After seven years of preparation, I am finally ready to climb a mountain. 

I have the necessary gear assembled and ready to go.  I have an assortment of cloth diapers, washable diaper covers, cotton washcloths, a 5-gallon bucket, water, and vinegar for soaking soiled diapers.  I also have my washing machine, clothes dryer, the proper detergent and a drying rack for the diaper covers.  If I want to make my first climb a little more challenging, I may attempt to hang dry each washed diaper so the sun can bleach any offending stains.  And of course, I have a 2-year old bum waiting to be diapered at least six times a day.

As you may have guessed, I am not preparing to climb Mount Everest.  I am going to climb my very own mountain of cloth diapers.  I tried to make my picture look ominous since that is how cloth diapering feels to me. 

I remember having a brief conversation with my sister-in-law about cloth diapering when I was pregnant with my oldest son.  Although I did not say it at the time, I am pretty sure my attitude was, “Well, that is nice if you are into that kind of thing but I have more important things to do with my time.”  A few years later, when my second son was six months old, I had another cloth diaper conversation with a couple of friends where I said something like, “Okay, let’s take the cloth diaper plunge (or climb) together!  I would rather spend my money on a cute shirt at the Gap then on another bag of diapers!”  My friends went on to climb the mountain.  I was really excited to make the climb until I realized how overwhelmed I was with the task of caring for two little ones while my husband was in school full-time and working.  I am sure I bought that cute shirt at the Gap anyway to make me feel better about my failed cloth diaper climb.

But I am ready to try again.  I have set aside some extra time.  I have a group of friends and family cheering me on and I think I have mustered up the courage I need to face my fears.  Cloth diapering is my next Grandma Challenge.  I thought about making this my first challenge but I was secretly hoping my daughter would decide to potty train before I had a chance to give it a try.  Then I could have written a nice little post about how I should have used cloth diapers but never got around to it.  Sigh.  No such luck.  My daughter recently turned two and shows no interest in the toilet other than flushing it over and over again.

I knew going into my year of trying to live like Grandma that this would be one of my big Grandma Challenges since disposable diapers did not really become popular until the 1960’s and I am looking at how things were done it the 1930’s, 40’s and 50’s.  My Grandma Marlene confirmed that she cloth diapered all 9 of her kids.  My own mother used cloth diapers on me and my brother.  I recently interviewed my friend Jodie’s grandmother who is 104 years old.  I took a moment to describe modern, disposable diapers to her and asked if she would have used them on her kids.  She replied, very matter-of-factly, “That would be wasteful!”  She went on to say, back in her day, waste was akin to sin.  I got the point in more ways than one.

How about you?  Do you want to use cloth diapers?  Why or why not?  Are there barriers that prevent you from trying?  Do you have any tips if you already use cloth diapers?   

Unless this challenge goes better than expected, I will not be posting again until Tuesday.  I want to save all of my time and energy for my cloth mountain climb!

In my previous post I wrote about taking on the Grandma Challenge of “climbing a mountain” of cloth diapers.  I was not able to get started right away because, well, peaches are in season.  It was a toss up - start cloth diapering or can some peaches.  The peaches won but Monday came and I could no longer procrastinate.  Here is a description of my first day of cloth diapering. 

Monday, August 18, 2008

8:15 am  I get my daughter out of bed.  I lay her down on the changing table and pull out a cloth diaper and a cover.  I put them together like my friend showed me and quickly realize my first cloth diaper climb has to be abandoned.  I do not have the right gear after all.

The mountain of cloth diapers pictured in my last post were loaned to me by a friend.  The conversation we had when she loaned me the diapers came rushing back as I tried to make my first cloth diaper attempt.

“You are welcome to use these diapers if they fit,” says my friend.
“Great!” I say in reply.  “I am sure they will be just fine.”
Key phrase of the conversation: “…if they fit.”

8:20 am  I put a disposable diaper on my daughter.

8:45 am  I walk my son to school with a group of parents who live nearby.  I quickly seek out my friend who loaned me her cloth diaper covers (a different friend than the one who loaned me the initial stack of cloth diapers).  I tell her about my failed cloth diaper attempt.  She promptly offers to loan me her cloth diapers that should fit my daughter.

9:15 am  I leave my friend’s house with a new mountain of cloth diapers along with two containers of wash cloths and my daughter who now has a cloth-diapered bum.

9:45 am  I feel like I smell like pee as I take a pile of food scraps to the compost pile.  A blob of the food scraps lands on my foot as I dump them into the pile.  I mumble to myself, “So this is how this day is going to go…one mess after another.”  I take a moment to weed the garden which leaves me feeling even messier.

10:30 am  I run back to my friend’s house who loaned me the proper sized cloth diapers to retrieve my stainless steel coffee mug.  Upon entering her door, she asks, “So did you change her diaper yet?”  To which I reply, “Um, no.  Was I supposed to?”  My friend gives me a few tips on how to check for a wet diaper which I am convinced will leave me smelling even more like pee.  I turn to leave and try to sound confident as I say, “I guess I better go home and check her!”

11:00 am  I lay my daughter on the changing table and take off her diaper.  Much to my dismay, her shirt and shorts are soaked with pee.  I change her clothes, put on a fresh diaper and fresh cover and decide to take a detour for some extra help.

11:45 am  I arrive at a local store called Hopscotch which sells all kinds of cloth diaper supplies.  The woman running the store nicely instructs me through another cloth diaper change for my daughter.  I leave with a couple of new diaper covers I hope will contain the pee a little better along with a wet/dry bag I can use for dirty diapers when I am on the go.  I put my daughter in her car seat and realize she has filled her diaper with poo.  Dread sets in as I anticipate what I will encounter when I get home.

12:00 pm  I lay my daughter on the changing table again and find myself staring at a big, squishy poo.  Since this was the diaper I put on her while at the store, I did not include a rice paper liner.  For those of you who do not know, a rice paper liner looks like a piece of toilet paper only it is thicker.  You lay it on top of a fresh cloth diaper.  If your child poos, you can lift out the rice paper liner (filled with most of the poo) and throw it in the toilet leaving you with less of a mess in the diaper.  I did not have a liner and so now I have a big mess.

12:10 pm  My daughter has a fresh diaper and another fresh cover on.  My son and daughter watch as I stand at the toilet swishing and flushing in an attempt to get a bunch of poo off the dirty diaper.  I am close to tears.  After a couple of attempts, I leave the diaper in the toilet, wash my hands, instruct my son to use the potty downstairs and make some lunch.

1:40 pm  My son and daughter are napping and I return to the diaper in the toilet.  I swish and flush a few more times.  I then move the diaper bucket as close to the toilet as possible, pick up the dripping, slightly poopy diaper and drop it in.  I wash my hands and take solace in the fact that my daughter usually only poos once a day.

3:30 pm  I wake my daughter from her nap, anxiously anticipating that her shorts and shirt will be soaked.  Her clothes seem to be dry.  I put a clean cloth diaper on her with the same diaper cover she was wearing.  Several people have told me I can reuse the diaper covers as long as they do not have poo on them.  I feel confused because the cover seems to smell like pee.  I put it on her anyway hoping I am doing the right thing.

3:40 pm  I realize my hands smell like pee and quickly wash them.  I pick up my daughter, snuggle her and affectionately call her my little pee-pee buns.

5:00 pm  My husband arrives home.  I give him his first cloth diaper training session as I change my daughter for the seventh time.  I am leaving for the rest of the evening and so I tell my husband to put a disposable diaper on our daughter at bedtime.  I do not feel like waking up to find her soaked in pee.  I tell him I will tackle a cloth diaper at bedtime after I feel more confident in my diapering abilities.

5:30 pm  I get in my car and let out a big sigh knowing I will have to face the same thing all over again the next day.  

What is the point of all of this?

In one of my first posts I wrote about how I feel very disconnected from the details of my life.  However, the more I try to live like my grandparents, the more I feel connected to the details of my life.  And the more I connect to the details of my life, the messier my life gets. 

I think this messiness is good because it is forcing me to take ownership of the messes I make.  The more I own each mess, the more I understand how they impact my self, my family, my community and others around the world.  The more I understand the impact of my messiness, the more I feel inclined to take responsibility for cleaning up after myself.

Although it is not easy, I am going to try my hardest to keep climbing my mountain of cloth diapers.  I have already left a big enough mountain of disposable diaper mess for someone else to clean up thanks to the years I used disposables on my boys (and daughter until now that is).

Thank you for all of your encouraging comments!  Please send me your best advice on cleaning up poopy diapers as well as what you use for bedtime.  I tried to put two diapers on my daughter at bedtime but she was clearly uncomfortable because of the bulk.  Not wanting to risk a sleepless night for my daughter or myself, I put her in a disposable diaper.

As part of my two week break from blogging, I spent three days at a monastery called, St. Gregory’s Abbey in Three Rivers, Michigan.  There is almost no quieter place on earth than spending time in the company of monks.

It was just what I needed.

From the moment I arrived until the minute I left, I found myself pondering one thing - the fact that my life has grown too noisy (again).  I knew very little about the blogging world prior to starting my own and while this has been a deeply satisfying journey, it does not fit well into the other parts of my life.

And so it is with a true sense of sadness that I have decided to close down My Grandma Was Green. 

I have struggled with this decision because on the surface it seems my reason is as simple as my life has grown too busy and full.  And in the American culture where a full schedule is praised, personal busyness hardly seems a reason to step away from something.  However, I have discovered that busyness can be and often has been a source of disconnectedness and pain in my life.  Consequently, busyness hardly lends itself to creating a more sustainable and simple lifestyle.

I never took time to define the word sustainability while writing my blog but I think I have started to form a working definition for my own life.  I believe living sustainably means taking only that which I need to live a meaningful, generous and connected life. 

In order to do this I need to be diligent in learning how to distinguish between wants and needs - no small feat in a culture that is saturated with advertising aimed at turning every single thing into a need!  I realize my definition is somewhat ambiguous because the words meaningful, generous and connected can be defined in a variety of ways.  However, when I view sustainability in this context, it puts me on a path of wanting to take less and give more.  It breaks down the walls of my everyday, ordinary life and forces me to consider the well-being of others in each decision I make.

I seem to have a passion for “s” words such as simplicity and slowness.  I am now committed to moving forward in my journey with another “s” word to pursue - sustainability.  Each of these words is connected in so many ways but the tie that binds them together for me is relationships.  I believe I can pursue deeper and more meaningful relationships with self, God, my family, friends, neighbors, community and the world if I commit myself to simplicity, slowness and also sustainability. 

Therefore, I am going to persist with the changes I have made and I will continue to make more changes in the future.  Only now I will have to record my journey in the old-fashioned way - in the pages of my journal, through conversations with friends and family and in the quiet moments of my days.

I am not sure which part of this short journey has been the most important - recommitting myself to a slower pace, my growing awareness of important changes I need to make toward a more sustainable lifestyle, or reconnecting with my grandparents and my own history.  I guess each one is important in its own way.

If you are interested in learning from and connecting to your grandparents or any older person who is significant to you and/or learning about sustainability by looking to the past, I would encourage you to make use of the extensive questionnaire developed by Virginia Allee called, A Family History Questionnaire.  It proved to be an invaluable resource in asking my grandparents to share their story.  I trust you will find the same.

Thank you for all of your support in this endeavor.  I have learned a lot and will continue to be inspired by the stories I have read and by those individuals who are making great changes through the blogging world.

Goodbye for now,
April