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Nurseries and Baby Gear
ashleigha894
member
Car seat stages
ashleigha894
member
My son is about to be 4 months on Friday and weighs 16 pounds. His infant seat is good up to 30 pounds.
My question is can we leave him in his infant seat until he hits 30 pounds and do we have to switch to one of those bucket seat looking car seats or can we go to the convertible car seat? He is sitting up almost completely unassisted already. I just want to start shopping now so that I can get a good car seat that is in our budget (I am currently a SAHM so we don't have a lot of extra money around the house). Thank you.
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Re: Car seat stages
I'm not sure what bucket seat you'd be referring to other than the infant seat? The next step after the infant seat is a convertible seat. You can leave your LO in the infant seat until he hits the max height/weight but many babies (my daughter included) start to get mad laying down in the car around 7 or 8 months so a switch to a convertible is more peaceful.
Just look for a convertible with a high rear facing limit, since the AAP is now recommending rear facing until at least 2 or whenever your child outgrows the limits.
After the infant seat he moves to a rear facing convertible seat. Some kids even start in rear facing convertible seats and never use an infant seat, so there's no reason you can't start looking for one now. He needs to stay rear facing until a bare minimum of 2 years old, preferably he'll get to 3 or even 4 rear facing. When he outgrows his convertible rear facing then you turn him around and use it forward facing.
When he outgrows the forward facing convertible you have two option, which will depend on his age and his maturity. If he's over 5 and can be trusted to sit correctly 100% of the time he can go to a dedicated booster seat, which uses the car seatbelt to buckle him in. If he's 3-4 or not mature enough to sit in a booster then you will buy a combination seat, which is a forward facing only five point harness then becomes a booster once the harness is outgrown or he is mature enough to sit correctly.
Carseats are outgrown rear facing when you hit the weight limit OR when there is 1" of hard shell over their head.
Carseats are outgrown forward facing when you hit the weight limit (this is very rare) OR the tops of the ears are even with the top of the carseat shell OR the shoulders go above the top harness slots.
Even when DS was nowhere near the weight limit, it was getting really tough to get him in and out of the infant seat. We switched to a convertible seat at 6 months and he seemed happier. We got a Britax Boulevard for my car, which we use 90% of the time. We got a Cosco Scenera for DH's car. What's tricky is not knowing how quickly your kid will grow... At 20 months, DH hit the RF weight limit of the Cosco Scenera (35 lbs), which is pretty unusual but he's huge. I want to keep him RF as long as we can. I just bought a Britax Roundabout 55 with a RF weight limit of 40 lbs to last him a while longer.
You'll need a convertible eventually so there is no harm in getting it now.
I guess I thought that the combination seat was the convertible car seat (because it converts into a booster). And the "bucket seat" I was referring to must be the convertible car seat. My son is in an infant seat right now and I guess I didn't realize that we would have to buy a total of 3 car seats for him I thought that he went from the infant car seat into the booster with a back and then just the booster. I feel like there should be a manual for all this stuff, there was tons of advice and manuals for being pregnant!
Before research came out showing just how important extended rear facing is that was how it was done. Kids stayed in the infant seat until they were 12 months and 20 lbs then moved to a combination seat and stayed in that until they were ready for a backless booster. But since then research has shown that the longer you can keep them rear facing the better and so seats that accommodate even larger toddlers and preschoolers rear facing have come onto the market. Many kids can stay in these seats until they're ready for a dedicated booster, a few very tall kids will need a combination seat in between. Which convertible seat you choose now will also be critical in how long it lasts. You want one with the tallest shell possible since kids outgrow seats for height long before weight usually. The best ones to look for are the clek foonf, diono radian, graco myride65 or size4me70 and the first years true fit. Those have the tallest shells on the market and will get the vast majority of kids to booster age/maturity. I would stay away from britax seats as they get few kids to booster age.
Very few convertibles will get kids to 7-8. My daughters are tall with long torsoes and outgrew their radians by 4 (well, one did, the other is on track to as she has about 1/2" of torso length left before she hits the top harness slots at 3.5) and radians are one of the tallest convertible seats on the market. The old generation britax seats (slighty taller shells than the current generation) were outgrown by 3 (long before a high back booster was an option). My nieces are petite with shorter torsoes and neither fit in a radian until 6 even using it above the top harness slots until their ears hit the top of the shell (and radian is the *only* seat on the market that allows that).