Ditch the Diaper Bag: My Travel-Inspired Minimalist Solution to Hauling Kid Stuff

I hate diaper bags.

I hate them so much that, despite having a toddler and an infant, I don’t use a diaper bag. Ever.

Instead of a diaper bag, I just have a purse. It’s not huge, it’s not messy, and it’s not a chapstick-devouring abyss.

Sounds like pure fiction, right? I have Marie Kondo, and years of travel experience, to thank for this.

I have to start by saying that I am not a super organized person. My house is not tidy. There are dishes in my sink and laundry, well… everywhere. I want to live the Konmari life, but it’s a goal that I am ever reaching toward, never achieving.

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But there is one area of my life that I think would make Miss Kondo proud: my purse.

I’ve always been a purse-switcher. I’ll go for a while with a giant tote where I can store (and lose) ALL. THE. THINGS. Then I’ll get frustrated and instead buy a tiny clutch that’ll fit my phone and credit card, and nothing else. “Organized” has never been an adjective that would describe my purse.

And then I had a baby. Suddenly, I had to add a diaper bag to the equation. Why do babies have so much stuff?!

Then that baby became a toddler, and suddenly I had to bring around snacks. Back up clothes. Separate sippy cups for milk and water.

AND THEN I had another baby, loaded my diaper bag to the brim and… had enough. I needed a minimalist diaper bag.

It was time to Konmari the hell out of this situation.

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We’re avid travelers. How is it possible, I’d wonder, that I can backpack Europe and Africa for 7 weeks with only a small backpack; I can take our family of 4 on a beach vacation with only one small suitcase; but I can’t get out to Mommy and Me classes without bags and bags of supplies?

And that was how I realized my solution – it came from our travel experience. The advice of backpackers everywhere: pack light and use travel cubes.

For the non-backpackers out there, what are travel cubes? They’re essentially mesh or soft plastic bags of varying sizes that you can use to organize your belongings inside your backpack or suitcase. They’re especially great for sharing luggage space, as each family member can have their own color-coded cubes.

Here are a few examples on Amazon. I have the first ones below, by eBags. I’ve been happy with them over the past 5 years of travel.

Not only do they keep things organized, but they help compress clothes and utilize space to the max.

So how do I use travel cubes to keep my purse organized and skip the diaper bag?

1. Get a reasonably-sized purse.

If I have a great big bag, I fill it with stuff. Not intentionally, of course. But over time, I’ll stick things in there, and since they fit, they don’t bother me enough to take them out. Until one day, I realize I’m carrying around dozens of receipts, a couple Tupperware containers, a smushed-up granola bar, and some socks. What happened?

I’m now a big fan of a medium-sized hobo or smaller tote. I want something with easy access and a pocket or two.

This is my current bag, and I love (almost) everything about it. It’s a beautiful, hand-crafted leather purse from a boutique shop in Rome. And while that sounds super expensive, it was actually under USD $100.

Isn’t it gorgeous? My only complaint is that the pocket inside doesn’t connect all the way down to the base of the bag, which means that things get stuck under there. If it connected at the base, that would create a little more separation, and that would better fit my needs.

In case you’re not planning a trip to Rome soon, here are some lovely alternatives that I found for some shopping inspo! (I could purse shop all day. Diaper bags? No.)

2. Get packing cubes.

This yellow packing cube is my diaper bag. It goes inside my purse.

Everything that I need for my kids fits snuggly into this little packing cube, and this packing cube sits perfectly in one side of my purse. When I’m ready to change a diaper, I just pull this cube out and go for it.

It’s not that big, so I only keep the things that I really need. This part varies depending on my children’s ages and stages, and I regularly re-assess what I have in there to make sure that I’m not carrying around extra stuff. Right now, it’s got:

• 1 pull up and a spare pair of panties for my toddler. We’re in the midst of potty training.
• 1 pair of leggings for my toddler. Again… potty training.
• 2 diapers for my baby. We cloth diaper, but cloth takes up a lot of space. I usually keep one cloth and one back-up disposable for just in case.
• 2 cloth wipes. Cloth is great – you almost never need more than 1, no matter what comes out of the baby. But you do need access to water during the diaper change, so I bring disposables too.
• 1 half-empty package of disposable wipes. When it runs out, I replace it with another half-empty package from around the house. I’d rather not carry around a huge pack. Alternately, a small refillable wipe dispenser would be great.
• 1 small receiving blanket. This is to set down under the baby. Sure, it’s not a fancy folded changing pad, but honestly – does your baby really need that for the minute it takes to change him?
• 1 wet-bag. This is necessary for cloth diapers. If I used disposables, I would probably just keep a couple plastic bags: 1 to bring home messy clothes, and 1 to potentially take a poopy diaper to dispose of elsewhere.
• Because we cloth diaper, I don’t worry about blow-outs. They just don’t happen. But if they did, I would throw in a change of clothes for the baby.
• Emergency snacks – more on that below.

At different times, I’ve had different things in here. But the key is that I only bring what I need, and I don’t have a ton of just-in-case extras.

I don’t keep diaper cream. If she has a rash, I’ll put it on before we leave, and if it’s bad, I’ll bring the cream and the cloth diaper liners along. I don’t need to carry it every day.

I don’t keep tons of extra clothes. Worst case scenario, we can make do with whatever we’ve got until we make it home. It’s not like we’re going away for the weekend.

I don’t keep nail clippers, a first-aid kit, toys, extra blankets, or anything else that I am not going to need immediately when I’m out and about.

The very few times when having some of that stuff might have helped have not compared to the months of freedom from the diaper bag.

3. Get a snack bag.

I keep a ziploc bag or small packing cube inside of the diaper bag cube for my emergency snack bag. These are my “oops! I don’t have anything to feed my children!” snacks. Enough to get us through an afternoon if needed: goldfish crackers, a pouch or 2, ready-to-feed formula with a nipple, a bar, etc.

But these are not my day-to-day snacks.

I have a toddler. If you, too, have a toddler, you know that toddlers require a constant stream of small meals throughout the day. These days, I cannot get away without bringing a lunch box with me in the car.

Yes, I know. Now I’m carrying 2 bags, and is that really any better than just carrying a diaper bag?

It is, for 2 reasons. First, I would need an insulated bag either way to carry milk and yogurt. Plus I wouldn’t want to lose a bunch of food in the bottom of my diaper bag and find it months later, so having a separate bag is necessary either way.

Second, I do not bring this bag everywhere we go. I leave it in the car. So when we are out and about, I’m still just bringing the purse.

In the morning before I leave, I fill this bag with all the snacks and drinks that my children will need for the day. I like to multi-task by having my toddler eat while we’re driving. If I really need to bring food in with us somewhere, I just take 1 item out and throw it in my purse, because there is plenty of room. Easy peasy.

Same thing for a sippy cup. My girls share a cup of water. I may or may not bring it out of the car, depending on where we go. It can go in the purse or stroller or my toddler can carry it.

Note that I am breastfeeding my little one, so I don’t have to worry about bottles. But when I did need them before, I actually kept the bottles in the diaper packing cube, too. It was just a little more jam-packed then.

Do I worry about being caught somewhere with a hungry, screaming toddler? Not really. In the worst case, I can just run to the car and grab a snack. If we’re somewhere far from the car for a long time, I plan ahead and shove a few more snacks in my purse.

4. Get used to cleaning out your bag every time you get home.

This is the step that makes this whole thing work, and if you’re cringing and moving that cursor to close the page already – just hear me out!

When I first read Marie Kondo describing how she cleans out her purse every evening when she comes home, I thought she was crazy. She takes everything out and puts it where it belongs for the night, then reloads it in the morning.

I don’t go to that level of effort. I keep everything in my bag (except my phone, of course). But I always pull out the diaper packing cube (assuming I’ve made a diaper change while out), throw the cloth diaper in the laundry, and replace anything that I’ve used. Then it goes back in the purse, ready to go for tomorrow.

Since I’ve made this a habit as soon as I walk in the door, I’m never stuck having run out of diapers or leggings because I didn’t realize I’d gone through them all. I always have just enough for a day out – no more, no less. I reset my bag when I get home, and it’s ready to go the next time we rush out the door.

This is also the point at which I clean out the snack bag. Dump any garbage, put any unused snacks away. I don’t fill this until I’m ready to walk out the door, but I keep a drawer of easy-access, ready to throw and go snacks to round out whatever fruit and veggies I pack for the day.

5. Keep the rest of your purse organized.

What else do I keep in my purse? This is all about personal preference, but I like to keep it minimal. The diaper bag packing cube takes up about half of my purse, leaving plenty of room for my most important items in the other half: wallet, phone, keys, lip balm.

In the pocket, I keep the stuff that I need occasionally: a pen, feminine products for a surprise! day, earbuds, lotion.

My laptop fits in my bag as well, so if I’m planning to do some work during the day, I slide that in, too. There is also plenty of room for my water bottle. I don’t always bring it, and it comes out for cleaning/refilling at the end of the day if I do.

That’s it!

Inevitably, I often end up with some extra stuff shoved in there throughout the day. It is super important that when I clean out the diaper bag cube, I also clean out anything else that ended up in the purse. If I don’t, I lose the functionality of my minimalist bag when it fills with a bunch of stuff.

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Minimalist bags aren’t for everyone. Maybe you feel unprepared if you don’t have every item that you could possibly need while you’re out and about – that’s okay! But if you’re looking to simplify your routine and get rid of all the extra stuff, give packing cubes a try.

Marie Kondo would be proud, and really – isn’t that all that matters?