think to move rooms around! :)

Anonymous said...

Oh my! Thank your for the websites, and tips. Although, I'm bummed because my car seat is Eddie Bauer, and I wonder if she can make covers for them? If we have another boy, of course it's not a big deal. But if we have a girl, I'd like something a little girlier.
And I'm thinking about using cloth diapers this time, when we get our income tax return I just may make that investment. I'm sick of paying so much for those darn disposable diapers!

Gumbo Lily said...

Good post, Miss Jaimi! I really like the car seat cover and those new-fangled diapers are not at all like what I used in the "good ol' days." They look very comfy, sturdy, nice fitting.


Jody