Here's how Liz simplified diaper changing way back when:
When my daughter was a little baby, we always pulled her outfit up and away from her bottom during diaper changes and then laid out a clean diaper under the dirty one before beginning. This little trick saved us from constantly messing up the outfit or the changing pad. Though you sometimes end up with a "wasted" diaper, as first-time parents, we preferred that over going through the stress of changing baby's clothes.
Warning! Graphic diaper description ahead!
I'm still in diaperland, so here's what I do: When there's poop, I open the diaper, then wipe the butt in question from front to back with the inside of the diaper, then fold it over and tuck it under said butt so only the clean outer portion of the diaper is touching the baby (and the changing pad is still protected). You'll be relieved to know there are no Flickr photos associated with my little howto.
I’ve enjoyed all of your hacks, but I have to say – what Momma doesn’t know this trick of putting a clean diaper under your baby’s bottom prior to a diaper change? It just seems like an obvious thing to do.
I always make sure to talk the socks off too because babies like to wiggle when getting changed and often I will end up with poopy socks if I don’t take them off.
THAT’S a graphic diaper description?
Uh, okay.
We have a few of these “Multi use waterproof pads” we picked up at Babies R Us for exactly this purpose. It goes between child and changing table. If it gets dirty, throw it in the wash and grab another one. No sense in wasting a diaper! Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000096PUS
Your method is exactly the one a nurse showed us in the hospital.
The Multi use waterproof pads are a great idea. I think those alone deserve the hack. No sense waisting a diaper when you’re doing thousands of loads of wash anyways.
Hey, Serrina maybe it was obvious to you but, we’re not all born naturals at this mommy thing. My husband and I were just doing the “hospital-wipe-down and tuck thing” that Asha mentioned until I saw my mom putting a new one underneath first. Trashing the old diaper first and then getting a new one sometimes just isn’t quick enough for newborns. I didn’t mind the laundry. I just didn’t like to always be changing my daughter’s clothes so many times a day, because I wasn’t a natural at dressing a newborn either 🙂
This is just what worked for me in the first month or two.
Here’s an earlier hack about using waterproof mattress pads for diaper changing:
http://parenthacks.com/2006/02/waterproof_matt.html
I have my hand up Serrina. I am another mama that didn’t know about the clean diaper underneath thing with my first son. My husband has been doing this, but I’m not sure where he picked it up from. I don’t use this method, it just never fit in my “diaper changing rhythm”. But great tip!
Our favourite thing was to put a spare coth diaper under. Even when she started daycare and we went to disposable, we keep a few cloth around for this sort of thing, and they can be thrown in the wash too.
My wife tried the new-diaper-underneath trick. I don’t think a new diaper provides enough area to protect the changing surface well. Also, since they don’t lie flat, it just gets in the way of baby wrangling, often making removing the dirty diaper from the crime scene somewhat challenging.
What we do instead is line the changing table/surface with “underpads” (sometimes called “chucks”). These are disposable pads, soft and absorbent on one side and waterproof on the other. THey’re used by incontinents to sleep/sit on. They’re usually in the adult diaper section, which is often near the baby diaper section.
When I changed my kids i would pull off their rubber pants, then tuck the rubber pants underneath their cloth diapers. That provided the waterproof barrier, then it was out with the safety pins, roll up the diaper inside the rubber pants, and toss into the diaper pail. Fresh diaper, pins, and rubber pants, and baby was done.