Life Hack: The Baby Wipes

baby wipes

There was a time when I bought baby wipes in bulk.  Then both my children graduated from diapers and stopped buying enough wipes to clean an army of hineys.  A few months ago a member of our family (who shall remain nameless in order to protect the innocent) had a bout of tummy troubles that resulted in a burn down below.  Things became a bit…shall we say, irritated and inflamed and any time personal business had to be taken care of well, lets just say there may have been gnashing of teeth.  My family needed relief so I took myself to the baby aisle in order to relieve said inflamation.  I decided to step it up a notch and spring for the Burts Bees wipes.  Nothing says I love you and have pity on your burning poop shoot like spending $7 for a small pack of wipes.

This experience got me thinking: there are so many more uses for baby wipes than just wiping butts.  Here are top 10 uses for baby wipes other than their intended use.

1.  Bathing baby:  Is bathing your baby sweet and precious?  Yes.  Has the Johnson and Johnson baby wash commercial made me weep and seriously consider having another baby just so that I can wash those tiny toes?  Absolutely.  Do they really need to take a bath everyday?  No.  Wipes are perfect for whisking away the neck roll shmultz and the thigh roll grime.  Basically, any place that those precious fat rolls have trapped milk, spit up, poo, and rice cereal; wipes get the job done with out having to submerge your angel in water.

2.  Grimy hands:  I believe that we, as a society, have gone way over board on the hand sanitizer.  However, visibly grimy hands reaching for fruit snacks…I can’t handle it.  Wipes get those hands clean enough for finger foods without annihilating the good germs our bodies need and science experimenting the creation of super germs that are resistant to Clorox.

3.  The car:  Have you ever wiped down your dash, console, steering wheel, gear shift, radio controls with a baby wipe?  It’s miraculous.  It makes you feel like the front seat has been to get the premium detail package at the car wash.  There may be brown banana peels, broken crayons, crushed goldfish, various as sundry plastic kid cups and fruit snack wrappers in the back seat but that’s all out of my line of vision so I’m not too concerned about it.  

4.  Make up removal:  On vacation and forgot your facial cleanser?  No problem.  Just rub a baby wipe all over your face and you’re fresh as a babies…well, you may not want to compare your face to a baby bottom, but you get the point.

5.  After meal clean up: Nothing cleans up pasta sauce from little hands, faces, high chair trays, kitchen tables, kitchen floors, walls, etc. like a baby wipe.  

6.  The bathroom sink:  You know the place where the bathroom sink and the counter meet?  That place seems to attract some sort of toothpaste/hairspray filth that hides from the regular counter cleaning until one day it reaches a critical mass that I hadn’t noticed on my previous swipes.  The baby wipe has just the right thickness and moisture to get in there with your fingernail and scratch it out.  The rest of the bathroom could be a bio-hazard zone, but by-god I’m going to get that crevasse clean.

7.  Adult non-shower days:  There are some days when taking a shower just won’t happen in the AM and that’s okay.  My grandpa only took a shower once a week and never once did any of us grandkids think that he was stinky.  Skipping a shower every now and then is just fine but there are some body parts (that don’t see the light of day) that need a refresher.  Baby wipes take care of that not so fresh feeling and remove multiple layers of deodorant.

8.  Toe cheese:  You know that grime that collects in-between toes after playing in the dirt, sandbox, wearing crocs, etc.?  That’s called toe cheese and it’s gross.  I always say you can sleep better if your feet are clean so give those tootsies a baby wipe once over before sliding in-between the sheets.

9.  Toy wipe down:  As much as I’m tempted to use Clorox wipes on all of the toys, I’m just not sure if bleach is the way to go for things that will go in a toddler’s mouth.  Part of my says yes, bleach the hell out of this crap and if some gets in their mouth then it will clean out the germs in their mouth too!  It’s a two-fer!  Then the other part of me responds with if your kids ends up with some sort of crazy disease or cancer it will be all your fault for letting him get bleach in their mouths.  The part of me that fears obscure childhood disease caused by household products trumps toy germs.

 10.  Arts & Crafts: I can’t speak to the ability of getting Sharpie off the wall (knock on wood, now that I have said it I’m certain someone will need to create a masterpiece in Sharpie on the living room wall) but wipes come in handy in cleaning up all sorts of crafty crafts.  Clay in various colors and markers are currently our art medium of choice and tend to leave their mark on whatever work surface we may be playing on. 

What use have you discovered for baby wipes?

 

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