How can I get on the list? Send an email to infoATlittleparapantsDOTcom (change the AT and DOT to their respective symbols) and ask to be put on the list. Or fill out the contact form here.

How does it work? First come, first served. I’ll start with the person at the top of the list and work my way down. You can choose a swim nappy, an all-in-one, a pocket, a wet bag, or a pull-up nappy in whatever size and whatever fabric you choose (subject to availability). I don’t know how long it’ll take me to work through the list, but I promise to keep you informed on the status of your item as much as possible.

There are five slots available with this first go. Get in quick if you want something!

I was hoping to be using cloth full time by now, but unfortunately I kind of messed up my estimates of how many a newborn would go through! So we’ve had to keep using disposables as backup, and will until I get a chance to make some more nappies for him. Anyway, here’s a rundown of what we’ve been doing and using up till now.

One size fitted nappies: we have three. They fit him really well! He’s now a whopping 6.5 kilograms and doesn’t need the front folded down anymore. As I said in a previous post, there’s no leg gaps or wing droop. I don’t think I’ll need to adjust that pattern much at all for him.

Flat terry nappies: I think we have about 14 of these. I started putting them on him a couple of weeks ago using the Jo fold. They look a bit big but do the job well enough.

Microfleece lined ‘budget’ pocket nappies: we have six. These are sized small and look like they’ll still fit for a couple of months. The legs did have a gap for a little while when we started using them, but he’s filled them out since then.

Small all-in-one (front snapping): We have one in our rotation. I don’t think the rise is quite big enough for him so I’ll be adjusting that pattern when I get the time.

Small pocket (side snapping): There’s one, and he’s already pretty much outgrown it!

Medium pocket (side snapping): One of these as well, and it fits him easily. Problem is, I think I put the microfleece in the wrong way, so it seems to repel urine rather than letting it pass through. He never stays in it for very long because he fusses after even one wee in it.

Newborn prefolds: Heh. Yeah, I made six of these and I think he wore each one once before he was too big for them. That’s what happens when your baby is born at 4.6 kilograms! Still, when they did fit, they fit him well enough. All I have to do is sew another six pocket shells and I can use the prefolds as the inners for those.

One Fit Wonder: We have one but haven’t used it yet.

I’ve also been lining all the terries, fitteds, and the all-in-one with a microfleece liner to keep moisture away from his skin.

And now the other bits & pieces.

Cloth wipes: We have about 20, mostly hemp/flannelette with a few bamboo/flannelette ones thrown in for good measure. We’ve been air drying everything, so they do get a bit stiff, but they soften up when they’re wet so it doesn’t seem to matter. The bamboo ones are definitely softer than the hemp ones, even though they’re much older!

Ginormous wet bags: We’ve got two. The intent was to put all the soiled nappies, wipes, and pooed-on baby clothes into one bag, wash the bag with its contents when it’s full, and switch to the other bag. And it’s working out pretty well. There’s only two problems that I can see. One is that the handle is just sewn into the side seam, and I can see it starting to pull away on both bags. I’ll address this problem in all future wet bags I make. The second problem is that it’s kind of a pain to dump a bag into a front-loading washing machine. I expect it would be a lot more convenient in a top loading machine.

And that’s just about everything I can think of! So far Ethan hasn’t had any rashes or issues with the disposables, except for a few times when he’s done a Stealth Poo that we didn’t know about till much later. They do however tend to leak a lot more often than the cloth ones, so I really hope I can find the time to do some sewing soon, so we can ditch them for good!

Here he is at two and a half weeks, weighing about 5 kilograms, wearing a one-size fitted nappy. And he fills it out really well! No leg gaps, no wing droop, just a well fitting nappy.

I’m sure I’ll have more to post in the coming weeks, particularly about how the whole cloth nappying thing is going for us the second time around.

We’ll be having a Facebook garage sale on Friday the 9th. That’s tomorrow!

One Fit Wonders – normally $49, now $30
Cloth wipes – normally $14 for 5, now $9
Newborn fitted nappies – normally $26, now $15
Scarlet Eve postpartum & breast pad set – normally $22, now $15

Use the Cloth Nappy Hunt discount code to get a further 15% off your order (excluding gift certificates and Facebook garage sale purchases)

Little Para Pants will also donate 50% of your order total to Lisa Barrett for legal fees if you mention her when you order.

And while supplies last, orders over $30 will receive a free sample pack of Rockin’ Green Cloth Nappy & Laundry Powder!

Keep an eye on the blog, the Facebook page, Twitter, and our hint thread for updates on future bargains! This is the ‘maternity leave sale’ in full swing!

So anyway, I thought I’d list my nappy stash and tell you a bit about what I’m planning to do for this baby. I’ve made everything on this list myself.

Flat terry squares – about 16 of them. I just went to count them and was sure I was missing a couple, but there are one or two in the wash from cleaning up messes around the house.
Prefolds – six newborn sized ones made from bamboo fleece/flannelette. The nice thing about these is when Chuck outgrows them, I can use them as boosters in other nappies. I’ve never used prefolds before so this will be new for me!
Fitteds – I have three one-size which should fit from a young age all the way up to a three year old. Or at least they still fit Caleb when he was three.
Pockets – Oh, I have a heap of these! They’re my favourite. I dug out two of the first pockets I ever made for Caleb – they look a bit dodgy but they’ll work as backups when we run out of everything else. I also have three medium pocket nappies that I made for Caleb when he was about four months old. They’ll come in handy later down the track. And I have about six other small pocket nappies to use fairly straight away, and a larger pocket that was my first experience with a side-snapping nappy. Plus one ‘patchwork’ pocket that I just made last week out of PUL scraps. We’ll have to wait & see how it works with all the seams through the PUL.
All-in-ones – at the moment I just have one, a small one with a butterfly print.
Wipes – about 20 cloth wipes, some hemp/flannelette and some bamboo/flannelette.
Woolies – I’ve knitted two small wool soakers (shorties) and a pair of larger longies. These will be to use over the prefolds, fitteds, and terry squares.
Wet bags – Just today I made two enormous wet bags with loops to hang on a door handle. They should hold about two days worth of nappies, and then we can dump the whole lot in the washing machine. No smelly bucket to maintain! I still need to make a couple of ‘going out’ wet bags for the nappy bag, though I do still have the ones we used for Caleb. They’re just delaminated.

We also have three Snappis and two pairs of traditional nappy pins.

So that’s the stash. And our change table is an old wooden table that Darrin’s mum gave us a few months before Caleb was born, and what do you know, it was the perfect size for a change table. So we’re using it again. We only ever folded up a giant beach towel to put down on it for padding. I always meant to get a ‘proper’ change table pad, but never got around to it. The towel works fine anyway.

Our nappy storage area is just a spare shelf from a secondhand wooden bookcase on top of a portable folding bed, wedged up against the bathroom wall by the change table. The terry squares are folded and stored in a hanging nappy stacker, which at the moment is in the bedroom, but I may move it into the bathroom later.

This is by no means the end of the stash. I know I’ll add to it as the months pass. But I think we’re off to a good start.

I will also be stocking some brand new items on the 1st of September – the last time until next year sometime.

Sure, there’s ways you can lengthen the life of your nappies, but it’s time to face facts – everything, no matter how well made, will eventually break down. Fabric will thin, elastic will stretch, snaps will loosen and fall off, stitching will break.

I made a set of three pocket nappies for my son when he was about four months old. We kept using them till he transitioned to undies at three and a half. By the time he was done with them, stitching had come undone, the lining had thinned, and I had to sew new boosters for them. I also ripped off all the Velcro and replaced it with snaps – and in the process, ripped a few holes in the PUL. They’ll still work for our next baby, but they don’t look so great now.

Another set of nappies I made from an old flannelette bed sheet. I don’t have any of them anymore because they were too holey and the elastic was poking through. I didn’t feel comfortable putting them on my son anymore at that point.

So here’s my point: don’t expect your nappies to be flawless when you’re finished nappying one child. They will most likely need some kind of repairs before you use them on another child. And this is normal! Would you expect a t-shirt to look the same after two years if it had been worn several times a week, urinated on, and washed every second day? No? Then don’t expect that of your nappies!

And now it’s time to announce our second raffle. Up for grabs is a custom made pull-up nappy/training pants worth $35. Twenty five tickets are available. The winner will be drawn on Monday 25th July at 3 pm Australian CDT.

Details of the raffle are here. Good luck!

I wondered if there was something wrong with my products, or my marketing, or me, that I wasn’t getting the results I’d hoped for. So I was starting to seriously think about quitting, because I couldn’t see how to improve things. And so I put the question to my friends – what can I do? And one said, in a nutshell, work out what I love about the business and stick to that. So I am.

I am a WAHM (work at home mum). I can only do so much with the time I have. So mass production really isn’t in my future unless I outsource, which I really don’t want to do. Therefore, I’m sticking with my favourite part of the business – custom nappies. I will still do the other things, like wipes, breast pads, and doll nappies by request (or to use up fabric scraps), but my main focus will be individual nappies custom made to your preferences.

Little Para Pants will stay in business till the 30th of September this year. I will then take the rest of the year off while my family adjusts to a new baby. At the start of next year, I will open the business again for custom items. I hope to have some new fabrics and designs to show off by then as well.

Some prices will change with the restructuring, and I expect some products will be discontinued.

And of course, this means I want to sell as much of my existing stock as possible before I go on leave. So keep an eye on the blog, the newsletter, Facebook and Twitter for notices of sales, deals, and promotions!

Now we get to the really exciting stuff. As part of the clearout, I’m introducing a raffle. You and a few other people pay $2 each for a chance to win a nappy. Tickets are limited to the cost of the nappy, postage, and Paypal fees. So in the first raffle for a One Fit Wonder, only 34 tickets are available. As this is my priciest nappy, this means other nappies will have fewer tickets available. You can buy multiple tickets for yourself, for friends, family, for whoever.

Details on the first raffle are here. It will close when the last ticket has been sold, and the winner will be drawn on 11 July at 3 pm Australian CDT.

How many raffles we have will depend on how fast the tickets sell for the first one. If you’re keen, I’d suggest you get in early!

Thank you for sticking with me through this time of change, and I hope to bring you great things in the future!

Today while I was at the shops with my son, I saw a family walking past with a trolley full of bulk-packed disposable nappies. And by full, I mean FULL. I don’t even want to think about how much money they’re throwing away! And I thought, yet again, that even if you only have one cloth nappy and use it every second day, that’s 182 fewer disposables going into your bin – and eventually to landfill – every year. That’s up to six packs of nappies you won’t have to buy! How much money will that save you? Let’s check it out.

The favourite brand in Australia is currently $16.99 for 32 ‘infant’ sized nappies from the grocery delivery shop I use. Let’s take a couple of dollars off that price for the shelf price in the shop. So that’s still $14.99 for 32 nappies. Let’s assume you use that single cloth nappy a little more in the summer when it dries faster – just to make the math easier. Six packs of 32 nappies is 192 nappies and $89.94. So you bought that one cloth nappy for about $30 and it’s saved you almost $60! It’s paid for itself three times over in just one year!

Now imagine how much more money you could save with each additional cloth nappy you purchase!