Diapers and Day Trips

I wanted to wait before I said too much about it. Sure, before the boys were here, we told everyone we were going to do it. I wanted to get several months of using them under our belts before I started bragging about how if we can do it with triplets, then anyone can. I'm talking about cloth diapers. When we found out we were having triplets, my second heart attack came from the thought of how much diapers would cost. I went on the Sam's Club website and found out that diapers are costly. That's when a friend of ours introduced us to Bum Genius Diapers. Now, we go through around 36 diapers in a 24 hour period. That's average. At that rate, we would be spending around $250 a month on diapers. Couple that with the fact that you are putting lots of diapers in the local landfill. I know I have talked about this before, but we would be looking at around 1080 diapers a month that we would be throwing away. For those of you with one baby, that's around 360 diapers a month. That's a lot. That's 4,320 diapers in a year. Fortunately, there is an alternative. Now, everyone you talk to will tell you that you are absolutely insane for trying it, but I'm telling you it's not only possible, it's not really that hard.

Check out this website:

BUM GENIUS DIAPERS

When you use these, you will not only save lots of money, you will be saving the environment. What do you need? Well, we had a big sink installed in our utility room right beside the washer. I would say the total cost on it was around $250. You will save that in your first month. What's next? Well, before you have your baby, register for diapers for your baby shower. That's right, while you are shaming all of your friends into buying you stuff for your baby, shame them into buying you diapers. It's not that big of deal. By the way, the baby shower system in this country is about as close to pure communism as you can get.

Okay, so I think each Bum Genius diaper costs around $20.00. Having 12 of them is a good number, so you are looking at around $240 for the diapers. That's no big deal at all. You are already seeing the savings. You may want to get more. Maybe get 20. Who cares? You're saving money, you're helping the environment. The sink and the diapers are going to cost you around $500. Sure you are going to use some water and electricity washing the diapers, but that cost won't touch the cost of disposables.

Now the big question.

How hard are they to wash? Not hard at all. Obviously some of the diapers are going to need to be rinsed out in the sink. I wear rubber gloves and try not to throw up when I'm doing this, and if I can do it, then ANYONE can. I have a very weak stomach. Washing them is pretty easy. Throw them into the washer and wash them on cold with no soap. Next, run them through the hot heavy duty cycle using this soap:

Rockin' Green Cloth Diaper Detergent

Throw them in the dryer, and then you are done. It's that simple. We even take these diapers with us when we head out of the house. Yes, we do have some disposable diapers on hand for emergencies, but we haven't gone through very many at all since the boys came home.

Now, Pampers and Huggies can go away.

In other news, I must say that the boys are really starting to be a lot of fun. The other day we went down to Town Lake here in Austin. The Colorado River runs through downtown, and it is absolutely beautiful down there. There is a place for dogs to run and Tess had a good time swimming in Town Lake.



She also had fun posing with the Austin Skyline in the background:


Stevie Ray Vaughan was one of the greatest guitar players that ever walked the earth. There is a statue of him beside Town Lake. We had to take pictures.


Oh, we have kids too:


Carrie wanted to get some pictures of the boys with the Austin Skyline in the background. Sometimes, triplets don't cooperate.

Actually, triplets rarely cooperate at this age. I can make the dog do pretty much anything.

That's right. She'll sit there forever. She is a very good dog. However, when it comes to triplets, Zane is the only one that would look at the camera.

Don't think for a second it was because I asked to him to look up at this precise moment. They will stare at you and smile until the camera comes out, then they are face down and usually crying. Sometimes in a really good moment at home you can get this:

This next picture is from this morning. Mornings are very nice around here. The babies seem to be morning people. It's from the hours of 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. that they scream bloody murder.


Carrie and I can handle the diapers, the laundry, the feedings, the mixing of the formula, the making of the baby food, the endless bottle washings, the dishes, the holding, the changing, and pretty much everything else that comes with triplets. The one thing we have trouble dealing with is the yelling. I swear that I'm going to have serious issues for the rest of my life with the blood curdling screams that these three can produce. It wears you down. They say water boarding is torture. It probably is. However, being locked in a room or a car with these three screaming at the top of their lungs is a different kind of torture. The screams work their way into your brain and drive you literally insane. Carrie and I will be riding in the car, staring straight ahead and doing our best to ignore the nightmare in the backseat. We try not to take it out on each other, but it is difficult. At this point you want to throw the ownership of the children onto your spouse. I might say something like, "Your kids are loud." This feeble attempt at humor is not met with the laughter you might expect. It's usually not met with anything. The volume of the screams seems to intensify. The boys feed off of each other and push themselves to higher and higher volumes. When they finally stop, it's the best sound on earth. The other night we had a much needed night out alone. For the first twenty minutes neither one of us said a word. We didn't listen to the stereo. We just drove in absolute beautiful silence. Silence is a beautiful gift here in the land of triplets.