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Austin Babies
Qs for moms
i need some veteran momma experience to help me out 
1. mommy mobile - car with third row seats... yay or nay? i wasn't a fan of having such a large vehicle until this weekend we rode in SIL's new ford flex. it was nice that all of us siblings and the baby could ride in one vehicle! its making me rethink my mommy mobile choices.
2. furniture - we're looking into getting new couches. so... leather/microfiber/slip-covered?? which do you think is the best way to go and why? have you had any major blow-outs/spills or whatever?
and this one is just curiousity...
floors? - i noticed this weekend SIL said carpet is a must with kids (b/c of falling)... i've been thinking the complete opposite. i'd much rather have wood floors than carpet cause of spills/messes... so you veteran mommas, which do you prefer? carpet or wood?
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Re: Qs for moms
couldn't live without our 3rd row seat and we're still outgrowing our suv - need mini van asap.
furniture - ours is fine, but we did have it sprayed for easy stain care. it's a canvas type material through la-z-boy.
floors - I would go with a hard surface (hardwood/ tile) and then put rugs down as needed with little ones.
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2. We bought new couches when DD was around a month old. We bought microfiber that looks like leather. We haven't had any issues. We got them from Rooms to Go and they were pre-treated with scotch guard and they gave us some special cleaner that we get free from them for the lifetime of the couches. There's also a 3 year warranty. If there's a stain that the cleaner doesn't remove, they will pay to have them professionally cleaned.
DD doesn't really ever sit on the couch at this age.
3. We have laminate in the living room and hallway, carpet in the bedrooms, and tile everywhere else. We have a big rug in the living room and we move the coffee table out, put a blanket on the floor, and spend a lot of time there. We got rid of the carpet because these floors are easier to clean.
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1- I like have the 3rd row. DH and I were just talking yesterday about how nice it will be to have when the kids are a little older and we want to take a group of their friends somewhere.
2- We have microfiber and like it. It attracts dog hair, but so does everything else. We didn't go with leather beacuse of the dogs. We have spills all the time.
3- We have carpet and tile. The tile is really hard and it is not great for falls, but it is super easy to clean. The carpet in the playroom is really nice to have, but we have had a few spills. It also gets drooled on a lot
And the carpet in DS's room has a few spots of hot pink nail polish that are not coming up. Tile wood have been a better place to spill that... Overall, the carpet will need to be replaced at some point and I have to ignore the dirt and grime that is most likely living/growing in it. I prefer rugs, because they can be more easily cleaned and replaced, but it is nice for comfort to have it in the bedrooms.
1 Mommy mobile: I started off in Tahoe but it was hard to get baby in/out in parking lot situation b/c I couldn't always get the doors to open all the way out if someone parked too close to me, so I switched to a minivan the VW Routan and love it! It has fold down 3rd row seating, so we only use it when we need to and it has come in handy many times now.
2 Furniture - get leather or faux leather b/c then you can wipe it off like it never happened! So easy.
3 Floors - I say NO WAY to carpet! Seriously, if we had carpet downstairs, it would be ruined by now. Kids are so messy; spit up, bottles, sippy cups, food, spills, poop, pee, etc. We had wood floors downstairs and carpet upstairs and it's been much easier to just wipe up a mess from the wood floors. I would rec any hard surface floor b/c it's easier to keep clean. Kids are going to hurt themselves no matter what, w/or w/o carpet. If you do go w/carpet, get something w/a stain guard in it and a color that hides dirt well and get pro cleanings often. No doubt carpet/padding is easier on knees when they are in the crawling stage, but the messy phase lasts much longer than the crawling stage!
Car - I think a third row is nice but not necessary. I have a 2-door coupe still. (Not much longer thank goodness). I think having a car that is higher up is nice b/c it makes it easier. When you only have one, I think a 3 row is overkill personally. But once you have 2-3, it starts to make more sense. You'll definitely need all the space from time to time.
Furniture - We have leather chairs and upholstery couch. They both have held up well. My only advice is don't get a super light fabric and be sure to have it scotch guarded if it's not leather. Leather is easier to clean but not as comfortable, imo.
Floors - Love, love my hardwoods. SOOO much easier to clean and helps with the allergens. We have rugs in her room and the living room. I personally am happy w/ the wood floors and haven't had any issue not having carpet.
Cars - honestly we did fine with my Nissan Altima. We could haul both of us, Meredith and my parents in the car. Yeah, it was crowded, but fine for short trips. We did just trade the Altima in for a Nissan Quest, which seats 7. It's going to be a lot more practical for us because we'll have two kids and a dog on our trips to my parents' house, along with all of our luggage, etc. So if you have one child and don't regularly take the dog with you in the car, a regular 5 passenger car is probably sufficient.
Furniture - we have a leather sofa and chair and a microfiber rocking chair/ottoman in our living room. We have had major diaper blowouts on the sofa, not to mention countless juice and food spills on all of the furniture. The microfiber cleans up fairly well - it's just an inexpensive chair/ottoman comb from BRU - but I think that once Alex is Meredith's age, we'll need to get a new chair or get this one reupholstered. The leather has held up VERY well. It's about 10 years old, and while it does have more of a distressed look now to it (thanks to both Meredith and the cats), you really can't tell that it's older. I think it's done better than the fabric chair. I'd also consider doing a fabric sofa with a washable slipcover that was custom fitted for that piece of furniture.
Floors - We hate our beige/cream berber carpet because we can't keep it clean. Yeah, it's softer than wood floors or tile, but it's also dirtier. We plan to replace it when we can afford the wood floors. From an environmental standpoint, I think wood is better than carpet because of all the chemicals involved with manufacturing carpet and the off-gassing it will do in your house. And from an allergy standpoint, carpet traps dirt, dust, etc., and can be worse for people with environmental allergies than wood, tile, or linoleum floor would be. But then, if you put down hard floors, you'll likely want to have some rugs here and there, so you may want to look into rugs that are easy to clean.
Meredith, 6-1-06 and Alex, 11-5-09
1) With three kids we felt like 3rd row seating was a must. If they were spread further apart then we could definitely have gone with something smaller, but with two strollers, three pack n plays, etc. the Suburban was the best choice. I think even if we were only going to have two kids we would still want the 3rd row when they were older for carrying around friends.
2) We have leather and I love it because it is so easy to clean.
3) No carpet at all in our house! We have stained concrete downstairs and we only have a game room upstairs, which has laminate. He has fallen and bonked his head on the concrete several times, but apparently with no ill effects. We do have area rugs in nearly every room in our house. My issue with carpet is both with spills/cleaning and dust mites. I love the ease of cleaning the hard floor. We have had puke, leaky poop diaper, spilled milk, etc. and I can just wipe it all up.
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1. I have a Tahoe and I love it. The third row is removable so if we need the extra space to take the boxers with us we have it and if we need space to take extra people we just pop the third row in. It's been great!
2. We have a light microfiber couch and I like it but I think leather would be much easier to clean. DS always puts his cups and food on the couch and leaves marks but we just steam it every few months and they all have all come up great. I would just recommend getting a dark color in whatever couch you get.
3. I have all tile and I love how easy it is to clean up spills, dirt, dog puke, etc. but I hate cleaning the grout. To me the grout always looks dirty so we are going to be putting hard wood down soon. I have rugs every where and it's so much easier to take the rug out and clean it as opposed to getting carpets cleaned.
1) I drive a Maxima. It's a good sized sedan, and I don't feel the need for more room. When we still had the Range Rover that was nice (pretty small for an SUV, not one of the ones with the 3rd row), but the Suburban is just too big for me to want to drive around. We've never even put the 3rd row in the Suburban. So I say it's not necessary.
2) We have leather, and I really like it. Some is smooth leather, some is pebble. It all wipes clean easily, and none of it is treated. DD hasn't been able to harm any of it.
3) We have a mix of carpet and tile. No real preference from a baby standpoint; DD never fell while learning to walk, and we have a SpotBot and steam carpet cleaner so carpet messes are a non-issue as well.
The #1 thing we did for the purpose of kids was to have the faucet in our master bath put in the corner by the wall instead of the corner towards the middle of the room. You have to reach across the tub to turn it on, so no scalding or drowning because she accidentally turned the water on. Obviously this is only an option if you build new or remodel, but all the other stuff I thought was important has been a non-issue.
1. We like to drive our cars into the ground, so we went ahead with the 3rd row. Ideally, it will get us through multiple kids/the next 10 years.
2. We have leather, and it's awesome. Spit-up, crayons, food, chocolate milk, it withstands it all.
3. We just had new carpet put down. We always thought we'd do wood. I am soooo glad we didn't. I much prefer gettng down and playing on our nice, cozy, soft carpet with the awesome stainguard built in.
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1. depends on how many kids. i think for 2 kids you don't need a 3rd row but would definitely want one for 3 or more kids.
2. leather
3. wood for kids but not the best for dogs......
1. i covet a vehicle with a third row that can fold flat for storage on camping trips and such
2. my bff advised not to buy furniture right before having kids, so i figure we're stuck with these couches until aubrey's like 6.
3. wood floors all the way - i'd rather spot-sweep than vacuum. when she was in the falling stage, i kept her confined to an area with a foam mat. but that period didn't last long, really. a month or two?
i love that you're asking these questions.