Honestly

I've been wanting to do some more extensive research on The Honest Company for a while now — ever since Ethan signed us up for their sample pack of diapers, wipes, and baby products when wee one was about 5 months old. At the time, we had switched Leo's diapers from Pampers to Seventh Generation in an attempt to be more eco. We'd been skeptical about how the Seventh Gen would hold up* for some of the more "armageddon" of poops, but they did great, and we've been fairly happy with them since — though I'll admit we now use Huggies Overnights for the long haul 12-hour stretches while the Bear is sleeping. The Seventh Generation Overnights just didn't cut it, and bathing Leo, doing an extra load of laundry every morning, and cursing the day we were all born on a daily basis was not turning out to be an enjoyable routine.

Still, I've been contemplating cheating on our Seventh Gen-ers with The Honest Company's adorable, celebrity-approved diapers stamped individually with love by Jessica Alba (okay, that last part's an exaggeration). But I've wondered, are they really more eco, more earth-friendly, and more health-friendly for your baby than the other "green" brands? Some internet searching today has led me to conclude... that I am even more confused than I was before. From what I can glean:

a) There's great debate over all of this. There are no black-and-white answers. You'll read one thing one place and one thing someplace else. This article was particularly well-written, but it left me with more questions than answers.

b) The "most" eco way to diaper is to use cloth, but even that's up for debate, since it requires a whole lot of washing (read: wasted water). Right now, for our family, cloth feels like a full-time job, and gdiapers, the hybrid between cloth and disposable, require you to flush — which can cause toilet clogs — or compost to really get the full effect. (And even then, you can only compost wet diapers, not poop-laden ones. Maybe one day, when we've got a legit compost heap set up in our garden, we could try these).

c) If you do opt for disposable, you want chlorine-free, chemical-free, and a company dedicated to making their diaper-producing processes as earth-friendly as possible. The Honest Company's diapers claim to be biodegradable, but from what I read on the nets, it sounds like biodegradable doesn't mean squat if the diapers are dumped in a landfill (because landfills don't offer the right environment for things to degrade). So, unless you're composting the diapers, you're doing as much harm as you would with a regular old, run-of-the-mill Huggie.

d) You have to be a scientist to make much sense of any of this. English majors like me are just shit out of luck.

My final question about Alba's nappies: what's the price like? I'm not one for complicated spreadsheets or even, ahem, calculators, but from a quick glance, it looks like their "bundle" of diapers and wipes might be slightly more expensive than our current Amazon Subscribe & Save sitch, but not by a lot. So maybe we'll try them for a month. Would be worth it just for the cute designs.

Anyone know more about the great diaper debate? Please chime in!

*Don't try Whole Foods diapers or their generic versions unless you want to cry. It's like using a soggy napkin with holes in it as a diaper.