Stripping

Our growing boy ate an entire scrambled egg all by himself this morning.

This post shall be about stripping...

This child was actually drawing a picture about when her mommy went to buy a snow shovel at Home Depot, haha!

..stripping diapers, silly. Get your mind out of the gutter! Our diapers were passed due for a good strip so I had them soaking in the washer overnight with 3 Tbsp Rock 'N Green detergent and 1 Tbsp original Dawn dish soap.

Some people strip on a regular schedule for maintenance, every 3-6 months or so, but not me! I just wait until there's a problem and then go for it. You use so much water when you strip so I feel like it is silly to do it more often than really NEEDED, though many other cloth diapering mamas would disagree. This was our second time stripping in a little over 13 months so that's not too bad! If you keep your wash routine simple and use the right amount of detergent, chances are you won't really have to strip them that often. Our issue this time was ammonia stink. This usually indicates some sort of build up (usually residual detergent) on the diapers.

After much research, I concluded that Dawn dish soap is great for breaking down and cleaning up any buildup your diapers might have. Hey, if it can clean oil off a duck, it will take anything off of a diaper, right? I add the Rock N Green to get a nice, deep clean and the combination works like a charm for me. If you choose to give my stripping method a try, you may want to know that putting Dawn trough your washer will void it's warranty. Lucky for me, my mom had a nice, old(ish) top loader that has well surpassed the warranty window. Top loaders are nice because you can just pause the wash cycle for an overnight soak. If you have a front loader, or your machine is still under warranty, just soak the diapers in your bathtub, large plastic container or bucket and then transfer them to your washer in the morning.

After their overnight soak, I just keep running HOT wash cycles until there aren't any bubbles left during the agitation check (which is just opening the lid while the machine is agitating to see what kind of bubbles you find. Bubbles that stay = detergent, bubbles that float to the top and quickly burst = harmless air bubbles). The diapers were suds free after three more hot wash cycles. Then I dried as usual. They were a little overdue since they started getting pretty smelly a week or two before the move. Then the $#!+ hit the fan and stripping diapers was kind of off my radar... Until the smell of ammonia would burn my nose every time I'd put a diaper into the pail.

After a day of washing and doing bubble checks, all the diapers are dry and ready to stuff. Something about freshly stripped and stuffed diapers makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. I'm not sure what it is about fluff, but almost every cloth diapering mom I know is addicted and actually enjoys diaper laundry day.

Here's a clip of the fun we had before Ayden's bed time.

Do you cloth diaper? What is your stripping routine?

~Sarah