Day 1 of the Flats and Handwashing Challenge! Each day we are asked questions or presented a topic of discussion for the day. Todays question was: “Why are you taking the challenge?”
Well, it is now at the end of day 1 in this household. I didn’t have time to write my blog post and answer this question earlier- even though the kids are in slumber, its still technically day 1 ,right? 🙂
Why am I taking the challenge?
In all honesty, I wasn’t planning on doing this challenge. In fact, it wasn’t until this past Friday when I decided to jump on the bandwagon and then took until yesterday to actually sign up. What pushed me to join? I bought some flats! A friend of mine offered me a great deal on some flats (her girls are all done with diapers) and I jumped on the deal! There really wasn’t a need for them- I have plenty of diapers (I wont deny I have an addiction to cloth!) but I was all pumped to get to actually give flats a shot- I have tried them in the past but only once or twice.
Then I remembered skimming by a post about this Flats Challenge. I wasn’t quite sure what it all entailed so I Googled it. Up came the Dirty Diaper Laundry site and the description of the challenge and my mental checklist started…
- Flats ONLY- check….
- Covers- check…
- No washing machine- wait… what?… okay I can do it…
- No dryer… oh heck yeah
- 7 days… Totally do-able… I’m in!
I knew it would be great for my blog, getting more posts out there and hopefully reaching out to more people. As a newbie blogger, I’m always looking for topics that will garner conversation and attention. Unfortunately, many Facebook groups that I am part of do not allow bloggers to share their information (whether its pertinent to the group or not)- well here is a great group of like-minded folk looking for bloggers to tell their story! How perfect!
It wasn’t all about me either of course. I am passionate about cloth diapering and I feel that in order for me to be a useful cloth diapering mentor to other moms, I need to gather as much information about cloth as I can! That means learning all the styles as well as different washing techniques. I have used every style (I think!) except hybrid fitteds. But before the challenge, I only knew one simple flat fold and as stated before, really didn’t have much hands-on experience with them. If anyone asked me about different folds, I’d have to send them off to YouTube. I have already learned a few new folds and I’m trying as many as I can to see which ones I like best!
Then I sat down and actually read the history of why this challenge started. Not to say “hey look what I can do”, but to bring awareness to the sobering fact that there are families that struggle to diaper their baby. They rinse out disposable diapers and hang them up to dry, unable to purchase new ones every time baby soils one. They simply don’t know how easy and inexpensive it can be to cloth diaper a baby. Unfortunately, cloth diapering has obtained the stigmas of being “dirty” and “gross” or “difficult” and “time-consuming”. It really is none of these things and I hope that this misunderstanding is cleared sooner rather than later. It is, plain and simple, unacceptable for anyone to have to struggle to put a clean diaper on their baby. Although I am not sure that I will directly reach anyone who struggles with this, maybe someone who knows someone will read this (or other posts on this challenge) and pass on the valuable information.
If you know someone who is struggling to diaper their baby, please get me in touch with them. I would love to personally help them or guide them to resources that can assist them.
I hope you stick with me through this challenge, I’ll pass on what I learn and show you how easy this really is! And, yes, this is totally Modernly Old-Fashioned!
