Si-yo! Samantha, dah-wah-DOH. Tsi tsa-la-gi.
Hello! My name is Samantha. I am Cherokee.
Hi, everyone! Lalabye Mama Samantha, here. If you were able to catch my live in the Lalabye Chat on Facebook, you may know that I am an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. November is Native American Heritage month, so I thought I would share with you a little history about cloth diapers and the Native American culture in North America.
Native Americans were the real MVP’s when it came to diapering their children for two reasons: while their diapers were cloth, they were also disposable and biodegradable. Most would use the hide of an animal as the cover portion, but they packed the diaper with various grasses and mosses to gain absorbency. I’m sure you’re thinking, “Animal hide and grass?!” Yes, animal hide was what many Native American cultures used to make clothes, since the cultivation of cotton was not introduced until the English settlers came, and grass and mosses, specifically milkweed, were great for stuffing!
So, what does this mean today? If you are familiar with the history of North America, you know that most Native Americans were put on reservations in the 1800’s. What you may not know is that reservations are some of the poorest areas in America. It takes a lot to prosper from the least desirable areas of America, so money is tight for a lot of families! That’s where modern cloth diapers come into play. Over the course of a child’s life, you will change his diaper approximately eight times a day until he potty-learns! That is a lot of money that you are throwing away and a lot of diapers filling up landfills with something that takes over 500 years to decompose! The solution: switch to cloth!
Cloth diapering is not animal hide and moss anymore, but it can still be economical and earth friendly! Lalabye Baby is the perfect diaper to start with. Melissa has designed a diaper easy enough for anyone to use with rainbow belly band snaps, the option to stuff inserts inside the shell or snap on top, vibrant solids, and beautiful prints!
So, let’s take diapering back to cloth for Native American History month and allow Lalabye Baby to change the way you diaper your children. Save money and take care of this beautiful planet we live on while doing so.
“We don’t inherit the earth from our ancestors,
we borrow it from our children.”
We have no word for goodbye because that’s too final; so, I will just say doh-dah-dah-goh-hun-i. That means, “til we meet again.”
~Samantha
Lalabye Baby: Simply Convenient Modern Cloth Diapers 