Awesome Happens: PHEW! It's been too long!

I'm gonna go ahead and blame life, the new baby, school starting for my 13 year old and LIFE (AGAIN) for the fact that I'm a lost blogger right now.

Right now, these blog moments are brought to you by the generosity of my eldest daughter as she watches my youngest so I can be here.

I'll dive right in. Some new things in our lives are finally full-time cloth diapering. We're mostly using prefolds with the exception of the 4 all-in-ones that we have and use primarily for overnight changes. This is turning out to be great for us! We used up MOST of the disposables that were given to us at our baby shower first, for fear that she'd grow out of them rather quickyly. And she DID! I wash diapers about every 2 days using the following routine/detergent/techniques:

Detergent-Ecos Free/Clear Nothing else for a normal wash. Exception: Once a month we use bleach in one wash.

Wash-Rinse & Spin Cycle w/out detergent. THEN, Soak, Heavy Duty (aka most water) wash with HOT water, THEN dry all in the dryer.

Techniques/Tricks/Etc.-I do not rinse any diapers off in the toilet, sink, etc before washing. Since I do them every 2 days, I have not had any issue with stink and IF (rarely) I have a diaper that comes out of the wash stained, I put that aside and dry it outside in the sun. So far, I haven't had ONE diaper dried in the sun that has a stain left on it. The sun bleaches it right out! I DO put bleach in a wash cycle once a month to avoid stink and generally strip them of anything that builds up, though I haven't noticed any build up or repelling issues so far. We might be lucky, or we might just have the proper wash routine for our water, washer and lifestyle. I don't know. I just know that it works for us and we are grateful for that!

Other-I change her diaper whenever I notice it's wet. Right now, she is just shy of 3 months old and we change her every 2 hours or so. Overnight changes are on an as-needed basis. If she sleeps all night, she goes all night without a change and so far this is working for us. ONCE she woke up with a soaked diaper but it did not leak through the cover (Econobum Cover). If she wakes up to eat in the middle of the night, I change her, then feed her. Most nights, she sleeps through the night from about 10pm-6am. Sometimes that is 11pm-5am, sometimes it's 8pm-4:30am. You get the jist.

One more thing-We haven't used ANY diaper creams/ointments/coconut oil or anything on her with cloth diapers. First of all, we haven't needed to. Second of all, I change her as soon as she is wet, usually, so as to avoid rashes and irritation. This has also worked well for us so far. Like I said before... we are lucky!

Nyla is now holding her head up pretty much all of the time unless she is sleepy. She recently started to become VERY interested in her toys, a show called Zig & Sharko, and her books. More than anything, we try to interact with her before she plays with her toys, etc. We both prefer that and I feel human interaction is the best thing for babies, kids and adults before any other distractions. We play with her toys WITH her, as well... she loves that at this age because she is just learning how to use them and how to hold things.

She is still very particular and semi-demanding. We don't really mind... she is brand new and still learning about the world around her and it's only our job to make her comfortable and teach her about life. She is overall a pretty normal baby. Cries when she's hungry or tired. Takes naps. Nurses on demand. She rarely likes a pacifier but will take a bottle now. She only gets a bottle when we're on the road or sometimes if it's convenient for all involved. Otherwise, she is breastfed. She recently learned to like side-nursing and will go to sleep this way 8/10 of the time. This is AWESOME!

My 13 year old started 8th grade about a month ago and is loving school. She always has! She is WAY into her video games and usually that's fine but sometimes it is a little consuming. Asking her to watch her sister here and there for just a few minutes is my way of pulling her away fromthe game for a break. It works for the most part. I'm happy she has a hobby she enjoys so much but I would like her to get back into horseback riding now that she is back in school. We are taking her riding this Sunday!

Here are a couple recent pictures of the baby girl and then I have to get back to my duties.