The Cloth Nappy Blog

Hemp is a common absorbent material used in fitted nappies and inserts. It is usually hemp French terry, which is a knitted (stretchy) fabric with small loops on one side, or sometimes a fleece. This is made from the terry with the loops brushed out to make the fleece so there is no difference in absorbency.  It is far more expensive than cotton, but also far more absorbent and it wicks well, so it moves the moisture around and you use the whole of the nappy.

This is important if you want your nappies to last or have a big wee-er, if you are changing every wee it may not be as important.  It has some anti-fungal and anti-bacterial properties but does tend to absorb the wee smell.  There are several ways to deal with this, such as rinsing as soon as you take the nappy off or adding  tea-tree or eucalyptus oil to the wash.  Vinegar can help too.

Hemp needs to have at least 3 hot washes before it becomes absorbent and it increases in absorbency for about 8-10 washes.  It should have been washed at least once during manufacture to stop it from shrinking, but when you receive your nappies you usually need to wash them a few times.  As clean nappies you can run them through with any other loads you are doing.

Unfortunately hemp becomes hard and crunchy when it is working the best. This is why it is great inside pockets or as a hidden layer, but not as good against the baby’s skin.  An advantage, though, is that it is extremely durable – I have some that has been used for 4 years and is still going strong.  So it is a good choice for a one-size nappy that will be used for a long time.  It is environmentally friendly.

When I was selling nappies I used ProCare as a water-resistant layer and I’ve been asked how I sewed it, so I thought I’d share it here.

ProCare is a very durable coated fabric made by Wazoodle, a Canadian company.  In my opinion it is far superior to PUL because it is much longer wearing but still soft, but it’s quite hard to get hold of in Australia.  One thing to note – my ProCare did not last the advertised 1000 home launderings, possibly because of UV exposure, but it did last longer than PUL.  One side has a knitted polyester, the other side is rubbery.  You can use either as the right side, my rule of thumb was to have the fabric side towards where people would be touching, so the inside of a cover or pocket.  I only used white because it was always a hidden layer, but it is available in plain blue, pink and green as well.

Most of my ProCare was sewn with an overlocker (serger).  The dilemma here is that the rubbery side is quite ’sticky’ and you can’t pull things through an overlocker or you can break the needles and needle-plate.  To get around this I kept the ProCare on the top, where it moved through easier and I could keep an eye on it.  On a sewing machine I found the opposite worked better – having the ProCare on the bottom near the feed dogs.  It takes a bit of trial and error to see what works with different machines.

I used a relatively heavy duty needle, size 90, but just a normal sharp – I’ve heard others suggest ball point needles for coated fabrics but personally didn’t find it made a difference.  If you are using pins, it’s very important to pin inside the seam allowance, otherwise you end up with holes in your water-resistant layer!  Bull dog clips are a good alternative to pins that won’t leave marks.  I’ve also heard of people gluing fabrics with special fabric glues, this would be good to ‘baste’ a hidden layer and the fashion layer.

The difficulty with making pocket nappies with a hidden layer and outer fashion layer is stopping the outer layer coming in contact with the pocket itself.  If it does, it can wick the moisture out and you end up with a wet nappy.  I know of several  solutions:

• The simplest way to avoid it is to use an outer that is 100% polyester, like minkee. Gorgeous and non-wicking, what more could you ask for?  Even better is if you top-stitch around the elastic, this makes it lie flat rather than rolling.
• Use fold-over elastic to sew your layers together. This is definitely the simplest sewing solution, no turning, no separate elastic, just put your three layers together and sew.  However I’ve only done it myself with non-wicking outers or on covers.  For a cover I’ve found it works best when the crotch is very wide so there is a gap between the nappy and the leg of the cover, I suspect a pocket nappy with a cotton outer would wick if done this way.
• Make an overlocked (serged) frill. Sew the elastic between the ProCare and the inner, then put the fashion fabric on top and overlock the three together.  You end up with an overlocked frill around the nappy.
• Make the pocket separate. Much the same as the overlocked frill, but turned.  Sew the elastic between ProCare and inner, then put the right side of the fashion fabric to the inner and overlock.  Turn right way out, you get a line of the inner around the edes of the legs.  It must have enough absorbent materials in the pocket or it will wick because there’s nowhere else for the water to go.
• Make a partially hidden layer. I haven’t tried this myself, but I’ve seen a couple of brands that say the outer layer is separate from the pocket because some of the ProCare is visible.

Most natural materials are absorbent, and most absorbent materials are natural!  It’s to do with the plant fibres – their job is to transport things like water around, whereas synthetics are long chains of molecules, not tubes.

Some of the absorbent materials used in modern cloth nappies (MCNs) -

Cotton –
This isn’t really ‘modern,’ it’s the old faithful.  Cheap, but not as absorbent as other fabrics.  It is generally used for cheap flats available from chain stores such as K-mart and older nappies as a terry (with loops) or flannelette.  Some newborn nappies use it because on a newborn you are generally changing frequently and flannelette is thin so makes trim nappies, and it’s not economical to make expensive nappies that will only fit for a few weeks!  It is also common in mass produced nappies.

Cotton is reasonably absorbent and easy to care for, but it tends to go hard after a few washes.  It can be softened fairly easily by using vinegar in the wash, drying it in the shade or using a dryer, and cotton terry flats can be worked extremely hard.  I have some that are 4 years old and still going – I don’t care what they look like because I only use them at home.

Depending on where it is grown cotton can be a very environmentally unfriendly crop.  It requires a lot of water, which is fine in monsoonal countries such as India and China, but not in Australia.  There are a lot of insects that eat the cotton bolls or fibres so it often uses a lot of pesticides, although there is an increasing amount of organic cotton becoming available.  For agricultural products including fabrics look for SKAL certification to check it is organic, this is for the EU but many international producers have it. There is some ethically produced cotton from places like India where community businesses are growing it, but for other cotton there may be a trade-off between environmental friendliness, work conditions, and local production.

Overall I have used a lot of cotton in my nappying, but only with flats around the house.  With the variety of MCN that are available I would go for something more absorbent or durable when I want reliability.

Old style nappies just had something to catch the wee and something to do them up with.  Then there was the invention of lovely plastic pilchers that kept clothes at least a little bit dry.  Now we are a bit fussy, and Modern Cloth Nappies have all sorts of options including super-absorbent, anti-microbial absorbency, water resistance and stay-dry linings.

Absorbency

Absorbent materials are the workhorse of the nappy!

For a little baby, how much you need depends on how long you want the nappy to last.  To last longer, add more.  Or if you change frequently you don’t need much absorbency.  As they get older the way babies wee changes – instead of many small wees they start saving them up and doing fewer, bigger ones.  Some toddlers may remain fine with relatively light nappies but  others may need a lot of boosting, because while their nappy is dry for hours, when it rains it really pours.

You might need to consider two types of absorbency – total amount, and distribution.  Total amount is pretty easy to understand, people generally talk about the number of layers.  But consider a fitted nappy, which is absorbent all over, compared to a pocket nappy which just has a strip through the crotch.  Obviously the fitted nappy will need less layers for the same absorbency, or will be more absorbent for the same number of layers.  This is where wicking becomes important – the ability of the fabric to move wee around and how fast.  If your fitted nappy is made of something that wicks really well, it will use all that extra material at the sides and back.  If it doesn’t wick well, you will end up with a big wet patch that may leak through on the crotch while the rest of the nappy is dry.  And that’s really annoying.

Because different absorbent materials have different strengths and weaknesses, I like having a combination in my nappies.  So for example all my pocket inserts have some microfibre, because it’s quick, and some hemp or bamboo, because it’s reliable.

Water resistance

Not water proofing!  The problem is that if something is water proof it is also air proof, which is not good for little bums.  Obviously water resistance needs to be on the outside, but it can be a separate cover or an integral part of the nappy.  There are advantages both ways, it depends what you are after.

Separate covers can be used with a folded pad inside them, or they can be extra boosted by adding more absorbent layers inside or outside the nappy itself.  Some can be re-used without washing, and there are some called things like longies, flongies, shorties, florties or soakers that can replace pants or trousers, especially as pyjamas.  And if you put them over a fitted nappy they are an extra line of defense against leaks because there are two sets of elastic seals.

Nappies like pockets or AIOs with integral water resistance tend to be trimmer and easier to put on, because there is only one thing to worry about.

Linings

There is a lot of talk about ’stay-dry liners.’ All this means is that the lining is some form of polyester, it could be a velour, fleece, suedecloth or anything else soft.  Synthetic fabrics are generally non-absorbent, so wee goes through them into the absorbent fabric below.  It won’t keep babies completely dry, but they aren’t sitting right up against wet fabric.  I feel a difference when my baby’s been wearing a pocket, which has a stay-dry liner, or a terry flat without one.  And from talking to adults who use nappies it does make a difference in the comfort.

The other main type of liner is all natural for babies who react to synthetics.  There are many nappies with cotton or bamboo velour liners for their softness, and really rashy babies may need raw silk.  This is the material least likely for there to be a reaction but it isn’t in general stock – you may need to get some from a fabric store and hem it yourself.  Natural liners are not stay-dry, and may wick moisture onto the outside of some nappies as well.