How long acceptable for "new mom" parking?

Robeano · January 2014

I have a general question, I get really frustrated sometimes when I want to park in new mother parking with Hannah and mom's with like 3-4 year olds park there. Am I being too judgy? At what age do you think you should start parking in normal parking? Thanks.

luvboston · January 2014

7 months

kmc84 · January 2014

I think 6ish months. Toddlers only mean you are no longer a new mom for sure!

ETA: Not that this is what you asked, but I get really annoyed at MEN who park in the 'expecting' parking spots. I mean really, what are they 'expecting'!?!

Eve_Angelique · January 2014

I think if you still have a baby in a bucket car seat you can be in new mom parking. Toddlers definitely not!

CarrieB. · January 2014

I think it can be harder to get a toddler into a store than an infant in a bucket, especially if you can multiple kids w you. Those signs should say moms w small children.

itsmevkb · January 2014

Honestly, I hate all these types of spots. So, some woman who is 2 months pregnant gets a spot close by and so does a new mom who has one kid asleep in carrier and I get the spot farthest away when I have four kids but only two hands of which to hold their hands to make sure they don't run off and get hit by a car while walking the entire length of the lot? How about everyone just deals and parks where there are open spots? If you have a legititmate issue you would have a handicap tag.

Sorry, but I'm bitter.

itsmevkb · January 2014

EmAzeem said:

I really do love the expecting/new mom parking. But I get so mad when I see a mom and her five year old parked there. I believe they should be used until your LO is out of the bucket seats. I lack muscles and he's getting heavy in his car seat

But, he'll be heavy even out of the car seat and before he can walk when you have to carry him in your arms. Why does him suddenly not being in a bucket seat change things?

And, the mom of the five-year-old could be expecting. That's the thing about those spots, early on, you can't really tell if women are or are not pregnant so can you only park there if you're clearly pregnant?

queenbone · January 2014

I've never seen one of these IRL, I was going to answer until I feel fully recovered from the c/s, but maybe that isn't the right answer either.? I have no idea.

PurpleIris30 · January 2014

I didn't know these actually existed. If it is specifically called "new mom," then I'd say just those first weeks or months of the newborn phase. I certainly wouldn't consider myself a new mom after a couple of months and would feel weird using one.

So what kind of stores/businesses have such things? And is this unique to a certain part of the country?

This is such a weird thing to me!

kmc84 · January 2014

@PurpleIris30
I have seen them at BuyBuyBaby, BabiesRUs, and BJ's Wholesale Club.

laura1 · January 2014

itsmevkb said:

Honestly, I hate all these types of spots. So, some woman who is 2 months pregnant gets a spot close by and so does a new mom who has one kid asleep in carrier and I get the spot farthest away when I have four kids but only two hands of which to hold their hands to make sure they don't run off and get hit by a car while walking the entire length of the lot? How about everyone just deals and parks where there are open spots? If you have a legititmate issue you would have a handicap tag.

Sorry, but I'm bitter.

I so agree with you. It is so much harder to get my 3 into a store now that DD#2 isn't a baby - It should totally be people with small kid parking spots, or no preferential parking at all.

I also get annoyed when I see someone with one kid using the shopping carts that are meant for 2+ kids (those red seats that attach to a regular cart at Target for example). I had times when I was with all 3 - DD#2 in a carrier, DS in the cart part and DD#2 in the seat, and I see one older kid being pushed around by a parent in those carts. Drives me nuts!!

kzawisl · January 2014

laura1 said:

itsmevkb said:

Honestly, I hate all these types of spots. So, some woman who is 2 months pregnant gets a spot close by and so does a new mom who has one kid asleep in carrier and I get the spot farthest away when I have four kids but only two hands of which to hold their hands to make sure they don't run off and get hit by a car while walking the entire length of the lot? How about everyone just deals and parks where there are open spots? If you have a legititmate issue you would have a handicap tag.

Sorry, but I'm bitter.

I so agree with you. It is so much harder to get my 3 into a store now that DD#2 isn't a baby - It should totally be people with small kid parking spots, or no preferential parking at all.

I also get annoyed when I see someone with one kid using the shopping carts that are meant for 2+ kids (those red seats that attach to a regular cart at Target for example). I had times when I was with all 3 - DD#2 in a carrier, DS in the cart part and DD#2 in the seat, and I see one older kid being pushed around by a parent in those carts. Drives me nuts!!

THIS!!!!!! i literally cannot go grocery shopping unless I have one of the double carts. At my local store, they have 5 double carts. 2 have broken belts and one is actually a half cart...so really there are two carts I can use. I get downright stabby when I see someone with just one child in the double carts.

Ruthie04 · January 2014

I see a lot of "parents with small children" spots at the grocery store, but that's about it. And, I'm with you girls on the two seat carts!! It makes me so angry to see them all snatched up when I'm having to strap one squirming toddler to me and one into a single cart!!

laura1 · January 2014

I don't know how you twin moms do it! A friend of mine has twins, and I would see her at Target pushing one cart with one twin in it, and pulling another cart with the other twin. At least by the time I didn't want to wear DD#1, my DS would sit in the cart part nicely (he was over 2 by that point - DD#1 was small, and I could wear her in the bjorn until she was over a year!). You ladies are my heros

LeoLauren · January 2014

My 71 year old mother parks in the expectant mom parking all the time... Her reasoning? They didn't have that when she was pregnant. Omg!

Robeano · January 2014

Well you've ladies have given me lots of ideas lol. My estimate was around a year. In my area it says parking for expectant moms and young families. And we find them at WalMart, grocery stores, both malls in my town have them. I just wondered if there was some unknown age that I wasn't aware of.

itsmevkb · January 2014

EmAzeem said:

EmAzeem said:

I really do love the expecting/new mom parking. But I get so mad when I see a mom and her five year old parked there. I believe they should be used until your LO is out of the bucket seats. I lack muscles and he's getting heavy in his car seat

But, he'll be heavy even out of the car seat and before he can walk when you have to carry him in your arms. Why does him suddenly not being in a bucket seat change things?

And, the mom of the five-year-old could be expecting. That's the thing about those spots, early on, you can't really tell if women are or are not pregnant so can you only park there if you're clearly pregnant?
Sorry if my response touched a hot button (and I really do mean that no snark intended) I never used that parking until I was in my last tri. (They only have them at one of our grocery stores) And yes he will be heavy regardless but carrying him is a little easier for me. When I carry him in his bucket seat my hip hits the side of the car seat and he wobbles all over. Dh always makes fun that I'm going to give him whip lash lol. I agree with what you have to say I was just stating how I felt about it as well.

It's just an annoyance of mine, sorry if it came off all super serious.

As for all the ladies and the two seat carts, I get that too. Although, have you ever gone to the grocery with one kid and they beg and beg and beg for the car cart? I HATE those things beause they have no turning radius and really discourage my kids from using them but I could see a parent giving in to their one child really wanting to ride in one even though they are designed for two. The ones at Target - do people use those when they have one bigger kid who might not fit in the regular cart seat? My older kids walk with me and my little ones are almost too little for those red seats, I like them in regular carts so I tend to only take one with me at a time to the store.

I think with all these things sometimes you just don't get it until you're in a different place. I know someone who complained about women with older kids using the family restroom, which is something I do often when out with my kids. I'm sure sometimes we look ridiculous if I don't have the baby with me but the truth is, I'm not letting my 7 year-old boy go into a men's room by himself. Who knows who could be lurking around in there. And yes, I suppose we could all go into the ladies room but if there is a family restroom I figure that is what it's there for and my son is old enough to say hey, that is the ladies room. So, when you only have little littles you don't get the issues a mom of a little older child has until you yourself are the mom of the older kid and then you look at a 7 year-old coming out of the family restroom and think yea, maybe there is a good reason for that.

Saraevh · January 2014

laura1 said:

itsmevkb said:

Honestly, I hate all these types of spots. So, some woman who is 2 months pregnant gets a spot close by and so does a new mom who has one kid asleep in carrier and I get the spot farthest away when I have four kids but only two hands of which to hold their hands to make sure they don't run off and get hit by a car while walking the entire length of the lot? How about everyone just deals and parks where there are open spots? If you have a legititmate issue you would have a handicap tag.

Sorry, but I'm bitter.

I so agree with you. It is so much harder to get my 3 into a store now that DD#2 isn't a baby - It should totally be people with small kid parking spots, or no preferential parking at all.

I also get annoyed when I see someone with one kid using the shopping carts that are meant for 2+ kids (those red seats that attach to a regular cart at Target for example). I had times when I was with all 3 - DD#2 in a carrier, DS in the cart part and DD#2 in the seat, and I see one older kid being pushed around by a parent in those carts. Drives me nuts!!

kzawisl said:

itsmevkb said:

Honestly, I hate all these types of spots. So, some woman who is 2 months pregnant gets a spot close by and so does a new mom who has one kid asleep in carrier and I get the spot farthest away when I have four kids but only two hands of which to hold their hands to make sure they don't run off and get hit by a car while walking the entire length of the lot? How about everyone just deals and parks where there are open spots? If you have a legititmate issue you would have a handicap tag.

Sorry, but I'm bitter.

I so agree with you. It is so much harder to get my 3 into a store now that DD#2 isn't a baby - It should totally be people with small kid parking spots, or no preferential parking at all.

I also get annoyed when I see someone with one kid using the shopping carts that are meant for 2+ kids (those red seats that attach to a regular cart at Target for example). I had times when I was with all 3 - DD#2 in a carrier, DS in the cart part and DD#2 in the seat, and I see one older kid being pushed around by a parent in those carts. Drives me nuts!!

THIS!!!!!! i literally cannot go grocery shopping unless I have one of the double carts. At my local store, they have 5 double carts. 2 have broken belts and one is actually a half cart...so really there are two carts I can use. I get downright stabby when I see someone with just one child in the double carts.

I'm pretty sure there is nothing more annoying in the world to me at this point in my life. And my favorite is when the woman with one kid who has the double cart is letting her toddler WALK along side of it, meanwhile I have my newborn in a carrier, one kid in the little front seat and another in the actual cart with most of my groceries underneath the cart. I'm actually feeling a little furious just 'talking' about this right now.

And as far as the parking spot stuff goes, I never use them (usually because they are full!) but I would have to agree that it is way harder to wrangle more than one kid in a parking lot than carrying a chunky infant who is contained in a carrier. Buttt, for some reason this one doesn't irritate me. Maybe because they don't really have many of those spots at places around here? I don't know.

And @itsmevkb I had to laugh when I skimmed your post being that I AM THE WOMAN you are talking about who b!tched about the family restroom thing. Sorry, but in the situation I was talking about it was a mom with her two girls who were elementary school aged ... like maybe 3rd and 5th grade using the family restroom while I sat big pregnant with a toddler in sh!t pants and a newly potty trained 2.5 year old crossing her legs telling me over and over and over again that she had to use the potty. If you strolled out of the family restroom with Quinn and Maren (in like 7 years lol) I would have given your ass the side eye as well. There was no reason that Mom couldn't have used the regular bathroom with her girls ... not the only one with a changing station and a toddler toilet. Sorry, not backing down on that one

With that said though, I do see your point about the creepers possibly lurking around and not wanting your young son going in the bathroom alone if there is a family restroom available. But if I was waiting outside of the family room with my kids and saw Shanon and Sully come out with you I would have never thought twice about it. I'm sure once they get to the age where they won't want to come in the ladies room with me, I'll do the same thing with my boys.

laura1 · January 2014

@itsmevkb - I totally get the car cars and one kid. It is the one kid in the big red carts at Target that I am talking about. I have seen a mom pushing around a big kid (like 6ish+ and playing on some personal electronic device) in one of those carts while I had all 3 of mine with me in a regular cart. And I have seen the same scenario as @saraevh - one toddler walking next to the big red cart while a mom and grandmother were both there pushing one of the big red ones. That time, I was by myself so I didn't get as upset, it just is beyond my comprehension! I hate those giant red ones - they are impossible to steer and are huge to get around. When I have them I am constantly saying sorry and bumping into things...but I needed to use them when my older 2 were younger and last year with a newborn, 2 and 3 year old. If you don't NEED them, why on earth would you elect to use it?!

Saraevh · January 2014

@laura I thought of you today. I was at Target and there was a Dad with his two kids that were NO JOKE probably about 7 and 9 using one of the double seat carts. I was laughing so hard. I was fumbling in the checkout line trying to get my phone out because I was going to try to nonchalantly pretend I was texting and was going to take a picture to post on here but by the time I found the damn phone in my purse and got in on camera the kids had both hopped out of the seats to help their dad put all of the stuff on the checkout counter.

I was alone so I laughed about it, but if I was with all three kids I wouldn't have thought it was funny

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