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Homemade Baby Wipes...Re-washable and Disposable
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This article was written and shared by Gloria Sutton. You may reprint this article, or copy and post it to a web site, following three conditions... 1) the article must be published in it's entirety as it is seen here, 2) credit must be given to the author and 3) the original source of her article must be included.
Please list credit as:
"Homemade Baby Wipes...Re-washable and Disposable by Gloria Sutton, shared with permission, courtesy of Peggy's Kitchen, www.peggyskitchen.com"

Homemade Baby Wipes...
Re-washable and Disposable
by: Gloria Sutton
 
I did this when my children were
small and in diapers so I could save money AND also so I could know what was in the wipes so I could keep my daughter, Pam, from having allergic reactions. Pam's skin was so
sensitive when she was little.
 
REWASHABLE WIPES
Take a squirt bottle or a spray bottle (your personal preference) and fill it up with warm water, add less than 1/4 tsp of baby soap (your preferred baby wash) and 1/4 tsp or less of olive oil or baby lotion, baby oil or almond
oil instead. Shake well.
 
The lotion dissolves in the water, but if you use oil, you will need to shake it a little before using the wipes each time to mix it up. It's that simple and easy. You can reuse your old and worn out washcloths, or you can get new ones pretty cheap in bulk quantity for under $4 at Walmart. If you are buying new wash cloths for this, buy the THIN ones, they should be soft enough to use on baby's bottom after you wash them when you bring them home. You can also use old cloth diapers, or old flannel material (like sheets and shirts), cotton velour is a nice soft fabric for baby's bottom as well. The KEY thing here is to MAKE SURE THE CLOTH IS SOFT, YET STRONG! You can customize your material into pieces the size you prefer to use. You can use the wash cloths full size just as they are. You can also cut them into halves, or into quarters for smaller wipes. I prefer the smaller ones (quarters) when the wash cloth is a very large one. Zigzag stitch the edges of them after you cut your choice of fabric into the size cloths you want.
You can take your dry re-washable cloths and keep them in a recycled commercial baby wipes box , if you want, or just in a freezer baggie, etc..however you wish to store them is fine.
 
Just dampen each cloth right before you use it, and toss them into a pail to wash with your cloth diapers, if you  use them. You don't have to use cloth diapers to use cloth wipes--just wash them with your towels or something else that gets
washed on warm or hot, preferably not with bleach.
 
When my children were little and we lived in Italy, we used cloth diapers and re-washable baby wipes at home, and we used disposable diapers and disposable baby wipes when we were out and about.
 
You can also just use water in your bottle, especially if you have allergy problems. Any baby wash or lotion that your child isn't sensitive to adds a little extra cleaning power, just make sure to add just a TINY bit so you
won't leave soap on their bottom!
 
DISPOSABLE WIPES
I have used this technique with heavy paper towels, as well for a disposable home made baby wipes, just like commercial baby wipes. Be careful, sometimes
they can become moldy if you make some and don't use them for a period of time...I had a friend find hers in the car where she kept some for when they were out and about, and they had molded. After that I was very careful to make sure I used my homemade disposable ones on a regular basis. Just be careful and observant should you decide to use the disposable cloths.
 
I always preferred to use a large freezer baggie to carry disposable cloths in my diaper bag...this way I could shove them wherever I wanted them to go and not worry about trying to fit things in around bulky wipe containers...you have to remember, this was before they started offering small and slim containers for the diaper bags (my youngest is 15yrs. old). You either dealt
with  bulky containers in the diaper bag as far as wipes were concerned, or you got creative as I did.
 
I did try a few times to take my bottle and a large freezer baggie with my re-washable cloths, and another large one to put the used cloths in...I did not like it  myself...it was kind of like carrying around dirty diapers, and
the "smell" on a hot day seeped through the plastic anyway..I was not happy with that at all. You might though, be able to figure out how to make the
re-washable wipes work for you when you are out and about. I just decided to leave  it alone and make my own disposable wipes.
 
Happy Diaper Changing!