Did you get sucked into the baby stuff blitz attack when you were had your first baby? Any little mutiny against this vortex is answered by mothers surrounding you with a sneer that says ‘what do you know, you don't have kids yet’.
My pet peeve was wipes. I never liked them. The way my hands felt after I used one, the smell, the preservatives, the chemicals, the whole deal. This was just intuitive, but the more I researched the more problems I discovered about wipes.
They aren't biodegradable since they are woven using a synthetic blend so they accumulate in landfills, or worse get washed away to the ocean. So we use this ‘tissue’ once for 1 second and it stays on earth for nearly a year. When it does disintegrate it doesn't turn to soil (like a paper tissue) or available compounds for the soil, rather it breaks up into microscopic pieces of plastic that continue to pollute and disrupt land and marine life.
If they do get washed to sea marine animals mistake them for prey and ingest them, causing severe consequences and even death. (Can you imagine having a wet wipe in your gut?!)
If flushed down the toilet they cause clogs and overflows. New York City spent 18 million dollars in the past five years on wipe related problems and equipment. Don't flush wipes! Even if the label says you can.
They contain a whole bunch of dubious chemicals (for example methylisothiazolinone, parabens, IPBC, SLS, etc..) that cause anything from skin irritation to dermatitis, strip natural moisture from the skin, linked to hormonal problems and more. For more detailed information about the chemicals read here.
Making your own baby wipes not only avoids all of the above but enables you to put healing infusions and oils on your baby’s skin. It is also much less expensive in the long run and is another small step to freedom from the industrial complex. It's a classic case of ‘avoid the bad and do good’.
There are many tutorials about making wipes that call for making a solution and soaking paper towels in them to use just like conventional wipes. I never liked this system. I chose to have a small spray bottle for the diaper bag along with a pack of tissues. I would get a tissue wet each time I needed a wipe. At home, I would usually just wash my kids in the sink and not use any spray at all.
DIY Baby Wipe Spray:
1.25 cups of lavender chamomile infusion
2 tbsp liquid castile soap (bronner or homemade)
3 tbsp calendula infused almond oil
2 tbsp chamomile infused almond oil
1 tbsp calendula tincture
2 tbsp vegetable glycerin
5 drops lavender essential oil
Mix all the ingredients together well and funnel into a spray bottle.
What are your thoughts on wipes? What solutions did you find to avoid them? Please share in the comment section.