Saturday, July 14, 2012

Ultimate Diaper Bag for Cloth Diapers--Unpacked!

I have been looking for a long, long time for a diaper bag that works well with cloth diapers. Diaper bags by nature are pretty varied, and I've been through a few in my time, from freebie hand-me-downs to downright pricey ones! And anyone who uses cloth diapers knows that a bag that fits more than 2 or 3 cloth diapers plus all the other diaper bag necessities is worth its salt.

After researching and asking many people, I decided the perfect diaper bag for me would be the Ju Ju Be BFF. It's shaped like a messenger bag, but opens like a backpack. It has many pockets for organization, and everything is easy to get to and won't get lost in the bottom of the bag.

Everything about this bag is perfect....EXCEPT the price tag! These bags retail for around $150 new!! With a toddler and one on the way, there was no way I could afford something like that. So I kept looking.

I finally thought that I might be ok with an actual backpack, so long as I could find one with all the features I was looking for. Well, back-to-school sales are in full swing around here, so I browsed all the backpacks at Walmart today, and guess what??

I think I found it!

The "ultimate" cloth diaper bag...I hope!

The first pictures shows it stuffed. And I mean stuffed like a turkey on thanksgiving! It still wasn't too heavy, either. Now let's look at my must-have features, shall we?

Stroller buckles and sippy cup pocket - on both sides of the bag

One feature on my ultimate dream diaper bag is built-in buckles so I can always buckle the bag to my stroller, shopping cart, umbrella stroller, etc. regardless of whether or not the basket underneath is full. This bag has these buckles! I have no idea what a student would do with them on a book bag, but it doesn't matter to me. I know what I'll use them for!

Fully packed and strapped to full-size stroller. It sits up a little higher than I'd like, but it works.

Fully packed and strapped to umbrella stroller. Yessssssss!

The next feature that I really had to have was external pockets for sippy cups. This bag has two of them (one on each side), as you can see in the pictures.

Now let's unpack this amazing bag, shall we?

First zipper open

I love all the many organizing pockets in the first, smaller zippered section! There are three up high and three down below, plus two pen pockets (that I use for baby spoons).

Everything from the first zippered section

The upper three pockets have a squeezy pouch snack, two fruit cups, and 6-ish nursing pads. Two of the bottom three pockets hold baby sunglasses & sunscreen, and other creams (teething gel, antibiotic ointment). I got three baby spoons in the two pen-holders. The third zippered pocket in the front is still empty. I also stuck a bib in the bottom of this zippered section.

Second zipper open - looks almost empty, right?

The second zippered section I used to store changes of baby clothes, plus kept that space available for me to stick my purse or some baby toys in as needed.

Everything from second zippered section

I put a baby jacket, romper, pants, legwarmers, 2 pairs of socks, a burp cloth, plus gum and tissues for me in this section. I also left room for my purse (I typically carry a smaller, clutch-size purse) in this section on top of all the clothes!

Third zipper open (with my 19-mo-old's hands "helping")

And now, you must prepare to be amazed at what I managed to fit in here. Seriously, you might want to sit down!

Contents of third zippered section

I was only going to put 3 or 4 diapers in here, but I had just finished folding diaper laundry, and thought hey, why not see how much I can cram in there? So just in case you're wondering what fit, I had 10 pocket and AIO diapers in there (8 bumGenius, one Green Bees, one GroVia), one Flip cover, three stay-dry Flip inserts, two disposables, three fleece liners and a tube of diaper cream. Bam!

But oh, we're not done!

"laptop" compartment in third zippered section

I wanted to make sure my backpack diaper bag had a "laptop" compartment so I would have an easy-to-access place to put my changing pad that I pilfered from our last diaper bag (the expensive bag that fell apart). So in this compartment, I had the changing pad folded up, and in its pocket were a case of wipes and a wetbag.

Changing mat, wipes case and wetbag in addition to the 15 diapers, cream and liners in that third zippered section

So there you have it! But before I let you go, let me show you a couple of other things I really like about it:

Mommy cell phone pocket behind one of the sippy cup pockets on the right side. You can also see the hand sanitizer hanging on the left--there's a little loop for it to hang from!

I took 4 pocket diapers out, and there's a lot more room in the middle section for my purse or some toys!

There is a place for my keys to clip on to either strap. 

Actually, there are about 4 places on each strap, and after trying the bag on, I decided I liked them clipped lower than they are pictured above.

The brand: Outdoor Products

I like that since the company makes a lot of outdoor backpacking products, the fabric is a heavier and hopefully longer-lasting backpack material, and not the cheap-o nylon that a lot of kids' backpacks are made of. I also like the bright colors; my daughter actually played with the bag a long time because of the colors and pattern!

And the best, the absolute best part about this bag? It only cost me $9! Yup, originally $14.88, but on sale with the back-to-school stuff at Walmart. 

I will post again in a month or more to update you all on how I'm liking the bag after actually using it for a while. But for now, I'm super impressed, especially for the price!







1 comment:

  1. I know this is an old post but I'm so glad it's here. I used a backpack with my son (also purchased after school started so it was nice and cheep, like $10 marked down from $45) then with the next child I had an awesome friend make me a diaper bag, which I used until the fabric literally fell apart. Now, pregnant again I was looking for a diaper bag, trying to decide if I was going to take the time to make one or spend the time trying to find one I liked and didn't cost me a ton of $. Then I came across this post and it reminded me of the backpack. It's still in almost perfect condition, and they totally are awesome for cloth, that extra room makes a huge difference! Thanks!

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