Posts Tagged ‘g-flappers’

Braden at 29 pounds in a medium long.

Congratulations to Tina Olsgaard who won this giveaway!!!

Monkey Doodlez are giving away a Tuck and Go cover, in the size and colour of your choice, along with one of their super soft bamboo pads.  I will draw the winner on August 20th.  The prize will ship directly from Monkey Doodlez.

It is very simple to enter.  Just read my blog review on the TAG cover and head on over to the entry form and answer the questions there.

One entry per household please.

You can however earn an extra entry by blogging about the giveaway.

Entrants will be put on a list here.  I will reply to your entry to confirm that I got it.  It may take me a day or two to process.

The first cloth diaper that Braden ever wore was a G-Diaper. When we started we were using the flushable/compostable/biodegradable inserts. They are just as expensive as disposables, but they do not fill up our landfills with trash like disposable diapers do. We switched to using cloth inserts to save money, and you can read about the story of the g-Flapper in another post.

Recently the Real Diaper Association held a photo competition for baby photos of babies in cloth diapers. One of the gmums, Christina, in the G-Diapers list submitted her baby’s photo. This one here.

Her husband spent a long time getting this absolutely perfect shot of their son Garrett in his cream g-Diaper. Christina and her husband proudly use G-Diapers knowing they are doing good things for the environment. They compost their “pee” flushies for the garden, and flush the “poopie” ones. So they put NOTHING in the trash.

The photo of Garrett was rejected. The RDA told them “Unfortunately, as an organization dedicated to promoting reusable cloth diapers, we have to avoid the appearance of endorsing companies that manufacture disposable diapers.”

I would like to invite anyone from the RDA to join the g-diapers yahoo group. You will find a lot of cloth diaper users on there. G-Diaper cloth diaper users as well as other brands of cloth diapers. Please come by and learn about what G-Diapers really are.

And here is my recent photo of my son Braden at 18 months and his friend Zach at 15 months. They are wearing “>G-Diapers with G-Flappers. There is NOTHING disposable about their diapers.

The G-Flapper is my own product. I came up with the G-Flapper when I was trying to find a cloth insert that worked really well in gDiapers. I found some that kind of worked, but realised I could sew better to fit. My first efforts had too many layers of cloth to cater to my heavy wetting son, and they took two rounds in the dryer to dry. So I came up with the flap system so that the insert would wash and dry better.

The ALL Bamboo G-Flapper is one of the later versions of my G-Flapper. I decided to try out heavy bamboo fleece as the bottom layer instead of hemp to see how the two would compare. I had customers test them out and fill in a survey for me, and the response was extremely positive. It is now one of my most popular G-Flappers. Many ask what is the difference between the organic flapper with hemp and this one with the bamboo fleece. Basically the bamboo is a more expensive fabric, hence the price difference. To me they absorb very similar, but the bamboo remains softer to the touch. Some customers tell me they think the bamboo absorbs better.

The ALL Bamboo G-Flapper is made up of two layers of HEAVY bamboo fleece (there are two main weights on the market and I use the heavy version), two layers of double bamboo terry (and many say this does the same job if not better than microfiber without the stink issues), and 1 layer of bamboo velour backed with a layer of single bamboo terry. I have the bamboo terry backing the velour to help keep it from shifting around everywhere because it is so silky soft. It also adds an extra layer of absorbency.

So here is what some of my customers have written to me and about the insert on various groups I am on:

Wendy writes “So I received my first “gflapper” the other day and have only washed it twice. I put it on dd around 2:30 pm while I was up in Maine, and forgot to change her until after we got home at 6:00 pm! I was slightly horrified when I realized that I hadn’t change her, and then I was simply stunned that it soaked up all her pee and no leaks anywhere! Thanks Sharni for such a wonderful product…..must go order more :)
P.S. It was the all bamboo one!”

Darlene writes “Hi Sharni-
Just wanted to share how much I LOVE the Bamboo G-Flappers! I purchased a tester version in March and loved it. (Unfortunately it was left at my inlaws out-of-state, never to be returned) As sure as it is everywhere, money has been tight, but I have never forgotten your inserts. I have been using the cheap Gerber inserts in which I would have to double up just to last us an hour of two. Slowly, my daughters thighs have been rubbed red as those inserts are so rough and had to be folded so thick. I finally got around to ordering bamboo g-flappers and can’t believe the difference! I continue to get ready the change her, to find that the third layer is still dry as could be. I feel so spoiled not having to change cloth diapers so frequently! In addition, the top layer of the inserts are SO soft! I feel guilty for subjecting my daughter to rough inserts for so long! Thank you for creating such a quality product! Cloth diapering is becoming more popular as the economy slows and I will continue to spread the word about your AMAZING inserts!”

Leslie writes “”I use nothing but G-Flappers from Nappy Shoppe. They are awesome and I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE them! They hold up, are absorbent, fit the G’s perfectly, …I could go on and on.
I highly recommend them!”

Tina writes “The gFlappers™ at www.nappyshoppe.com are awesome!! I am a huge fan of Organic Bamboo Velour and she makes the top layer with that. It’s a 3 layer insert, all sewn together at one end so it also drys really quickly as well!”

So yes I know these G-Flappers are the most expensive in my line up. But when combined with the G-Diaper system they still come out dramatically cheaper than any disposable system. And cheaper than some other cloth diaper systems.

And yes I have customers who love to use them in their pocket diapers too :)

Chelsea Hibbards little blog is a great read. She even says nice things about my g-Flappers on there. She has some video reviews of different diapers too.

http://www.chelseasaidso.com/2009/07/gdiaper-review.html

Chelsea does little give aways every now and then. At the time of writing she is giving away a gDiapers starter pack. Oh and coming soon she will be doing a give away from Nappy Shoppe!!

Cindy is one of my Canadian customers. She has a blog that I have enjoyed reading, especially the articles about her journey into the world of cloth diapering. She sounds alot like me, she has to try out all the different options out there :) I don’t know if Cindy realises it yet, but shes addicted to cloth diapers.

She also has the cutest baby!!!

So check out her blog at http://ckpwong.wordpress.com/

Daisy is one of my customers. She has blogged about my g-flappers and I have used photos of her son at 6 months old as my model for the gPants on my site.

I like to read Daisy’s blog as she blogs about parenting issues, and she is not afraid to talk about the tough issues like immunisation and extended breastfeeding.

http://daisyryanadkins.blogspot.com/

Keep an eye on Daisy’s blog. Coming soon Daisy and I will be doing a Nappy Shoppe giveaway some time in September 2009.

gDiapers were my very first “cloth” diaper that I tried on Braden. A friend was cloth diapering her son who was born a few weeks after Braden. And she was using a diaper service but was asking about diaper liners. I told her I used some great ones with Lauren 20 years ago, and I would see if I could find them on line for her.

While I was hunting down these liners (Chux in Australia btw), I tripped over the gdiapers website. I could not help but stop. I was feeling guilty about using disposables, but I didn’t think any kind of cloth was an option without a laundry sink — a requisite in my mind when using a wet pail system. And here was what was the perfect alternative. gDiapers use reusable covers and flushable/compostable/biodgradable inserts. And cost was similar to using disposables. I placed my order right there and then for the shower gift pack. Braden was less than a month old at this time.

The diapers arrived the same day I was hosting a dinner for my quilting girl friends, and there we were after dinner, with the baby (about 4 weeks old at this time) on the floor trying out these new gDiapers on them. My friend Ann was telling me “You know you could still use cloth, you don’t need a laundry sink”. I hrumphed at her and said “I don’t see how, but these will work”.

Well then the leaks started. I would breastfeed the baby, and I would end up with a wet lap. My husband was tired of changing his pants as often as we changed the baby’s diaper. He told me, forget it, these are not working. So I went to the website and checked out their wonderful videos showing you how to fit them on the baby, and saw the link to join the yahoo group.

Looking back, joining the gDiapers yahoo group was a life changing moment for me. Not only did I get the help I needed to put the pants correctly on the baby, I learned so much more about making my life greener. All our cleaning products are now green. We don’t use paper towel to clean anymore. I use cloth pads for me. And more importantly, I learned about the dry pail for soiled cloth diapers!

So started my foray into cloth in gDiapers. I started out with microfiber towels. I bought different inserts from different sites to try out, and was never truely satisfied with the fit. So I started to make my own. When my first effort took forever to dry, I designed a flap system. And thus the g-flapper was born! So I made myself some g-flappers (though I was not yet calling them that) and was using them in my gDiapers.

I saw that I was not alone in the search for the perfect insert for gDiapers. So I decided to name my inserts and sell them online. I was, still am, a web designer. And my main client had retired (a quilt shop in Plano), so instead of looking for a new client, I started Nappy Shoppe. The biggest hurdle for most online stores is the cost of a good quality website. Well I had that one covered.

So as I write this review, I am coming up to one year since my first “real” order of g-flappers. In that time I have added many brands of diapers to my store, but I was thrilled when gDiapers allowed me to stock gPants in May of 2009. I just celebrated 500 orders too!

What I love about gDiapers is how flexible the system is. You can use cloth in them to save alot of money in diapering. It is one of the cheapest cloth diapering systems you can get with cloth, even if you go with organic inserts. And I love the fact you can use the flushable inserts if you want. I use the flushables if Braden has a rash, when we are out and about (I keep some stuffed all the time in his diaper bag that lives in the car), and when travelling. We did a recent trip to San Antonio with family, and Braden was flushable inserts all the way there and back. We used gPants, Otter Blotter covers, and Gro-Baby covers.

One con with gDiapers is they can be a little tough to learn starting out. Unlike other diapers, you do not pull them tight. If you do, you cause the inner white liner to pucker up and leaks will happen. That is what was happening when we started out. And that was the issue that the wonderful folk on the gDiapers yahoo group helped me solve very quickly. You need to let the velcro pretty much fall into place. Greg still wont use them. They intimidate him, so I just have stuffed pockets and AIO diapers ready for him when he is watching the baby alone.

The other con with gDiapers is I cannot use them at night. Some folk can. One customer told me she uses two All Bamboo inserts at night with great success. For us, we simply could not do it. But they are a great day time option for us.

They have some really cute designs, and some limited edition designs, like their earth day gPants and glory G gPants.

Oh and I would like to blame gDiapers for starting an addiction. An addiction to cloth diapering :)

I give gDiapers 4.8 out of 5. (- 0.2 for the learning curve and for scaring Greg).

Microfiber terry fabric is great at absorbing pee! Surely not it’s inventors thinking on inventing it, but it does a great job of it. I started out with microfiber towels I got in the auto section at Walmart. They were cheap and it was a great way to get started.

I have since discovered the quality of these towels is not high. They are very thin, and it took several to do the “job” with Braden. The used ones were used in microfiber pads for my swiffer wet jet mop. I now buy high quality microfiber terry on the roll. And it is not a small roll that it comes in. Its the biggest one I get at 90 odd yards. Too big to get up the stairs when it first arrives.

So while the microfiber towels from Walmart are no longer an option in diapers for me, I did go back to get more for use in the kitchen. We do not use paper towel for clean up, and the microfiber towels do a great job cleaning the kitchen. A roll of paper towel lasts a long time in this household, it only gets used for cooking and by house guests ignorant of our efforts not to waste resources :)

Microfiber inserts on their own do not work that great with my son, but coupled with hemp fleece or bamboo fleece, they work great. They do the quick work of absorbing pee, and the fleece does the job of holding it.

There are a couple of drawbacks to microfiber besides not being a great solo act:

a) Do not put it directly against baby’s skin. It will dry out their skin as it does such a great job of pulling moisture into it. So use a protective fabric over the top like a g-liner.
b) It is prone to detergent build up more easily than other fabrics which causes it to get stinky. So inserts made of microfiber may require stripping every now and then.

I sell quite a few inserts that feature microfiber, and I also sell it by the yard. If you are sewing with it, be aware that it generates A LOT of lint, so you will need to clean your machine often. I take my serger in every month to be cleaned professionally.