How to Take Care of
Your Wool Diaper Cover

One nice thing about wool is that you don't have to wash it after every use. This is due to the natural lanolin in the wool.

Lanolin is a natural wax-like substance produced by the sheep themselves. The lanolin acts with the urine to make a natural "soap" that will clean the wool and keep bacteria from growing, which keeps your cover from getting stinky.

Between washings, you can just let the diaper cover air dry until it's next use. It is time to wash your wool cover when it starts to stink or if it gets poopy.

You will also need to lanolize your wool diaper cover from time to time. You can tell it is needing some lanolin when water starts wicking through the cover onto baby's clothes.

We use a wool cover about once per day. I wash that cover every other week or so and lanolize it every third wash, give or take. You will figure out how often you need to do this with a little trial and error.





So, how do you wash and lanolize a wool diaper cover?

First off, don't store your dirty wool covers with your other dirty diapers!! Have a separate bucket or bag just for the wool. You don't want them to accidentally get washed and "soaking" them in with the others is just going to make them really hard to clean.

There are a lot of great products out there to help you care for your wool covers, which I think are kind of expensive. But, they are easy to use and can save you a little time. Feel free to use any of these products, just follow the instructions on the label.

However, if you are like me, you don't want to spend a bunch of extra money on specialty products. So, here is how I take care of my wool covers (for cheap!).

• The wool diaper cover that needs washing.
• A soft, gentle soap. I find baby soap works best
• A sink you can plug, or a large bowl.
• Lanolin (I use the Lansinoh I got for breast feeding. That stuff is really inexpensive, you can get it at the grocery store, and one tube will last FOREVER. Also, you can find very cheap lanolin at the pharmacy).
• A jar with a tight fitting lid.
• A towel.

Step Two: Let the diaper soak for 10-30 minutes. If you have some poopy stains on the diaper, you can gently rub that area with a little extra soap.

Step Three: Rinse the diaper with luke warm water.

Step Four: Carefully squeeze out the excess water. Do not wring, again be gentle. (if you are just washing and not lanolizing, skip to step ten)
You will be getting it wet again, so this is just to prevent water from getting all over the place while you prepare the next step.

Step Five: Place a small amount (pea size) of lanolin in the jar and fill the jar 3/4 full with HOT, super HOT, water. Put the lid on and shake the jar vigorously until the lanolin is mixed well with the water.

Step Six: Fill your sink again with luke warm water. Pour the lanolin water into the warm water.

Step Eight: Let sit for 10-30 minutes. You can come and slosh it around a bit more to make sure the lanolin is getting all over the diaper.

Step Nine: Carefully wring out the excess water from your diaper.

Step Ten: Spread a towel out on a table or the floor. Lay the diaper on top and roll the towel up tightly to remove as much water as you can.

Step Eleven: Place the cover somewhere to air dry. This can take a few days and if it is laying flat, you might want to flip it over after 24 hours. Or, better yet, lay the diaper on a cookie cooling rack - this will help speed the drying time quite a bit.

The biggest thing about taking care of your wool diaper cover is to plan well. Especially if you only use wool covers. Since they take a few days to dry, you don't want to wait until they are all dirty at the same to wash.



Click here to read more about Wool Cloth Diaper Covers.

Want to read about the different types of diapers to go under your covers? Click here to go to the Types of Cloth Diapers page.

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