So…. being the green beans that we are …. I was happy to say “Yes” when I was contacted to try out the new Green Works(TM) line of cleaning products from Clorox(R).  We have already been using several brands of biodegradable and natural cleaning products, so trying out a new one was a delight.

We tried out the Green Works laundry detergent, and the All-Purpose Cleaner.  I’ll let you know how well they cleaned and how we liked them in a sec.

First, I’ll tell you a little bit about why anyone would want to clean with this stuff in the first place.

Think of it this way – when you use a cleaning product that is full of unnatural and poisonous chemicals, you are basically dumping those chemicals into the water while you rinse.  Imagine standing by the water system and dumping chemicals and bleach into it.  It’s not the type of thing you would typically do on a Saturday afternoon – but you are doing it every time you clean with harsh chemicals.  Using cleaning products that are natural and biodegradable helps you sleep easy, knowing that what you are rinsing into the water supply is natural and will biodegrade.

That brings me to Green Works… what I think is the first mainstream natural and biodegradable cleaning product on the market.  It is really about time that a big company brought something like this out.  Before, you had to go to specialty stores to get these types of products, and usually they were produced only in a small scale.  So I’m happy to see Green Works on the market, and hope that its presence will encourage more people to go green and use green cleaning products.

Green Works natural cleaners are made with at least 95% natural plant and mineral-based biodegradable cleaning ingredients derived from coconuts and essential oils.  They are packaged in recyclable bottles, and are not tested on animals.  The only thing I would like to see in the Green Works future, in terms of packaging, is a low-plastic “refill” package – so that customers can re-use the big bottles and just refill them to reduce waste.

Now comes the big question… will it clean the crayon marks from the wall?  Will it clean the pureed carrots from the floor?  What about the vomit on the shoulder of my best shirt?  And how does it smell (the cleaner, not the vomit)?

According to Green Works(TM): “in lab tests, Green Works hard surface cleaners clean as well as many traditional cleaners on many soils.”

So what does that mean in practice?

Well, we used it to successfully clean a lot of marks on our walls, without any degradation of the paint.  We used it to clean our stainless steel appliances, and other appliances and fixtures, and it worked well there too.  We have been using the laundry detergent regularly, and it gets the clothes nice and clean and smelling good too.  Compared to other natural and biodegradable laundry detergents we have used, Green Works leaves the clothes smelling best overall.  We will definitely continue to use the laundry detergent from now on, and the all purpose cleaner too.

But don’t take my word for it… try it out yourself.  I have some coupons for a free bottle of the laundry detergent.  (Not buy one get one free… just simply, give the coupon at the cash register and get one free).  If you’d like a coupon, and you live in Canada, just leave a comment here and I’ll contact you by email to get your address, and I’ll send you one of the coupons in the mail.  I’ll send coupons to the first five people that leave comments here.  Just use the coupon to get your free bottle.  I hope trying it out will convert you to, or at least get you thinking about, using green cleaning products.  If you like Green Works after you’ve tried it, come back again and leave another comment to let us know!

P.S. If you’d like to fill out an online survey giving feedback on Green Works, you can do so here.  For every survey that is completed, a $2 donation will be made to the Redwood Family Support Shelter.

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If you live in the U.K. or Ireland, Mother’s Day has already passed and I hope you got your wife something nice.  You can stop reading now.

With less than a month until Mother’s Day, its time to start thinking about getting a little something for the mother of your children, to show her how much you appreciate what a great mother she is, and to thank her for blessing your life with those little *cough* bundles of joy *cough*cough*

Hence this post about Mother’s Day Gift Ideas.  Not just any Mother’s Day Gift Ideas though.  No no.  The Dad Jam is not about ordinary flowers and chocolate.  I’m giving you my favourite Geeky Mother’s Day Gift ideas.  If you and/or your wife are geeks, you’ll love these gift ideas.  If you’re not a geek, you too, can join forces with the Brits and stop reading… now.

Okay, if you’ve made it this far, you and/or your wife are non-Brit geeks.  Congratulations, you are in for a treat – especially if your wife has a blog or loves to tweet on Twitter.  I spent some time browsing ThinkGeek.com for the ultimate Geeky Mother’s Day Gift Ideas.  Now that I’ve done all the hard work for you, just sit back, relax, and read my ideas.

There are quite a few nice T-Shirt ideas for the summer.  For example, there’s an I’m Blogging This T-Shirt, which is ideal if your wife is a blogger.  A nice, related, T-Shirt is the I’m Tweeting This T-Shirt, if your wife tweets everything and the kitchen sink. (By the way, if you Twitter, don’t forget to follow me on Twitter as well).

Alternatively, if your wife gives you strange (but loving) looks whenever you talk about your blog or about all the wonderful things you are tweeting on Twitter, you might find the I Love My Geek T-Shirt more appropriate.

Okay, enough with the T-Shirts already.

Lets face it, being a mom means sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation means caffeine dependency.  So why not give the mother of your children the gift of caffeine? If you give her a Caffeine Molecule Necklace, she can have caffeine with her everywhere she goes.

Besides caffeine, what’s something else that every mother needs? Yep, you got it, serenity NOW. With a USB Aromatherapy Oil Burner your wife can have serenity while blogging or tweeting about how stressful her day has been. It’s like two therapies in one.

And last but not least, for those relaxing or romantic moments, when you want to light a candle, but have hidden all the matches from the kids in a place where you can’t even find them, an LED Candle is the perfect solution. You can leave it unattended without worrying about your toddler setting the house on fire when he inevitably knocks it over.

So there you have it, practical Mother’s Day Gift Ideas with a geeky twist to them.  Cuz lets face it, if you’ve read this far into this Jam, you must have a little bit of geek in you, and that’s a good thing, so why not show it off!

In the spirit of full disclosure, ThinkGeek.com did not pay me to write this post.  I really, genuinely, like their products (because I’m a geek).  I belong to their affiliate program, so, the above links ARE affiliate links, but I don’t get paid if you click on them.  It was my own choice to share these products with you, because I like geeky products.  I would get a commission if you were to click on one of the above links and actually buy something.  If you don’t, that’s alright with me.  If you do, think of it as supporting The Dad Jam.  Whatever little money I earn from The Dad Jam (and it is very little), I put back into improving this site for all you Mom and Dad Jammers out there.  Peace and Happy Mother’s Day!

If you like any of these ideas, or have a Mother’s Day Gift Idea of your own that you’d like to share, please leave a comment below!

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When we got home, we cracked one of the board games open and started playing it.  Smarty Pants loved it and we had more fun than Paris Hilton at a birthday bash.

All this board game fun got me thinking – whatever happened to family fun playing board games?  Do you ever hear of families having fun together playing board games anymore?  I’m sure there are families out there with older kids that have family board game fun, but do any parents out there with 3 or 4 year olds play board games with them?

Some of my fondest childhood memories are of playing board games with my family and friends.  Whether Scrabble, Monopoly, Sorry, or Checkers, I was on those games like a fat kid on french fries.  I’ve spoken to many parents who share the same sentiments.  Board games are fun, educational, and provide the perfect opportunity to bond with, and teach, your kids.  Most importantly, you can play them with young kids too.

I asked the owner of our local toy store recently why he doesn’t carry any board games for young kids.  His answer:  They don’t sell well.  Why?  Because parents more often buy something that their young kids can play with independently.  Board games are more work and take more time and involvement.

Maybe parents also don’t realise that you can play a board game with a three or four year old, or can’t be bothered to try.

This is a reflection of how changing times affect our family activities and the time we spend bonding with our kids.  In our hectic lives, we would rather hand our kids something that will occupy them than take the time to sit and play a game with them.  It’s a pity, because board games are fun, and are the perfect opportunity to spend time with your kids.  Think back to your own childhood, and I’m sure you can remember having family fun over a beloved board game.

If you have a young child, try playing a simple board game with her.  I guarantee you a fun, bonding, experience.

Here are some great board games that we like, that can be played with children as young as 3 years old:

Enchanted Forest: We bought this game at the swap meet and it looks awesome.  It is a Ravensburger game, so you know you can’t go wrong. The game involves looking for treasures under trees in the forest, and remembering where they are to report them back to the King.  Different variations of the game can be played, depending on the age level.  For younger children, you can play a simple version that just involves collecting the trees as you move along the board.  The more complex version (which is great for when the kids get a bit older) involves memory, strategy, and the use of “magic.”   I’m really looking forward to playing this one!  Smarty Pants already had a great time setting up the little wooden trees on the colourful board, and  laying out the magical cards.

The Squirrel Game: Another one from Ravensburger that we got at the swap meet.  We recently played this together and had a blast.  This game comes with little squirrels carrying wheelbarrows, a bunch of little pine cones, the game board, and special die.  Each player is a squirrel, running around the game board collecting pine cones to bring back home.  You collect the pine cones in your little wheelbarrow.  When you have more than six pine cones in your wheelbarrow, you have to dump them out because it is too heavy for the squirrel to carry.  If you meet another player along the way, you can either take up to three of his pine cones, or give him up to three of your pine cones to lighten your load – which adds a bit of strategy to the game.  The player that collects the most pine cones at his home wins.  It’s really cute game that I don’t think is on the market any longer, unfortunately.

Orchard (Obstgarten): This is a cool game from the German toy titanic “Haba” – one of the best toy companies in the world.  This game is a top seller in Germany and Austria, but doesn’t seem to be as well known in North America.  We have it and have had lots of fun playing it.  It is a cooperative game, where you roll a nice wooden die, and depending on the colour you roll, you pick a wooden fruit from a tree and put it in your basket (e.g. if you roll red, you pick a cherry, if you roll green, you pick an apple, etc.)  If you roll “the Raven”, then you put a piece of the raven puzzle together.  If the raven puzzle is built before all the players collect all the fruit, then the raven wins.  If you collect all the fruit before the raven puzzle is complete, then all the players win.  We have a lot of fun with this and it is great for learning about fruits and colours.  The little baskets for collecting the fruit are really cute, and the pieces are all high quality solid wood.  I also like that this is a cooperative game.

So there you have it, some fun ideas to get you started back in the world of board games and to help you revive your family board game night.  Do you have a favourite board game or childhood board game memory?  Do you agree that parents don’t generally try to play board games with younger kids?  Leave a comment and let us know!

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Our cat got a lot more attention from me before the kids were born, and having small kids around hasn’t been an easy adjustment for her.  For one, Smarty Pants chases her around until she finds a hiding spot.  For two, we have less time to play with her and keep her active.  I’m sure there are other parents out there with cats and dogs that feel the same.

A couple of weeks ago I took our cat to the vet for a check-up, and he noticed that she is slightly overweight.  It didn’t come as a big surprise to me, since the only exercise she gets is running from Smarty Pants to her favorite hiding spot.

I confessed this to the vet.  Luckily he is a reasonable, friendly guy, so he didn’t put me in cat-jail for neglect.  He understood my predicament and gave me a great tip for keeping the cat active when my hands are full.  (That’s not the only thing he gave me — I also walked away the proud owner of some not-so-low-priced diet food — grumble grumble)

What was his tip?
You got it:  A laser.

Yes, a laser.  Okay, well, a laser pointer.

He said we should buy a cheap laser pointer (you can get them these days for less than five bucks), and see if our cat would chase it around.  He explained that about 50% of cats will chase a laser dot endlessly, and the other 50% will chase it for awhile then figure it out and never chase it again.  Our cat falls into the former 50%.  Not sure if that is something I should be proud of or happy about, but I am.

The beauty of using a laser pointer, if you have the “right” cat for it, is that you don’t have to run around the room with it to keep your cat running.  And you never have to pick it up off the ground and throw it (well, you can, but you might break it).  You stand in one spot, and with just a flick of the wrist, move the dot from one end of the room to the other.  You can do it from any distance too.  Back and forth, high and low, round in circles.  Skip to my Lou.

Our cat loves it and chases after it with vigor.  Smarty Pants even plays with her and the laser now.  He points it across the room and watches with bliss as she chases it around.  (Of course we monitor him to make sure he is not misusing it or pointing it in anyone’s eyes, including the cat’s.)

Now if I have Sweet Cheeks in one hand, I can entertain the cat with the other hand, or if I’m reading a book to Smarty Pants, I might have the book in one hand, and move the laser around across the room with the other.  Or I might just hand the laser to Smarty Pants and let it keep him and the cat occupied.

We like our little laser.  For $3.99, both our cat and Smarty Pants have had hours of fun, and the cat got some good activity out of it too.

Have you noticed you have less time for your pets since having kids, and what have you done about it?  Add some comments to this Jam and let us know!

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Flickr photo courtesy of fofurasfelinas

Photofiddle.com is a cool service that allows you to upload any photo of your choice, “fiddle” it (i.e. use Photoshop-like tools and filters to make it look artsy or artistic), and then have it shipped to your doorstep in your choice of format: framed, rolled print, rolled canvas or canvas wrapped on stretchers.  The end result is your own piece of art that looks like real art.

Photofiddle.com has been around since 2004 and most notably has been featured on Oprah’s “O List” in 2006.  This really put them on the map, as you would expect from Oprah’s Midas touch.  More recently, the Today Show picked Photofiddle.com as a great DIY decorating idea and the CBS Early Show featured it as a best Mother’s Day gift idea.

Well, Mother’s Day has come and gone and your Mom missed out on this great gift-giving opportunity (although I’m sure she loved the flowers too).  Don’t fret…you can make up for it this Christmas.  Depending on what style and size artwork you choose, this $50 gift certificate can nearly get you something for free.

So check out Photofiddle.com and enter here to win the $50 gift certificate. 

As a bonus, I have a Dad Jam exclusive coupon code that will get you 15% off of any order you place at Photofiddle.com.  I will send out the coupon code to everyone who enters the giveaway contest, including the winner, just for entering.

Here’s how to enter, and the rules:

1. Each person can have up to a maximum of two entries in the contest.
2. You can enter the contest by adding both thedadjam.com and this post to your Stumbleupon.com favorites, AND/OR, by adding thedadjam.com and this post to any other social networking website (delicious, digg, etc.).  You must also leave a comment here at this post to let me know that you have entered and how you have entered (e.g. either via Stumble Upon, or the other social networking site, or both).  This is so that I can verify your entry, and also so that I have your email address to send you the 15% off coupon code and the gift certificate if you win.
3. I will not use your email address for any other purpose other than to send you the 15% off coupon code and the $50 gift certificate should you win.
4. To get two entries in the contest, you would do both of the tasks in point 2, but you only would need to leave one comment to let me know.
5. The contest closes at midnight Pacific Time on Tuesday December 9th, 2008.  All entries past this date will not be included in the contest.
6. I will announce the winner on Wednesday December 10th, 2008, and will send out all coupon codes and the winning gift certificate on that day, Pacific Time, my time permitting, depending on the number of entries, I may not have everything out until Thursday December 11th, but will try my best to get everything out by the 10th.
7. The Dad Jam does not take any responsibility for your orders with Photofiddle.com after this contest is closed.  You will need to deal with Photofiddle.com directly to redeem your gift certificate and/or coupon and abide by Photofiddle.com’s terms and conditions for doing so.
8. The winner of the contest will be chosen by random.org.  I will assign each email address a number (two numbers if you enter twice), and ask random.org to choose a random number.  The holder of the email address with the matching random number is the winner.
9. The winner will be asked to answer a simple skill testing question to claim the prize, in order to cover my butt for any places where there it is required to do that.
10. I will be nominated to become an honourary lawyer for having written these rules.

So go ahead and enter, and let me know about it!  If you have any questions, please contact me.

Return to Parenting – The Dad Jam Home.

Take a look at the photo.  Now read the description of the bag as per the site where we bought it:

“The DUO diaper bag…all glammed up!
The DUO Glam is the perfect diaper bag for stylish moms who want the DUO design in a gorgeous, multicolored dot pattern and lightweight laminated cotton canvas.”

Key words:  glammed, stylish, moms, gorgeous, multicolored

How am I ever going to pull this one off?  It is hard enough for me to look cool with my current clothing and accessory pool (or lack thereof).  Now I have to try and pull off a “cool and laid back dad” look while toting my gorgeous, stylish, glamour bag.  Any ideas how to make this work?

Need to find a way to offset this and detract attention from it.  Maybe a really cool hat would do the trick (maybe that is where the term “Hat Trick” comes from…).

At least it has a lot of pockets… maybe I can fit my Archos 605 Wifi in one of them and try and look like I am making a fashion statement with the bag.  Or maybe if David Beckham starts sporting the same one it will suddenly become cool and I will be the hottest dad on the block.

Let me know if you still think there is hope for me!  Will definitely let you know how it is when we get it and maybe post a picture of me with it… if I am not too embarrassed!

What type of diaper bag do you use?  Did you compromise to get a unisex bag, do you have a man-bag, or do you just use a glamour bag, like I will?

P.S.  Love buns, if you are reading this, I love you and please forgive me!

The plotline goes like this:

11pm.  A tired and desperate father is trying every trick in the book (and on this site) to relieve his seven week old baby daughter’s fussiness and crying.  Nothing seems to be working.  She has been fed and has a clean diaper.  Feeling desperate, the father eyes his wife’s 26 inch Zenzu Exercise Ball in the corner of the room.  In need of a moment of zen, he gets on the ball.  With his baby held upright and her head close to his left shoulder, he starts bouncing up and down on the ball gently.  Gently.  Not like Tigger.  More like a slow, gentle, TLC type of bounce.  It feels good.  Faster than he can say, “Supercalafragialisticexpialadocious,” his baby relaxes and so does he.  No more fussiness.  No more crying.  Just a calm, relaxed, sleeping baby.  The father has achieved zen.  The mystery of the bouncing ball, sleeping baby has been solved.  Wondering why he didn’t try this earlier, the father realizes he is too tired to wonder and heads to bed.  He sleeps.

Based on a true story.  Coming to a bedroom near you.  Give it a try!

Disclaimer:  be very gentle when bouncing and don’t bounce too strongly.  You don’t want to shake your baby.

Join the Jam and tell us your favourite baby calming story!

Before I start, here are a few things you need to know about me:

1. I do not own a T.V. (nor do my wife or children) and haven’t owned one for two years
2. I want to be able to choose what I watch and do not like to watch commercials
3. I prefer movies over TV shows
4. I have wireless internet at home
5. I love music
6. I find that Vancouver radio stations are crap
7. I occasionally travel for work, sometimes with travel times of 20 hours each way
8. I find 20 hours of airplane movies BORING
9. I either walk to work or take the bus to work
10. I was in the school choir when I was in grade 3

Okay, maybe you didn’t need to know the last one, but I thought I’d tell you anyways.

Now, to my third baby.  My Archos 605 WIFI is my all-in-one dream gadget.  It is a portable media player, and I think the only main features it is missing are GPS and a built-in phone.

Two other things you should know about me are:  I generally know where I am (most of the time), and I don’t want to be interrupted with phone calls while listening to music or watching a video.  Having said that, GPS and a built-in phone are two features I can do without in a portable media player.

Now onto what it isn’t missing (don’t you just not dislike double-negatives?).  Sorry, I should be kinder to all you tired dads and moms out there and write more coherently and flowingly.  Maybe I could if I wasn’t so tired myself .

This baby is a portable media player that plays any video or music file format you throw at it.  In addition, it has a pdf file viewer, photo viewer, ability to connect to wireless networks and share/stream files and browse the web, widget capabilities (like weather forecast, currency conversion), mass storage and web radio/TV capabilities.

Am I drooling?

I know what you are thinking… what’s the difference between this and the iPod Touch, and why is he drooling over this iPod Touch knock-off?

Well, this is actually not an iPod Touch knock-off.  Archos was producing PMPs like this way before the iPod Touch was even an apple in Apple’s eye.  And there are important differences between the two.  I don’t want to say that one is better than the other (although if I had to save one from a burning home, I would save the Archos first), I would rather say that it depends on what you are looking for.

The iPod Touch is sleeker and has a better battery life, but the trade-off is with screen size, storage capacity and price.  The Archos 605 gives you are larger hard drive and larger screen for a lower price.

So enough of the iPod Touch debate… on to the real imporant question…. what does my wife think of all of this hoo-haw?

Well, when I first told my wife I was going to get this, I got the usual grin and shaking head.  Kinda like as if she was saying, “Okay, go ahead, get it…. you’ll need something to keep you occupied before you go sleep, because you’ll be sleeping on the couch.”  But, after I got it, I hooked up the web radio from this baby to her favourite radio station (not a crappy Vancouver radio station) and plugged it into our stereo, and she was a happy camper who could see that this was a very justifiable purchase.

With a newborn, I do not get a lot of time to sit back and watch movies. Actually, I have NO time to sit back and watch ANYTHING.  I usually use this right now for the web radio, quickly browsing the web if I don’t want to turn the computer on, and listening to music (or watching the occasional movie-snippet) on my way to work.  Luckily I haven’t had to travel lately, but next time I do (which hopefully won’t be for awhile), I will be able to choose what I watch on the plane and not be doomed to 20 hours of edited-for-content chick flicks.

Of course, unlike my real babies, the Archos is not perfect.  Some things you should know if you are considering buying one (and I encourage you to do research for yourself to make sure this is the right thing for you) are:

• it doesn’t come with all the capabilities that I described above out-of-the-box.  You need to purchase and download plugins to be able to use web radio, watch certain video file types and browse the web.  Totally unintuitive, but I guess that is Archos’ way of making a few extra bucks.  So, be prepared to spend between $50-$90 extra for the plugins, depending on which ones you want.
• it doesn’t come with a docking station or AC wall adaptor.  You can only charge it via USB from your computer.  So you can anticipate buying a mini-dock or battery-dock if you want to be able to charge it via your wall outlet.
• the case that comes with it isn’t very good, so you probably will want to consider buying a carrying case for it, and there are a few on the market that are pretty good.
• there is no “resume” function, meaning, if you turn it off in the middle of something, when you turn it back on again you have to navigate from the start menu back to where you were.  Not a huge deal, just a minor annoyance.

That’s it on my third baby for now.  Will let you know if I have any more babies any time soon (although I’m sure my wife will not want to be pregnant again for awhile)!  We will get back to our regularly scheduled programming and talk about real babies again tomorrow!

Let me know if you have any questions and feel free to share your own favourite gadget stories and comments!

There was a recent (and very funny) post from dadorbust the other day on diaper changing and the associated poo-poo. (read it here). His post got me thinking about diapers and poop (two wonderful things to be thinking about) and my wife’s insistence on using cloth diapers.

With our first child, we started using cloth diapers when he was about 7 or 8 months old, and the cloth diapers we used were from Bamboozles. They are made from Bamboo fibres, so are highly absorbent and also very soft. They were also very easy to use. I must say, cloth diapers have come a long way over the years and are no longer just a piece of cloth held together by a safety pin. These babies come in all kinds of colors, have velcro to keep them in place, come in all different sizes, have fancy inlays and overlays… pretty much the only thing they don’t do is clean the dishes and take the dog for a walk.

I am glad that we ended up using cloth diapers with our boy. He is now almost two and a half and has been potty trained for awhile already. I am certain that he potty trained more quickly and easily because of the cloth diapers. They really helped him to recognize the signs that he had to “go potty.”

Now the main disadvantage of using cloth diapers is that you usually have to change them more often. With an older baby/toddler, this is a disadvantage compared to disposable diapers, because older babies/toddlers don’t go “Number 2″ as often, so parents can wait until the disposable diaper gets full and sags to around the child’s knees before changing it if they so desire. You don’t really have that “luxury” with a cloth diaper, because after about two pees it is pretty wet and probably won’t be able to handle a third.

That is a small price to pay for using cloth diapers for an older baby, but what we are finding is that for a newborn or young baby, this “change frequency” factor is negligible.

To explain what I mean, I will use the example of our newborn daughter. Like most newborns, she is a wonderful poop producer, averaging about six poops a day, if not more (no, I am not bragging). We started using cloth diapers with her (again, on my wife’s insistence, but again, I am glad). We use pre-fold cloths, or even just regular cloths, with an outer micro-fibre wrap to block out the wetness. My worry was that they would leak all over the place or that the poop would just come exploding out of them. Luckily, I have been proven wrong, and they absorb quite nicely and keep all packages contained. We change them often, but if we were using disposable diapers, we would be doing the same, because of the poop frequency.

This has led us to a great monetary savings (we now use about 40-50 fewer disposable diapers per week), and a great reduction in garbage.

Doesn’t that mean you have to do tonnes of laundry, you ask? Well, yes, we do have to do laundry often, but, if you have read my previous post on projectile poo-poo (here) and the dadorbust article referenced above, you will know that poop gets all over the place when you have a baby anyways, so you generally have to do laundry more often, no matter what type of diapers you use. Also, the amount of water you use to clean cloth diapers is much less than the amount of water used to produce disposable diapers, so the environmental impact is still lower.

In summary, the major pros that I see with using cloth diapers are:

• cost savings
• much better for the environment
• child potty trained sooner, so your diaper changing days will be over sooner
• don’t have to take out the garbage as often

The cons of using cloth diapers are:

• for older babies/toddlers – you have to change them more often
• after the projectile poo-poo phase, you’ll probably have slightly more laundry to do than if you were using disposables

If you have been considering trying cloth diapers, I say “go for it!” you will be doing the environment, you child and your pocketbook a huge favor.

Join the jam and leave comments about your experiences with cloth diapers, or if you have any questions about using them. If you have any additional tips that you would like to share, please do!

I came across this image on the web yesterday and just had to write about it. Is it not the most bizarre looking baby bottle (or bottle in general) that you have ever seen?
This is an idea from “Design Continuum” – they are working on developing a customized nipple bottle, that will look similar to what you see in the picture.
And get this – the nipple will be custom made based on a 3-D scan of the mother’s breast!
It is also oriented upside down to better simulate the breast feeding position.
It hasn’t been released yet, but the idea is still being researched.
We never bottle-fed our first child and so far haven’t tried bottle-feeding our second, and we don’t plan to. We have been lucky enough that breastfeeding has gone very well, so haven’t had a need to bottle-feed.
With our first child, we did try a bottle on one occassion (with pumped milk) when he was about 8 or 9 months old, to see if he would take it, but he didn’t. Perhaps if we had this he would have?
This image and idea raise many questions in my mind. Would I feel like I am “fooling” my baby if I used this? Would I be comfortable walking around in public flashing an exact replica of my wife’s nipple around? Would I be tempted to “experiment” with it myself, to see how close to the real thing it is (jokes)?
In any case, it definitely is an innovative idea, no matter how bizarre it looks. Perhaps parents who really want to give their baby the feeling of being breastfed, but are unable to breastfeed for whatever reason, will find this a wonderful alternative.
Join the Jam and post your thoughts and responses to the above questions? Is this something you would carry around with you?