This review is from a parent of now two. Our second son was a very heavy wetter. I have purchased 6 brands of hemp pads, as well as bamboo (3 brands). The short version, these are incredible. By far my favorite. The long version... Each pad is actually two thinner liners sewn together. When I first received these, I was a bit confused. Once I discovered why, I absolutely love the design. The two panels sewn together means that they dry much faster in the dryer. I have several other brands (including hybrid cotton-hemp ones) that are still a bit damp and need another 10-20 minutes to dry. Since these leave more surface area available for drying, these come out very dry and fold back easily when stuffing a diaper. The second benefit is that after about a year the stitching connecting the two pads failed on a few of the liners leaving me with several single panels. I was going to sew them back together, but now I like using them on my now two-year old on road trips. They add almost no bulk and provide several times more absorbency and dryness over a single microfiber insert. The older single panels were also great on my second son when he was in his first weeks and I was struggling with the vast volumes of pee he was producing. Hemp is more absorbent then bamboo. If you have a spectrum, put hemp on one end, then bamboo, then microfiber, then regular cotton. Both hemp and bamboo absorb very slowly though. This is why a few manufacturers sell hemp-cotton blends. They are more absorbent then cotton, but absorb as quickly as cotton. However, I do not like any of the hybrid solutions. They still soak quickly, not nearly as much as hemp (if I had to guess, I would say hemp is easily 5x more absorbent then cotton, and a composite liner is about 2x more absorbent then cotton). The main failure of a composite liner is that a child can still feel the wetness. If you have a microfiber liner and a hemp backer, the hemp wicks all the moisture out of the microfiber liner. Since that is what is closer to the child, the child does not sense the wetness much, if at all. My morning experience is to find a nearly saturated hemp liner, and a microfiber liner that barely feels damp. While I touched on it a bit in the last paragraph, it is important to understand how to use these. First, you need to wash them a few times in hot water to strip some of the natural oils out of them. If you do not, they can actually reduce the absorbency of your other pads, and then you will be stripping diapers. After that, it is game on! Second, if you are using any liner besides a cotton liner, understand that they are so absorbent they will wick moisture out of your childs skin if there is direct contact. That leads to rashes, etc.. I use pockets and need to check and make sure that the insert pocket completely covers the microfiber and hemp liners (microfiber is also more absorbent then cotton and will also wick moisture out of skin and cause rashes). The solution is to have a pocket diaper with a microfiber liner, and behind that your hemp liner. If you are not using pockets, use a cotton liner with a hemp one behind it. Third, you will be amazed how absorbent these are. The main benefit is that your baby will not fuss over wetness as much and instead of 5-8 changes overnight for a heavy wetter you will change once or twice at most (depending on how thirsty your wee one is). I tend to use aplix (velcro) diapers for overnight, and snaps during the day. I do not even need to turn a light on to change my boy. I stuff the velcro diapers with the hemp + microfiber inserts, and add a few extra of the now single panels in some of the snaps. It is very easy for me to determine by touch which diapers in my stash are night diapers, and which ones are day diapers. My experiences using this method are for my firstborn... over 1 year without a single diaper rash. My second born... three months with no rashes and 1 month of sleeps where I get up and change him once a night and give him a bottle. Bliss :) I have also helped a few friends with kids who suffered from kids who peed out of their diapers often. Some have switched to cloth and are using a similar system. Others are stuffing every diaper with the combo. It is all good. Just get these and sleep more!
