Cloth Nappies (Diapers)

So recently we decided to take the dive and throw ourselves into cloth diapering. We have two little boys, Jasper is the oldest and he is 20 months and Maddox is the youngest at 3 months. Since Jasper is about to be potty trained we deiced that cloth nappies will be for Maddox only. WE LOVE THEM!! seriously not even kidding. We had talked about it for some time before hand just to make sure we knew what we were coming up against and if it was worth it. Our main concern was our pockets not the environment so we are LOVING the $50 a month we are saving!! they are so easy to clean and keep on top of, i was nervous about all the washing and the smells but i haven't had a single problem yet. I wash mine every 2 days. I have a HE front loader so i just whack them in on a small setting and they are done in 20 mins and dry in less than 10. Fantastic. The only 'con' i would say is that they are more bulky than a disposable but you can get cute colours so who cares right?!

Anyway, moving on from the pure new found love of cloth nappies ... we started out with the FuzziBunz brand with the pocket insert, which we like (nervous they could get a little hot in the summer time) but looking at them i decided that I CAN TOTALLY MAKE THIS MYSELF!!! one cloth nappy from fuzzibunz will cost you around $15- $25 dollars depending on what kind you get (we got the one size fits all) 

SO i got on google and had a look around at some of the ones that people have made themselves and i was inspired to give it a spin. I found a pattern or two but just didn't like the look of how they turned out. Thats when i got the idea to trace round my fuzzibunz and just match it to what i already had. Genius? probably....

So heres my pattern. I'm giving it away free, Its simple and straight to the point. I drew it out by hand and scanned it in so its probably not the most amazing pattern you've ever used but it certainly does the trick!

The image shows the cloth nappies i made using this pattern. 

PATTERN PAGE 1 

PATTERN PAGE 2 

PATTERN PAGE 3

My ability to upload pictures in fancy pdf files is limited so i hope this works for you, if anyone has any ideas on how i can make the pattern better I'm all ears!

DIRECTIONS:
each pattern piece should be printed on a full A4 piece of paper, in american terms i believe thats 8x11?

the lines should meet up end to end and the right side of the paper should all be flush, make sense? Tape it all together and there you have a pattern!!

Then here comes all the 'fun' stuff' sorry i don't have pictures for a very detailed tutorial, i'll get round to that one day!

You will need ...
I found everything at joanns .. take coupons!!
1 yard of PUL fabric for the outer shell (priced at $12.99)
1 yard of Fleece for the lining (priced around $8.99)
3 yards of elastic ( priced at $3 for 3 yards)
snaps and snap tool to apply ( i found the tool VERY helpful snaps were priced at $7.99)
and a sewing machine

What you do. (I'm just going to assume those reading this have basic sewing skills, if you would like more detail feel free to ask!!)

* place the pattern along a folded line of your fabric and cut out a piece from the PUL and the fleece.
make sure you mark all the snap markings (shown as stars on the pattern) on your fabric
* first you will apply the snaps to the PUL fabric only, and ONLY the bottom snaps, there will be 14.

TIP: when applying the snaps cut small squares of fabric and put the snaps through the small square AND your top piece, it just makes them a little more sturdy. 

*Put both pieces of fabric right side together and pin all around.
*fold flap (dotted line on pattern) and pin then sew. this will be where the back elastic goes.
* starting from the back where you just sewed the back flap, sew all the way around making sure you don't sew the pocket closed (look at the fuzzibunz image if you need)
* put the elastic through the back slot ( i estimated the length, i would make it looser rather than tighter) sew it at both ends
* using a zig zag stitch, start sewing the elastic for the legs at the markings shown on the pattern,
AS YOU SEW, PULL THE ELASTIC TIGHT- AS TIGHT AS YOU CAN!
*do this to both legs

*turn right side in, DONT PANIC! it will look freaky, i promise it will get better.
* So next, top stitch all the way around, as you get to the elastic, move your stitches to the inside of the elastic and pull it out straight as you go.
* then, apply the wing snaps.
FINISHED

Hope this works for others as well as it did for me.
Good Luck!
(extra images to come)


Note: Pattern is for personal use only, you may not sell the pattern or the final product. If you want to post this on your blog, please inform me and credit my work.