Cloth diapering a preemie - what weight did you start diapering?

[jesuslover34]

My baby was born at 34 weeks and is a month old today (calendar age - her corrected gestational age is 38 and a half weeks, her due date is 8/14). She was a little thing at birth and is now just about 6.5 lbs. She’s just now fitting into newborn size clothes and newborn size disposable diapers (she’s obviously been in preemie sizes before now).

Have any other preemie parents made the switch from disposable to cloth? The brand I currently have is Simple Being and they definitely are way too big on her. I’m hesitant to buy newborn sizes as I’m not sure how long she’d stay in them, though if they can stay in newborn sizes for a while then it might be worth the investment. I hate how much trash we are generating right now and since a box of newborn diapers is like $40 it might be worth the investment in cloth. Any thoughts or suggestions on brands to look at?

 

[midnight26]

@jesuslover34 As soon as my baby was out of the nicu and home we went straight to cloth. She weighed 4.2 when we came home. I use little river cloth diapers she runs her business out of her home.

Anyway my daughter was born may 30th came home June 11th. I bought little rivers cloth and used mens xl tshirts cut into flats. 8 covers lasted me 2 to 3 days . She still fits in them and she's almost 10 weeks old she weighs 8.2lbs. Is on the second rise setting and we used a flour sack towel to stuff now. I paid 40 for the 8 covers got them on earth day. But she sells 3packs of messups honestly don't see how they are messed up but anyway they are $15. So it would be 45 plus 22 for tshirt flats so $67ish.

Down side of using flats and covers would be being sleep deprived I would screw up the folds at night. So now I use newborn alva at night with one of the covers over to contain leaks

 

[zzareyan]

@jesuslover34 I clothed my first from 1.5 weeks and my daughter from birth. He was 6.5 lbs and she was 6.75 lbs. We used NB prefolds and covers for a good 3 months. I'd recommend Rumparooz because they have a higher weight range. We also used Thirsties size one and they fit my kids for 9 months or so. The NB prefolds were great because when they needed more absorbency, I doubled them up, then I used them as boosters when they needed more absorbency with the infant size. I finally stopped using them and resold my NB stash when my second was 12 months!

 

[ladylemonade]

@jesuslover34 I also highly recommend the GMD newborn wrap with cloth-eez prefolds! It fit our full term but petite and narrow waisted baby until she was 11lbs. We actually couldn’t use our one size diapers for a while because she was so narrow hipped they were uncomfortable for her. If she wasn’t so long we’d still be using the GMD covers but the rise is too short for her now.

I definitely think this is the way to go, it’s pretty inexpensive even new and you can reuse the prefolds as burp cloths. We had 8 covers and 24 prefolds but we could have gotten away with probably 5 covers.

 

[tempytemptemp]

@jesuslover34 My full term baby was less than 6.5lbs at birth, dropped below 6lbs at one point. We started cloth on day 3 and at 6 weeks we're still very much in newborn covers with a set of rise snaps yet to go. 3+ months of diapers is much more expensive than a handful of cheap covers and flats that can be used as inserts later. I did have to buy more snappis, so I've spent maybe $80 CAD on my newborn stash.

I ordered happy flute covers through aliexpress and got some fsts and second hand flats. I'd look around for used if I were you. Newborn diapers get very little wear compared to the OS ones.

 

[alwaysontime]

@jesuslover34 Agreed with a lot of the other posters here, our little girl was 5 lb. 3 oz at birth; we started with newborn cloth when she was about 6 lb. She stayed in them for several months and I would say it was totally worth it! Plus we plan to have another and we'll be able to use them again.

Nikki's diapers make some extremely affordable newborn AI2s that served us well!