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How to Make Your Own Cloth Diaper Liners for PENNIES!

Ditch the disposable cloth diaper liners & DIY your own cloth diaper liners out of fleece while cloth diapering on a budget.

These are so easy to make, VERY cheap & best of all, there’s no sewing required!

If you are on a cloth diapering budget, you are probably scouring the web for simple ways to save money while using cloth diapers. After all, that’s one of the biggest reasons that parents choose to cloth diaper their children – the $$$ savings.

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Even with all the advantages of cloth diapering – better for the environment, healthier for your child… you still have to deal with one thing that most people don’t like dealing with – poop. Diaper liners are a great way to make dealing with poop much easier.

And they are one of the easiest and cheapest things that I’ve DIY’ed during my cloth diapering days. Let me show you how!

What are cloth diaper liners?

First, let’s talk about what cloth diaper liners are and what they’re not. Cloth diaper liners are simply a piece of fabric that goes between your baby and their cloth diaper.

The main difference from cloth diaper inserts to cloth diaper liners is that the liners aren’t used for absorbing.

There are a few types of cloth diaper liners, but they mainly fall under two categories: disposable and reusable.

Disposable diaper liners are a piece of very thin fabric, usually made from bamboo, and are meant to be 1 use only. Some are biodegradable and can be flushed and others are meant to be thrown in the trash.

Reusable diaper liners are usually made of a fleece material and are so cheap and easy to make!

Cloth Diaper Drawer Side

So, why are cloth diaper liners even used? While they aren’t necessary to use with cloth diapers, they certainly have advantages:

  • Cloth diaper liners help to keep baby’s bottom dry.
  • Liners help to keep stains at bay. This makes selling used cloth diapers easier, if you decide to later. Plus, they just look better without stains!
  • Cloth diaper liners make clean up a bit easier. Sometimes it’s easier to shake solids off a liner than a diaper. They are especially helpful when you are traveling with cloth diapers.
  • Diaper liners help protect your diapers from diaper creams. Even cloth diaper safe creams can cause build-up on your diapers.
reusable diaper liners pros

And when you DIY them, they’re cheap and totally worth the pennies you’ve invested.

All you need to make your own DIY Cloth Diaper Liners:

  • Fleece fabric
  • Scissors
diyfleeceliners

Seriously. That’s all you need! The best part of fleece fabric is that it doesn’t fray so there’s no sewing required!

These reusable fleece cloth diaper liners can cost you pennies, literally. I purchased the above purple fleece before Sophia was born. I had found an odd yardage amount of fleece at a craft store that had been deeply discounted, but you can also buy fleece online, even on Amazon.

fleece reusable diaper liners

To make your own fleece diaper liners for cloth diapers, you’re simply going to look at your cloth diapers for sizing. There’s no perfect size to cut these liners to, just see what will work best in the diapers you have. You’ll want them to be a bit smaller than your diaper so they reusable liners will lay right into the diaper without bunching.

When should you use cloth diaper liners?

The main times I use my liners are with overnight fitted diapers. I like knowing that Moreaya has a barrier between fabrics so I know she’s not got a wet diaper against her all night. 

Remember I said fleece is a miracle worker? It is. Liquids pass right through it and it acts as a barrier. So, when a child pees onto the fleece, it passes through to the more absorbent diaper and doesn’t sit in the fleece, which makes it stay dry. 

That’s why a lot of your pocket cloth diapers are topped with a stay-dry fleece material.

I also like to use them when I am using a diaper cream, whether it be cloth diaper safe or not. If it’s not, I usually wash my liners with towel laundry.  Otherwise, the reusable diaper liners go straight into the diaper pail with the diapers!

Diaper creams can make your cloth diapers get a build-up and may cause leaking issues. The only way to remedy this is by stripping cloth diapers. You eliminate this worry when you use cloth diaper liners.

Travel Friendly Cloth Diapers

I also use these cloth diaper liners when we travel. While I always use our fleece liners for cloth diapers at home, I do buy disposable cloth liners when we’re traveling. Just because they are so easy to use on the go.

How to Make Your Own Cloth Diaper Liners out of Fleece

DIY Reusable Diaper Liners
Active Time 5 minutes
Total Time 5 minutes
Difficulty Beginner
Estimated Cost $1

Materials

  • Polar fleece

Tools

  • Scissors

Instructions

  1. Once you have your polar fleece, lay it out over your cloth diaper to get a feel for the size you need.
  2. You'll want your fleece liners to be a bit smaller than your cloth diaper, but not a lot smaller or they'll move around too much.
  3. Cut the polar fleece fabric with scissors.
  4. That's it! There's no need to hem or sew because fleece fabric doesn't fray.
  5. You can wash fleece liners for cloth diapers right in your normal diaper laundry.

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Have you DIY’ed a Cloth Diaper Project like these reusable cloth diaper liners?

This post was originally published in August 2013.

Marina

Thursday 26th of March 2020

What size for newborn babies?

Sally

Tuesday 11th of December 2018

You can buy fleece at any store. I purchased my fleece on clearance for about $1-2 a yard for my guinea pigs from JoAnn's but many other stores have it too. I tried blizzard and no-pill, and it has worked just fine for the past 6 years. They have shrunk a little over the years, but I do wash them with hot water, detergent and bleach. On high in the drier. So you can't expect anything to last forever under those conditions. I have purchase more, mostly because I like to have variety for aesthetic reasons.

What you do have to do to make the fleece pass the water through is to wash it several times Do not use fabric softener or a drier sheet as they will cause the water to float on the fleece.

Good luck

Kelley

Tuesday 20th of February 2018

I found this when trying to add something to the diaper for more absorbency. I actually use flour sacks towels inside of diaper covers but my little one is leaking a little at night. Would something like this work only for at night or do I need to use something else instead? Thanks!

khuldin

Wednesday 22nd of February 2017

Hi... I have some mattress protector sheets. its like fleece on top and waterproof material on the other side. can it be put to any use in diying cds?

angelique

Saturday 17th of January 2015

So, I'm confused. On the site that had a link to here, (http://soeasybeinggreen-blog.com/inserts-liners-faqs/) it says not to put micro fleece against the baby's skin. So are you using a different type of fleece??? Thank you.

angelique

Saturday 17th of January 2015

Never mind. It seems I've confused microfiber for micro fleece. :/ lol

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