Description

Wool Diaper Cover for newborns

The WeeCare pull-on wool diaper cover is used as the water-repellent layer on top of a cloth diaper which is not waterproof in itself. It can be a cloth diaper made of cotton or bamboo, a flat cloth diaper or a Prefold folded into a diaper and assembled with a snappi.

Wool is a great material and it is ingenious to use in conjunction with cloth diapers if you want a natural and breathable solution for your baby. When treated regularly with lanolin, it will be highly water-repellent and even self-cleansing. This means that when you have a pair of lanolin-treated wool diaper pants on top of a cloth diaper, the wool diaper pants will ensure that liquid from the cloth diaper does not penetrate to the clothes. Wool can furthermore absorb up to 40 % of it’s own weight without feeling wet.

What is lanolin

Lanolin is the fat that the sheep naturally produce through the skin, and which therefore sits in the wool. If you touch a sheep, you will clearly be able to feel the greasy lanolin in the wool. The lanolin in the sheep’s wool keeps the sheep clean and dry on the skin. Therefore, sheep can go outside in the rain without getting wet on the skin.

Intolerance of wool

When sheep wool is to be spun into yarn and then woven or knitted into fabric, you need to wash the greasy lanolin out of the wool to get a product that is easier to work with. This process requires soap and in some cases chemicals. When some people cannot tolerate wool, it is most often residues of the chemicals that have been used that they react to. Therefore, we will at all times recommend, both for the sake of the environment and human well-being, to choose wool products that are untreated and organically certified. All WeeCare wool products are untreated and organically certified by GOTS.

Mulesing free

Another thing that is important to us in choosing both wool and lanolin is animal welfare. Mulesing is a method in which the sheep breeder cuts off skin folds on the buttocks of the sheep (often without anesthesia) to prevent flies from settling, which can create infection in the skin of the sheep. The problem with the infection has arisen due to the breeding of sheep with more skin on the body (to produce more wool).

We are not in favor of mulesing, and therefore we guarantee that this method has not been used in the production of either our wool and our pure lanolin.

Lanolin treatment of wool – how to

The newly purchased wool diaper cover from WeeCare is not treated with lanolin. It will therefore seem kind of “dry” as an ordinary fabric. Therefore you need to treat the cover with lanolin before you start using them as a diaper cover on top of a cloth diaper for your baby. You will need to treat the diaper cover with lanolin regularly. When a wool diaper cover looses it’s “fatty” feeling and it maybe starts to leak, it is time to give it a lanolin treatment. Here’s how to:

1) Soak the wool cover

When you need to treat your newly purchased wool diaper pants, start by giving them a gentle wash. It can be by hand or in the washing machine on the wool program and possibly with a little wool detergent. The detergent can easily be avoided the first time you wash them. The most important thing is that the whole cover is soaked with water so that the lanolin can get into all the fibers. The lanolin will not adhere to the wool fibers if there are dry areas or small air pockets in the wool. Be sure to wash or rinse the wool in cold or lukewarm water and without “rubbing” them or moving them around too much. You can gently squeeze the cover to soak it with water.

2) Dissolve the pure lanolin

For one pair of wool diaper pants, you need to use one teaspoon of pure lanolin which is whipped / stirred vigorously into a cup of boiled water and a few drops of dishwashing detergent. The combination of lanolin, dishwashing liquid and boiled water that is whipped together will result in the mixture emulsifying (fat dissolves in the water). You can see that the mixture is emulsified by the liquid turning milky white in color. If this does not happen, use a little more dishwashing liquid and then whip a little more / harder.

When you have a milky white mixture in the cup, you can mix this with more water in a water bath. Use a tub or similar in a suitable size, and pour as hot water as you touch. Pour the milky white mixture into the tub and stir.

3) Place the wool diaper cover in the water bath

Now you take the completely wet wool diaper cover and turn it inside out and carefully lay it down in the very hot water. Be sure to move the wool as gently and slowly as possible and do not stir the water around. When the wool diaper cover is completely covered with the water/lanolin mixture, gently press on the wool again to get any air pockets completely out of the wool. Then leave them in the water bath for a few hours.

4) The wool is taken up and dried

Once the wool diaper cover has been in the lanolin bath for a few hours, you can gently pick it up. Gently squeeze the water out of the wool and turn the pants right again. Now you can put the wool diaper pants on a towel and roll the towel along with the wool. That way, the water is squeezed out of the wool diaper pants. Avoid twisting the wool!

Now the wool diaper cover needs to dry. You can lay the cover down flat so it does not lose it’s shape. Avoid exposing the wool to too much heat by placing them on a radiator or similar.

When the diaper cover is dry, they are ready for use.

Washing of wool

Wool diaper covers should not be washed very often. Once the wool diaper cover is saturated with lanolin, it will be self-cleaning to some degree. Dirt and urine that come in contact with Lanolin will trigger a saponification process, which keeps the wool clean. Therefore, you do not need to lanolize the wool diaper cover as often. It will often be enough just to hang them to dry – preferably in the fresh air outside. It is a good idea to have 2-3 pairs of wool diaper covers – so you always have a pair to use when the others hang to dry or are being washed.

The wool diaper cover is washed by hand or in the washing machine on the wool program. Remember that you may only use wool detergent to wash wool, as the enzymes in detergent for ordinary clothes will destroy the wool fibers.

Composition

The WeeCare Wool Diaper Cover is produced from 100 % pure, organic merino wool which is untreated and undyed. The fabric is very fine and delicious and organically certified by GOTS.

The diaper cover consist of 2 layers of fabric, and are reasonably thin.

WeeCare wool diaper covers are produced in Denmark.