Bottoms

So we’re back in the city for a few days. Dot’s Dad phoned from the pub last night to say he was in culture shock. Dot’s been a bit off her normally very mellow stride today too, so you have to wonder if she’s discombobulated by the change. Or maybe it’s because she’s sleeping in my friend Lucy’s wardrobe (the best place we could find to hang her hammock). I think I’d be a bit thrown by that. Hey, no need to phone social services – we haven’t shut the door….!

So, on to the rather lovely topic of bottoms and the fact that, over the past twenty-four hours, two people’s bottoms have rejected my attempts to make them greener.

First was Dot's. As we mentioned on day one, since she was born, Dot’s been trying to find a greener alternative to disposable nappies but had fallen on back on them as, being upstate, we didn’t think we could manage the cloth diaper thing without a washing machine. Well, they might be chlorine-free, but even so I just couldn’t believe how many Seventh Generation disposables we’ve already contributed to landfill.

So on Saturday I thought, we’ll be staying round the corner from Whole Foods this week, I could buy more of those G-Diaper liners so let’s just give them one last try. (For those of you who aren’t familiar, G-diapers are these natty, colourful numbers; the outers are cotton and the liners are fully flushable and/or compostable. Lovely idea, but in practice, we’d found they leaked. All the time. So I spent half my life with hands immersed in scalding water washing poop off the outers. (Just the thing when you’re trying to get the hang of a week-old baby.)

All morning, Dot’s nappies had been suspiciously clean. I put the G-diaper on for the retrial around noon. I fed her. She scrunched up her face. She went red. She clenched her little fists. And boom! A pant explosion on an epic scale. She’d obviously been saving it all up for a real torture test. Anyway, the next part of this story has been deleted to protect the innocent, but let’s just say the G-Diaper failed the retrial quite spectacularly.

So for now, it’s back to the disposables. I’m actually going to try these Nature Girl nappies recommended by Amanda from my yoga mummies group – apparently less materials used and biodegradable (ooh, actually just visited the site and they're compostable, so will def do more research when not so totally knackered, as well as into composting and wormeries...there's hope on the horizon!). And if I’m feeling really good, might even try my friend Evie’s suggestion to use cloth diapers in the few days in the run-up to laundry day. As she said, even one a day is 365 less in landfill a year (she’s a cloth diapering pro – enough respect Evie!).

Bottom number two was my friend Kim’s. Over tea and sticky toffee pudding today at 220 on 9th Ave she said she’d been so shocked by our loo roll blog entry that she’d rushed out and bought some Seventh Generation paper to try (hurrah!). But she had not been impressed. “It’s like that awful cheap stuff,” she said. “And the roll goes on forever. I just want my Charmin back.” I guess I’ve been using it for so long I hardly notice.

So, Kim, two top tips for you and your tender-bottied fellow Charminites. If you do use the Seventh Generation stuff, the 2-ply is better than the 1-ply. But you might like to try this quilted Green Forest paper. You go through the stuff in no time, but it is more luxurious-feeling and might sugar the pill a little. They usually have it at Lifethyme on 6th (between 8th and Waverly).

Right, bottom’s up gang, I’m shattered and off to bed.