The Wisdom of Moms En Masse

25w7d - Whooo-eee, are you readers ever diaper smarties. Gigantic thanks to all of you who left your advice on my last post—there was no way I could respond to each of you, but know that I have combed a half-dozen times through your comments, created a reading/resource list, and will be making some decisions in the coming weeks regarding how to begin tackling our cloth diaper debacle. And I'll certainly holler individually as necessary for more info.

Really, your insights are invaluable: It's this crowd-sourced wisdom that seemingly makes parenting in the 21^st century easier. 

Wait, it does, right?

I think a lot these days about what it must have been like 30+ years ago when my own folks were trying to decide how to cover the bums of their three kids. Disposable diapers were around, sure, but diaper services reigned in their circle of friends, and so there was no question that they, too, would be signing up for this (at the time) cheaper, more widespread option. There may have been a couple phone calls to friends for recommendations of local diaper services, but spending hours researching differences among PUL-backed cloth and all-cotton covers, hemp-blend inserts vs. microfiber, the relative benefits of different wet bag models … it didn't happen because it couldn't happen. Because there weren't the 1.9 million individual pages of information on cloth diapers out there to obsess over when a 2a.m. pee wakeup morphed into a three-hour fact-finding mission on your iPhone in bed. Because, as sage moms from even two decades ago can attest, all that info just wasn't available on demand: Not in schnazzy digital form, not in print. (And, to be clear, the sheer amount of infant stuff—diapering et al.—didn't exist, either.)

So I'm either lucky to have seemingly infinite resources for making these new-baby decisions, or cursed with the prospect of the nagging cousin to buyers' remorse: Being overwhelmed with opinions and advice (all solicited, all appreciated) while making a harried decision that even after all the research is complete, feels entirely not founded.

Then I remember: They're just diapers.

And, let's be clear, the fact that we are two-thirds of the way through a pregnancy that never felt like it could possibly come to fruition does bump decisions like these into the grateful we even get to make them category. I would rear and shear sheep, spin yarn, and knit individual diapers for this baby daily if it was required for entry into this parenting club.

And where would I go to find the perfect knitted diaper cover patterns? Here, likely. I'd just ask you moms.