I am getting overwhelmed with baby stuff. I know nothing about the little creatures, except that there’s all this stuff. So, wise dopers, please help me narrow down the decision making process: should we get a convertible car seat, or an infant car seat?
Convertible seat pros: can hold babies from newborn through 60 pounds, as rear facing and then front-facing seat.
Cons: Have to take the baby out to put in stroller, etc.
Infant car seat pros: may fit small babies better (not likely to be an issue for my son, coming from a family of big babies), can remove it from the car to carry around if baby is sleeping)
Cons: Can only be used for a relatively small period of time before baby outgrows it; heavy to lug around with baby in there.
Factors to consider: I work at home and have arranged in-home care, so baby won’t be traveling to day care on a regular basis. I do have two different styles of sling/ carrier to put baby in when wandering around.
Basically the problem is that, other than their physical characteristics, I don’t know a lot about what it’s actually like to have a baby, so I don’t know how to figure out what will work best. I’m not even sure I’m considering all the pros and cons. And do we need two car seats, one for each car, or should we just get one and move it into husband’s car if necessary?
IMO, it depends on how you’ll use it. Which maybe you won’t know until the baby is here. We got a convertible car seat and an infant carrier system, and I ended up not using the carrier system much. But I found it much more convenient to wear my baby in a wrap than to carry him in the carrier (suckers are heavy).
As for the number, we eventually got cheap, el strippo (But safe! Nobody call Children’s Services! I consulted Consumer Reports and everything.) convertible carseats and keep them in both cars. My husband and I tote the children around in about equal timeshares, and constantly shuffling carseats was a hassle we did not care to deal with. If families where whoever has the kids takes the van, clearly duplicates are not needed.
If money isn’t a big issue, you may want one of each, because then you can put one in each car, and when the baby outgrows the infant seat, by then you’ll know if you need two or not. You’re not going to want to move the car seat from car-to-car often though; they can be tricky to install correctly, unless you have one base in each car for an infant car seat, but those things aren’t cheap anyway.
It does depend a lot on how often you’ll be taking the baby out though, as a very young baby. Even though they CAN use an infant car seat until about a year, you’re probably not going to be using it as a carrier past a few months, because it will be heavy to carry and the baby will be able to sit in a high chair in restaurants, etc. Plus you have the sling. So if you’ll be mostly staying home for a few months and mostly driving the baby in one car, it’s fine to get only a convertible seat.
We got infant carriers for our children. I like that you load them up in the house and the whole carrier clicks into a base in the car. We got 3 bases, one for me and the Mrs. and the grandma/regular childcare provider. My wife is a crazy bargain hunter and coupon clipper and she found a screaming deal on air protect side impact car seats and we bought a few of them as well. Once the youngin is too big for the carrier it’s nice to have multiples of a real seat, particularly one with a cinch strap to tighten and loosen the straps. YMMV, we live in the desert and it’s downright inhumane to spend any longer than absolutely necessary in the car before getting the AC going.
I like our infant carrier. Newborns are FLOPPY and it was nice to be able to fiddle with the straps and such inside instead of in the car. It’s also very, very nice to be able to carry a sleeping baby inside and leave him dozing in his carrier. Getting him out of it to carry him in would wake him up. It’s good for more than a few months: my kid is almost six months old and long for his age (95% percentile at his last checkup) and he still fits just fine.
That was the other thing I forgot to mention. Neither of my kids ever consented to sleep in the car. (Ever. We tested this out on a 24-hour straight-through car trip, which was quite literally hell on wheels.) So the sleeping-baby thing never worked for me. If I had had car sleepers, I might have a very different opinion.
It depends on how much your child will be in the car. I don’t have a car during the day, so we decided to go straight for the convertible seat as I wouldn’t be moving the kid in and out very much. Additionally, I used a mai tai sling particuarly with #1 so the capsule would have not been that useful. Certainly as far as our 2 have been concerned, they may have woken when we take them out, but they settle back to sleep pretty easily in the sling or pram.
If you are mainly car based, the capsule might be better. One caution is that they don’t recommend babies being kept in them for long periods of time, as it’s detrimental to their spines. Better to be either in a sling or on a flat surface like a pram bassinette when sleeping.
The other benefit of the convertible was that our first stayed in it rear facing until just before her 2 year birthday (new safety recommendations), and was able to shift to her new convertible booster seat in time for #2. Between the 2 seats we don’t need anything else for ages - the convertible can be used by #2 until she’s 4, and #1 can use her seat until she’s between 6-8.
Don’t know about where you live, but around here you can rent a capsule for the first few months if you like the thought of that, but don’t want to have to invest in one if a convertible seat is better for you long term.
I loved the capsule. I went and got it when my daughter was a week old and I was standing half in/half out of my car, in the rain, strapping her in to the convertable seat. Ripped that thing out, put it away for when she was older and installed the capsule. The convenience of doing up the straps indoors before heading out to the car was immeasurable. In every way it was nicer to use… until, combined with the baby’s weight, it got too heavy to carry.
I hired the capsule from the local baby shop rather than buy it (if I have three or more kids it would have been cheaper to buy one, but it looks like I’m stopping at 2 so I’m still ahead financially).
Missed this bit - while some of the bigger kid seats are easy to remove and swap between cars, the infant ones often require more careful fitting (we got ours professionally installed as apparently many seats are incorrectly placed). So getting 2 seats and not moving them may be more reassuring.
I think I have seen some seats though which come with 2 bases, and 1 seat for just your situation - could be worth considering? (This is capsule only, you’ll require 2 convertible seats).
Thanks everyone, for all your points to consider. I think I’m suffering a bit from the delusion of “I have to make the PERFECT decision, right now!”, which is especially foolhardy since we don’t know 1) what this particular baby will be like, or 2) how our lives will change or not change once we’ve got a baby.
I think we will most likely end up getting one of each, so we’ve got something in each car. I know my mom will be getting a carseat of her own (and she’s got a high chair, and a play yard, and a jogging stroller; my stepmom has a high chair and a play yard at her house, too. Can you tell everyone is ready for a grandkid?), so I suppose we’re pretty well covered wherever the little guy goes. Again, I really appreciate all your advice.
We had the infant carrier with a base for each car. It could also click into a stroller.
Definately a must for colder climates. You don’t really want to be trying to properly secure the baby when it’s 2 degrees outside and your ass is hanging out the back door in a crowded parking lot.
Much easier to drop the carrier in the base and ‘click’ you’re ready to go.
Weather was a big consideration for us. With several months of cold winter, it was valuable to be able to get baby strapped in and tucked up with a cover before going out to the car. You shouldn’t strap them into a seat in winter outerwear, because it makes the straps fit less safe.
Also, neither of mine liked being woken/transferred to sling, so it was nice to be able to lug the infant seat out of the car, into the store, and shop while they were still asleep.
We’ve had both. While she was small enough to ride in the carrier, I wouldn’t have known how to manage without it. At stores with shopping carts I would wedge her carrier in the top part of the cart. And stores without shopping carts… I just didn’t take her to, for the most part, until she was big enough to sit up in an umbrella stroller.
But they do get too heavy to carry in the carrier pretty fast. I think I gave up on it around eight months. She has a convertible car seat now and I think she finds it far more comfortable–she sleeps more on long car trips now.
My 6 month old used an infant seat that could snap off the base and onto a lightweight stroller frame that folded up into the trunk of the car. Could not have survived the winter without it. You just bundle the kid up in the warm seat inside, cover him with blankets, and leave him cozy and undisturbed until you reach your destination. Now that he is bigger, less floppy, and it’s nicer out will be getting him big boy car seat and ditching the infant seat.
ETA: The lightweight stroller frame is essential. I saw so many poor parents lugging their car seats around the clinic for checkups or breastfeeding support group and felt bad for them while pushing a stroller. I could put my purse, extra blankets, and even a sweater for myself in the compartment under the car seat.
Good to know - I didn’t realize that it wasn’t a good idea to strap little sausage-babies into carseats with all their hear on. And my mom has bought these little snuggly reindeer and monkey outfits that I think are so damn cute that I want him to wear them every single day. Guess he’ll have to be squeezed into them once we get to our destination (she said wildly optimistically).
This is useful info, too - we haven’t made the stroller decision yet, so I’ll have to make sure this gets factored in.
Part of my brain is just like, “Well, if it’s too much trouble carrying the baby around in a store, I just won’t ever go to a store with the baby. Problem solved!” The tiny remaining rational portion of my brain gets that that’s not exactly realistic, but that part seems to have less control of the rest of me with every passing day.
You will have to take the baby to the store. I don’t know how you are handling your maternity leave yet, but I only stayed home with Baby Bird a couple weeks and I was still raving loony with cabin fever. I had to get out of the house and going to the store was a really nice little excursion.
Also, you go to the pediatrician and then need to stop at the pharmacy for drugs, or you realize you are out of formula/diapers/whatever and have to run to the store or whatever. Just plan for it, it will happen.
We used our arms. Much cheaper, and you’ll probably find that most of the stuff you’re carrying around becomes culled down to a baby and a diaper bag. Just get a car seat, and save the money for some baby books.
I’d have to say go with the infant seat with an extra base for the other parent’s car. It’s so convenient to be able to strap and unstrap in the house. When the four of us come home from an outing (or an eating) we bring the bucket inside with the Bird strapped in, and she sits there contentedly for a bit while we lug everything else inside and get our other daughter situated.
That time is invaluable. If she had to be unstrapped to come inside, then we’d have to take the 20 minutes to put her to bed immediately while the leftovers sat on the counter or Big Sister whined about when she’d get those grapes we’d promised her. (Uh, obviously not an issue for the OP, but still, you get the gist.) Plus, you can get them that snap into a stroller or stroller frame, so you can lug the kid around without waking him up.
The biggest disadvantage is that he will outgrow it, esp. now that the APA recommends keeping them rear-facing until age 2. But if your alternative plan is to buy both anyway, you’re not losing out on anything there.
That’s what we did. It’s been really nice. And when she outgrew the infant seat we put a booster in the second car.
Yeah, this. Or our Ergo carrier. Those were fine until she could sit up in a regular stroller by herself, and rather more versatile (strollers don’t do well on stairs or when hiking, for instance). I never once had a moment where I thought, “Wow, I wish I had gotten the infant stroller.” ETA: We did unsnap the seat from the base e.g. when I took her to church, or when she fell asleep in the seat, but those were situations in which a stroller wouldn’t have been useful.
I’m not sure what the weather was like where you were, but transferring a little floppy, fussy baby from a car seat into a carrier and back again, bundling and unbundling him from his blankets, in the middle of winter is not fun.
Also–we got ours very cheap because it was second hand. Unlike the car seat and dock that expire, the strollers are good forever, and you might be able to pick one up on CraigsList for a song.
