My Favorite Type of Laundry - Diaper Laundry!

I hate doing laundry.  I don't know why.  I just don't enjoy it.  But for some reason, I love washing my cloth diapers.  Call me crazy, but there is something wonderful about a beautiful basket full of clean, stuffed and folded, cloth diapers.

Everyone has a different laundry routine.  To be honest, finding the right routine was the thing that scared me the most about cloth diapering.  I asked a lot of online friends what worked best for them and went from there.  I started in the same way they suggested, using Rockin Green detergent.  After a few months I received a sample of EcoSprout from Kissed by the Moon and fell in love.  It got my diapers cleaner and removed the stains better.  I also love my Laundry Tarts Strip It and wool dryer balls. 

Let me start by saying I live in the Midwest.  We have hard water, but a water softener.  We also have a top loader, old school style.  I wash diapers every three days.  What works for me, may not work for you, so please keep that in mind.

I store all of my dirty diaper laundry in wetbags.  It's just more convenient that way since I send a new one to daycare every day A is there anyway.  Once they're full they get thrown in a garbage pail that used to act as a diaper pail before A went to daycare.  On laundry day I take the pail upstairs and dump all of the wetbag contents into the washer with one tablespoon of EcoSprout.  The washer is set to warm and a short wash cycle is run, for me this is a number five.

Once the first cycle is done, I go through and unstuff any pockets that need it and make sure the laundry tabs are securely fastened.  A second short cycle with warm water is run with no detergent.  The first laundry day of the week I add about a teaspoon of Laundry Tarts Strip It as a preventative.  I battled the ammonia stinkies once.  I don't really care to do it again.

Next comes the actual wash cycle.  Two tablespoons of EcoSprout and hot water.  Here's the catch with me.  We're living with our in-laws right now.  They have their water heater set really hot.  I mean scalding, will burn you if you touch the hot water, hot.  So to keep the diapers within the recommended temperatures, I let the washer fill up part way with warm water first.  Set the washer to the longest wash cycle, which for me is a number twelve.

After that I run a double rinse cycle in cold water.  Everything with PUL/TPU is hung to dry with the ceiling fan running.  The rest goes in the dryer with my dryer balls, including my wonderful Woolzies dryer balls.  If you use GroVia hybrids, I suggest flipping the inserts inside out.  They dry much faster that way.

In the morning, everything but the AIOs are dry. I can fold and stuff my diapers and wipes and be ready to go again!

Have you found any tricks that helped improve your laundry routine?  If so, feel free to share!  I used a lot of blog posts to help figure mine out, so I'd love to be a resource for others.