29 Diapers’ All Cloth Diaper Event: Thirsties Duo Diaper

Welcome to yet another giveaway from 29 Diapers’ All Cloth Diaper Event! Today I want to introduce you to another new contributing writer on the blog, Heather Schweich! She tested a Thirsties Duo Diaper for this event. Here is a little more about Heather:

Thirsties Duo Diaper Review

I love fluffy mail! The day I got my Thristies Duo Diaper I was thrilled. I’d been wanting to try this diaper, but it just hadn’t worked into our budget yet.

The Duo Diaper is a two-piece pocket-style diaper.  The outer is water proof PUL with a micro-fleece liner.  The insert is another two pieces; a 2 layer micro-terry piece that snaps to 5 layers of hemp jersey. It is offered in two sizes. Size One is to fit newborns to about 9 months (6 – 18lbs), while Size Two will fit from 9 months to 36 months (18 – 40lbs). Both sizes have a three-snap rise and currently are only available with hook & loop closures. Average price for each individual diaper is $18.50 for solid colors and $19.50 for prints.

With as many times as I mentioned “two” in that last paragraph, is it any wonder that this diaper is called the “Duo”?

When Laura asked me to do this review I requested a Size One.  Even though my little guy is now over 9 months, he’s pretty slender, at 16.5lbs and 28” long. Not the huskiest of babies by a long shot.

I received a Size One Duo Diaper in Meadow, which is a beautiful bright green. My first words were “I love this color!! It’s so skinny!” The insert is incredibly trim, which is a big deal for me. It is the first diaper we’ve tried  that has ever been able to rival my flat diapers for trimness!

It was a new experience for me to unsnap the rise completely and at first I felt a little panicked that Jaron was already too big for it. But the Duo Diaper actually fit him very well; there is still room for him to chunk out around the waist and legs, but we’ll probably have to go up to a Size Two soon because of the length of the rise.

The Size One does not have a cutout for the umbilical cord, but does have a gather and dip. Just by looking at it I’d say there’s a good chance that it would work well with a 7 or 8lb baby and wouldn’t chafe the cord stump.

It has a wonderful contoured cut and dual leg gussets. Calling it a pocket diaper is a little misleading (my fault, Thirsties does call it a sleeve diaper). It’s actually a sleeve. Since both ends of the “pocket” are open it was much easier to stuff that my other pocket diapers. I was concerned about it wiggling out the front or the back while it was being worn, but that never became an issue. The sleeve also allows you to just toss the whole thing in the washer without having to take the insert out. The insert just agitates free during the wash cycle.

While I really love the fit, the absorbency falls far short of my expectations.  Maybe it’s because I have an older baby using a newborn-size insert? Jaron isn’t really a heavy wetter, but a bigger bladder is going to yield more liquid  volume. Or maybe I just expected too much from the hemp jersey; this was our first experience ever using hemp.

Whatever the case; during the daytime I needed to change Jaron from this diaper after about 1.5 to 2 hours. The stay-dry micro-fleece, ummm, didn’t. Every time I changed him his skin was very damp. I chalked it up as a possible consequence of using the smaller diaper and insert on an older baby.

Nighttime was… a surprise to say the least, although I guess it shouldn’t have been with our daytime experiences. After Jaron had been asleep for about 6 hours I went to check on him and found him, his sleeper, blankets, and sheets all soaked. Not just damp, but soaked.  We didn’t try that again. I will readily admit that this could also be an age issue; overnight absorption isn’t typically required of a diaper sized for newborns.

When it came to poop, we got to put the diaper through just about all of its paces. Jaron decided to boycott solids for a couple weeks and only nurse, getting us back to breastmilk only diapers, and then passing through the stages that come with starting purees and tablefoods. For all of this the Duo Diaper did fantastic. Thirsties’ signature leg gussets did a fabulous job of keeping everything contained around the legs and the elasticized waist kept poopsplosions from escaping the diaper at the front or the back.

I’ve washed it close to every day since I received it and it’s held up beautifully. Of course only time will tell, but after close to 30 washings and machine drying things are looking pretty good and we’re not experiencing any leaks. While I machine washed and dried the majority of the time, the insert is thin enough (due to its two layer make up) that it easily line-dried over night. A definite plus!

Conclusion

I absolutely love the fit of the Duo Diaper. It is the first one I grab for putting in the diaper bag when I go out because it doesn’t take up a lot of space.  It has also become the diaper that I use when someone else is going to have to change him: less bulk = less intimidating.

I would recommend going ahead and moving up to the Size Two once baby starts sleeping through the night; instead of waiting to hit the top weight. Of course, that being said I can’t comment on whether or not the larger waist would not cause other problems on a small and slender baby.

Another option would be to do what I’ve started doing: stuff it with something else. Stuffed with an infant-sized prefold, Jaron’s been able to go 3-ish hours without leaking and his skin is much drier when I do get around to changing him. If you’re going to do that though, I’d recommend that you consider the Thirsties Duo Wrap diaper cover, which has the same leg gussets and fit, but only costs $12.75/$13.75 and is available in a snap closure as well as hook & loop.

Thirsties Duo Diaper Giveaway

Even favorite cloth diaper makers like Thirsties have a hard time getting the word out about their amazing products. To enter this giveaway, leave me a comment on this blog post telling me what the hardest thing was to figure out about cloth diapers, or what information or product you’re still looking for to help you cloth diaper. Maybe between 29 Diapers and Thirsties, we can help!

Extra Entries

Want extra entries? Leave a separate comment for each of the following things you do (e.g. “I blogged about your giveaway #1, I blogged about your giveaway #2,” etc.) Please be sure to include your email address in your comment so I can contact you if you win.

You can get extra entries in this giveaway if you:

1) Like both 29 Diapers (1 entry) and Thirsties (1 entry) on Facebook, and then leave a comment here with your Facebook name.

2) Follow @29Diapers (1 entry) and @ThirstiesInc (1 entry) on Twitter. Please include your Twitter ID in your comment. Current followers count, too!

3) Tweet this giveaway w/ @29Diapers included in the tweet: include a link to your tweet (1 per day).

4) Follow 29 Diapers via Google Friend Connect (on the sidebar). Please include your GFC name in your comment. Current followers count, too (1 entry)!

5) Blog about this giveaway: post a link to your blog post (3 entries).

6) Add a link to 29Diapers on your blog/website (1 entry) or grab my new button from the 29Diapers.com homepage sidebar and post it on your blog (2 entries).

7) Subscribe to 29Diapers via email on the sidebar (note: this has moved with the new blog design) (1 entry). Don’t forget to confirm your subscription. Current subscribers count, too!

* This giveaway is open to U.S. residents, and will run through 11:59 Eastern Time on Monday, September 5th. Winners have 72 hours to respond to my email, or another winner will be drawn. I can’t be held liable for lost mail, prizes that don’t arrive, etc. but if you have a problem receiving your prize, please contact me so I can make sure the sponsor has mailed it to the correct address. Good luck! *

Heather received product from Thirsties to test for this review but was not compensated. 29 Diapers never accepts payment for posts, so you can be sure that opinions you see on this site are uninfluenced by compensation.