A Lesson in Carseats

Well...we did it, we purchased Owen's big boy carseat today. Half of my heart broke, and the other half was giddy with excitement seeing him sitting in the carseat at Babies R' Us.

We (aka I) spent alot of time doing research for this purchase. I'm sure you recall the blog post with a few options that I was himming and hawing over...

Yeah...we didn't go with any of them.

Yesterday, I was at BRU and had help from my favourite sales lady. She's this little old Ukrainian lady who I absolutely adore, and she helped me with our crib, stroller and carseat selections while I was pregnant, so she was really excited to see Owen yesterday. She had some words of advice that I hadn't really considered before.

I told her that we have a smallish car (Hyundai Elantra) that is cramped as it is with our current carseat. When I asked about which ones would be good for a small car, she immediately suggested The First Years truefit, which I'd been considering before. She asked how old Owen is (3.5 months!) and how much he weighs (pushing 18ish lbs.), then had this to say.

The First Years infant-child carseat for compact cars is good only until 22lbs because then the headrest must go on, therefore making it the same size as all of the other car seats. What we need to look at is recline.

I had two in contention - the Evenflo Triumph LX 65 and the Eddie Bauer 3in1 Convertible. The Evenflo was a great design, however the Eddie Bauer will go right up until he's 100lbs. and not needing a booster seat anymore. AHHH! The Options.

We went back today, and I was really impressed that we were encouraged to take the seats off the shelf and actually put Owen in them, see how he fits and if we like how he's sitting in them. We put them next to one another, reclined them both all the way and realized that we had a winner almost immediately.

Here's the newest addition to our ever growing collection of baby stuff...

Our favourite parts are the tension system knobs, that its side impact tested, rear facing to 35lbs, and (best of all) the infinity strap system - no more need for unthreading and rethreading as he gets taller and taller! The straps grow with him, and that's definitely a bonus for our growing boy!

For any of you with smallish cars like us (like the ever fantastic Shizz), before settling on the next phase carseat, go to the store. Check out the recline positions and compare to the infant seat that you have now. Recline it all the way, and compare the seats all in a row to see which one has the most room for your growing kiddo, and the best recline to fit in your car!

Happy shopping!