I was reminded today just how precious and fragile life is. I found myself recently telling a friend that "I fought too hard to keep him alive this long!" in reference to a frantic search for my son at a graduation. It turned out that the graduate was showing him off to some friends. That night I was only half joking but today I realized how very true this concept is. I'm not sure if it has been the discovery of my son's peanut allergy or just his growing activity level but I feel that even more base than my need to love and care for him is my need to keep him alive.

Each day brings a smattering of potentially life threatening scenarios such as dodging hidden ingredients in processed foods, a small toy drum commandeered as a stepping stool when reaching for a book, curious fingers nearly grasping a shaving razor left in the tub or containing the excitement of running through an open space which also happens to be a parking lot. Today alone brought two new scenarios which my head is still spinning from. First there was the few seconds I turned my back to coil up a laptop cord which I had just unplugged. I was grabbing for the plug cover in order to replace it when I turned to find my son with fork in hand (stolen from a few inches in on the table top- man he's getting tall!) ready to jam it into the electrical outlet. How a child automatically sees an interest in doing this without seeing his parents first do it is beyond me. Then later in the day we were having a lovely lunch and I decided to let him have a few tortilla chips. Lately things of a crunchy nature have been therapeutic for his gums which have been doing teething battle with his 2 year molars. I was absolutely horrified to see my son gasping for air, with panic on his face and obviously choking on the chip. For a moment I really wondered if I'd be able to dislodge it from his throat since it had been so long since I had taken CPR class. I unbuckled him from the booster seat and began the procedure I remembered for infants. He did cough up the chip but the experience really shook both of us up. He was crying, I think, because it scared him that I was wildly beating on his back and of course because it probably hurt. I was reeling from the thought that I could have lost him in that moment and also thankful that I hadn't.

Ma-Ma Sisterhood Group

Show us a photo of your diaper bag and it's contents or if your child is older, the gear required for a happy outing.

I promised Prairie Plains I'd answer this prompt and I'm just now getting around to it. She is soon to be a first time mama and I vividly remember how much I loved hearing other mom's reviews* of products and researching different baby things during the last trimester. So hopefully this will be of some use to her.

The Bag

About the bag: I love this bag. I owned another bag previously and mostly liked it but the zippers broke after 8 months and we pretty much were reduced to carrying it around open all the time. It wasn't something I could fix myself so we just stubbornly continued to use it because we spent $30 on it and we wanted to get our money's worth out of it. I finally found the one I'm using now at Target. Skip Hop makes a line for Target called Spark. This model was on clearance for $13.60! I snatched it up and haven't been disappointed at all. It washes nicely and it's got three different ways you can carry it (messenger, around the stroller handles or over the shoulder- a feature carried over from their original line). I think there are some differences in the quality of the fabric or hardware between the Duo and the Spark version, but so far it has held up. Of course we're not lugging around half the stuff we used to. Maybe we were just stressing the zippers of the old one too much.

The Contents

Show us an example of architecture you find interesting or inspiring.

Ma-Ma Sisterhood Group

Most of us are lucky to share our parenting duties and experiences with a great spouse. Tell us why your man makes (or will make) a great father and parenting partner.

Da, da-da, duh, da-da, duh, da-da, duh, duh

I was finally able to get Juno from Netflix and didn't quite like it as much as I expected to. I suspect it was because I found a few flaws with the details of the movie. 

So I mentioned that I switched my son to gDiapers in an earlier post and had planned to do a review of them. Luckily AshbyChick had asked about them too, so it gave me an extra reason to bore you all with my review. I plead with those of you who are childless or otherwise disinterested in discussions on types of diapers... please save yourself and skip this post now!

First, a short explanation of how they're different than disposable or cloth diapers:

• They're completely biodegradable.
• They contain no irritating or cancer causing chemicals.
• They do not require special care such as sun bleaching, line drying, double rinsing or special detergents.
  

• I started to consider using gDiapers after reading that my son's disposable diapers contained cancer causing chemicals and watching this video which demonstrates how long it takes for a disposable to break down.

• I finally decided on getting them after watching this video which showed how easy it is to flush the biodegradable insert. This removed any doubt that the health and eco benefits would outweigh any extra work involved.
  

They come in the most simple but completely adorable packaging. It included a Handy User's Guide (H.U.G)  which only had like 5 pages (quick reading is always a bonus for me). I purchased 2 starter kits because it's cheaper than buying 2 gDiapers* separately and you get 10 inserts and a swisher** stick with each kit. This gave me a swisher stick to hang on the side of each toilet in the house and extra inserts which is nice.

You begin with a cover (the orange fabric) and then snap in a nylon liner (the white fabric with orange snaps). You then take an insert and stuff it into the liner until the liner and diaper curl up into a "c" shape. That's it. The diaper is ready to go.

You must change the diaper every two hours. After the diaper becomes soiled or wet you remove the insert and flush it, compost it or trash it. The liner can be washed and if the cover is not wet or soiled it can be used again. Otherwise, the liner and the cover both go into the wash.

Finally, my thoughts on them after using them for about 2 weeks now:

Positives

1. They breathe better than disposable diapers which does help with his diaper rash and eczema.
   
2. Because you can flush the soiled or wet insert there is no longer any need for our diaper genie, which I had to empty before it was full anyway because it would start to smell of diapers and that disgusting scented plastic.
   
3. My son is no longer being exposed to cancer causing chemicals around his reproductive organs.
4. We're not contributing more diapers that will not break down for who knows how long.
5. The cover is made of super soft cotton and has the cutest little design of different words beginning with "g" printed all over it. It makes me smile when I see it. Totally superficial but fun.
6. The extra bulk of the diapers have helped me move my son up to the next size of pants which he was ready for in the length but not in the waist. Just another little bonus :)
   

grateful, giggle, ga ga, grace, gift....

Negatives

1. It requires me to do more washing and be cognizant of how many covers and liners we have clean at all times. I have to admit nothing will make me more nervous now than realizing we have no clean diapers ready. I have since ordered 2 more starter kits to bring our total number of diapers to 8.
2. My son poops a lot and consequently I have to be on top of changing his diaper more than I used to be when we used disposables. If the child sits on the poop and smashes it, the poop can smear past the insert and onto the liner. This almost always happens and sometimes it gets on the cover but this is rare. So what, right? Well...we feed my son lots of interesting foods so his poop is always full of seeds and raisins and corn and such. This makes for a little resistance when wiping the smeared poop off the liner before it goes into the wash. So I'm definitely motivated to get to him before he smears it. Not a big deal though. I've gotten used to it.
   
3. Occasionally, there is very little clean area on which you can grab an edge of the insert in order to release the pulp before flushing (see flushing video). It's not my favorite thing to touch pee saturated material first thing every morning, but eh, I'm a mom so I've touched worse before.
4. After you put the insert into the toilet you must use the swisher stick to further break up the pulp. This means the plastic stick gets wet with toilet water. Yuck. I just wipe the end of the stick with a wipe which I now keep near the toilet. This also comes in handy for wiping poop off the liners. I then hang the swisher stick on the suction cup hook on the side of my toilet which allows it to air dry and if it happens to drip it is positioned over my trash can.
5. The cost is twice that of the disposables I used to use. Cloth diapering usually works out to be cheaper over the course of the diapering period when compared to disposables. But because you invest in the diapers (which are comprised of the cover and the liner) and you need to continually buy the inserts (which alone cost twice that of the disposables I used) it is way more expensive. I figure my son's health is worth it though.
   

SUMMARY:
Overall I am glad that we switched to the gDiapers. There's actually little to no learning curve, it's not like they're hard to figure out or anything it's just a different way of changing the diaper that takes getting used to. There are a few small issues such as snap imprints (even after reviewing the fit video) on my son's skin although it doesn't seem to be irritating him in any way and the extra face and nose time with feces which is irritating to anyone used to rolling up the dirty wipes and diaper in one neat little bundle.

I would recommend someone switching to these after using disposables only if you're serious about sticking with it and you have a conviction about your child's health and/or the environment***. It's a little expensive to just try out. It is VERY rare that we would spend this much money on something when there is a cheaper alternative. However, both my husband and myself have made commitments to our health such as eating healthily and exercising and we feel that reducing our exposure to harmful chemicals should be a part of this.

I think if I were to do it all over again I would have just started with these kinds of "grow with the baby" cloth diapers from infancy but this was the perfect solution for me after coming from disposables.

*each gDiaper cover comes with 2 liners.
**swisher sticks come with a suction cup hook so that you can hang them on the side of the toilet.
***Just for the record, I do not believe that we are running out of landfill spaces but do believe that harmful chemicals can leach into the soil and groundwater which affects everyone. I also believe that even if there is enough land to accommodate our trash for the next 20 years we should still choose materials which break down and contribute to the health of the soil or at least remain neutral in their effect.

What's on your "To-Do" list today? What are you most looking forward to and what are you most dreading?

HA HA HA HA

To Do List?

I can barely remember my name.

Objective #1- Survive the day with a toddler!

Supernanny

Jo Frost

I was just flipping through the channels and saw that Super Nanny was on. I laughed to myself as I remembered how I enjoyed watching the show pre-child thinking that it would make me a better parent some day. Now I like watching it because it reminds me that my child is not as bad as other people's.

Is that sick or what?