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Fuzzibunz Black Friday Sale!

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The Ongoing Saga of Cloth and Ammonia

***new note! I now wash every 2.5 to 3 days.  I use 4-5 tbs powdered tide and calgon in each wash. 5/6/14

Well, my tried and true method of getting rid of ammonia failed me a month ago.  My son's overnight diapers reeked in the morning of ammonia and he even got an ammonia burn from one.  I washed, stripped, boiled, soaked in cloth safe detergent, soaked in ammonia bouncer, and even tried fish tank ammonia remover.  Nothing worked.  These methods would improve the ammonia for one time, but weren't fixing the problem.

Understandably I was frustrated!  I mailed the company that made my CD safe soap and worked with them for a few weeks.  None of their methods were working.  I turned to my local diaper circle leader and pleaded my case, and gave my attempts at fixing the problem.  It turns out the solution was in two things I had been told.

First, switching to a non CD detergent.  Tide was recommended by Nicki's Diapers after they had been testing it on Best Bottom diapers for quite some time.  The other part that was needed was a good soak.

I used 1/4 cup of Tide and soaked my diapers overnight.  After that I washed and rinsed until all bubbles were gone.  This took hours, but the end result is diapers that no longer stink or burn my son!

I tried switching back to my CD safe detergent, and after 1 wash, the ammonia was back, so I stripped again, soaked again, and we were back in business!

I now am washing my diapers with a different routine that I posted below.

First is still a pre-wash/rinse.  My setting for this is the comforter setting because it adds more water.  I do this on WARM because it will rinse the ick better.

Next is a heavy duty wash on HOT with 3 TBS tide and 3 TBS Calgon water softener with an extra rinse.

At the end of this cycle, I remove PLU shells, wetbags, and pail liners.  These hang to dry.

I then run cold rinses until there aren't any more soap bubbles when I stop the rinse cycle.

So far this is working and it's again, a simple wash routine. 

Suds, suds, and more suds

Last week I started having an ammonia issue with my overnight diapers.  I know this is usually caused by a buildup of soap in the diaper itself, usually because they aren't being rinsed enough. So, I did a load of diaper laundry.  Low and behold, suds galore!

It took hours to rinse the diapers enough.  I couldn't figure out what was wrong.  I hadn't changed soap or how much I was using.  Then it dawned on me, I hadn't run my washing machine cleaner in over a month and a half!!

While this doesn't seem like a big deal, soap had been building up in the washer, making my diaper laundry a nightmare.  We use a different soap for regular clothes, and apparently they don't rinse all the way. 

So, on Sunday I ran my Tide washing machine cleaner through the machine.  Monday morning I started a load of diaper laundry.  I used my normal routine, and no suds after the second rinse! 

It really is amazing the little things that we can do that can really foul up our diaper washing routine!

What would you like to know?

I'm opening this post up to see what you, as a reader would like to know about cloth diapering.  I had a LOT of questions when starting out.  Post in the comments below!