When I was pregnant, I thought a lot about diapers; how extraordinarily expensive they are, how I barely had money to clothe myself let alone waste money on a perpetually disposable item that unfortunately was a necessity.

I thought about cloth diapers. I really did. I considered the option. But then I thought about the prospect of washing excess poop in the bath tub. Yuck. So I vetoed the cloth option.

Now that I have nearly a one year old son, I am thinking about diapers, again. I spend $34/month on them. That’s $408/year. Considering my household income, that is a lot of money.

So now I am thinking about cloth diapers again. My best friend recently told me that her parents used cloth diapers on her. This was nearly 30 years ago. They, like my boyfriend and I, had very little money. So they never touched disposable diapers.

This brings to the forefront an interesting issue; if disposable diapers are so expensive, why do the majority of the parental population use them? Convenience? Less mess? What did people do before disposable diapers? They used what was available to them; cloth diapers.

I’ve decided that I cannot live in ignorance of the cloth diaper any longer. I need to sample this animal and see what it is all about. Perhaps I will even save myself a little money in the process.