Product spotlight Car seats

meatballs37 · November 2018

I figured we have had a lot of questions about car seats and this would be a good second thread to get us chattering. I even don’t mind starting them every few weeks.

meatballs37 · November 2018

For our infant seat we have a chicco keyfit. Loved it for DD.

Pros:
-Affordable
-Not bulky Can click into multiple different kinds of strollers (with adapters)
-clicked into the base suuuuper easy. Not a struggle to load into the car compared to others we tried
-highly rated for crash safety
-one of the few that goes down to 4lbs for preemies to ride in

Cons:
-only an infant seat, you would have to buy a convertabile seat once you max out the height weight

We have the graco 4ever for DD now. And meh? I’m just not crazy about it (doesn’t seem to tighten well, super bulky, etc). I wish we had gone with the chicco nexfit.

ETA: does anyone have a convertible car seat they love?

dntstpbelieveing · November 2018

@meatballs37 we love our Evenflo symphony LX. DS seems to be very comfy in it! We also have A Graco contender 65 which is a bit of a pain to loosen. We also got 2 Graco nautilus 65s for forward facing. They don't appear to be as comfy but they take up a really small footprint in the car which is nice.

For bucket seat we have a Graco snug ride. It worked for us. DS was only in it for about 7ish months because he is a huge kid. He is super tall and out grew it quickly. We never got a base for DHs truck since I did most of the transporting. We went straight to the contender in his truck since it was only used few and far between. This time DH picks up from daycare most days so we will probably get another base for ease. It's nice to strap the kid in inside and just click the seat in. While we did go straight for the convertible in the truck I really liked having the infant seat for going to resturants etc and having somewhere to stash the babe so I could eat.

Erin1510 · November 2018

Since I know we may get a ton of carseat related questions the closer we get to our due dates I wanted to share an amazing resource that helped me and saved my sanity over car seats:

Car Seats for the Littles - Its run by certified car seat technicians and has answers for everything under the sun when it comes to car seat safety. There's also a facebook group you can join to ask questions and get support from certified techs in real time
https://csftl.org/

I will admit I am a self-taught car seat crazy lady but they can be SO confusing but it is SO important to use the proper seat and use it safely!

sparklingdiamond · November 2018

We also had the Chicco Keyfit and loved it. Then we switched him to the convertible one that the brand is slipping my mind right now! I need to go figure out what it is and report back.

carleym93 · November 2018

Is anyone thinking about skipping the infant seat this time around and going straight to a convertible? I’m thinking about it but wondering if I’ll seriously regret it later.

srscott3 · November 2018

We had the Chicco Keyfit for DD, which we will be using again for this baby.

DD is now in a Chicco Nextfit Zip and we like it. I was debating whether we would get another nextfit for the new babe or switch to Graco 4ever. But after DD threw up in her car seat I think I’ve decided to stick with Chicco. Zipping off all the fabric and tossing it in the washing machine really made cleaning up vomit a breeze. (As breezy as it can be, at least)

messymyranda · November 2018

We drive maybe 3 or 4 times a year so I think I might just get a convertible car seat. It's not like I'll be taking an infant seat around with me on a regular basis to benefit from having that to keep baby in while I'm out. I'll likely invest more time and money into a stroller that I'll like.

ki1244 · November 2018

We were given a Britax B-Safe from a friend who lived in downtown Chicago (so she never actually drove with it, so it definitely hasn't been in an accident) and still has 2 or 3 years before it expires. But I don't think it's compatible with the stroller I (tentatively) want, the Evenflo Xpand Pivot. Anyone have experience with either of those brands? We both drive midsize SUVs (he's in a Forester, I have a CX5) so fitting in a small backseat isn't a big concern, although ideally we don't want a giant 90-pound contraption either.

dntstpbelieveing · November 2018

@ki1244 I've been lusting over the evenflo xpand pivot. I don't know how tall you all are but I have a girlfriend with a forester and she has to move the passenger seat up pretty far for a rf carseat .I'd definitely make sure to try a few different types of seats to see what a good fit is.

canuckbaby · November 2018

My husband is sold on the graco modes stroller that comes with the snugride 35 bucket (i think). I would consider one that transitioned to the larger sizes simply for not having to pick out yet another seat lol

ncm1919 · November 2018

I personally still miss the ease of using my infant car seat. Mine was so easy to click into my stroller and the base. And traveling at the airport was a breeze. For me it was worth having something that could only be used for a year. Now that we are having a second, it seems even more worth the expense. We have a Mesa.

I really like our big car seat as well. I got our Clek on Amazon on super sale. My daughter is to and still easily rear facing. We have another rear facing setting to go. It’s the narrowest, extended rear facing seat on the market I believe. It’s kind of a beast in terms that it’s tall. We have a pilot and it fits in easily and we can push the seat back to accommodate my 6’ish husband

marijaa333 · November 2018

We did the Key Fit and now the Next Fit Zip. Super happy with both (although our son had reflux for a long time so he hated the bucket seat, but I think that was brand-independent). We bought an Evenflo seat for travel and it's not nappable forward facing. We'll try to install it backward facing on our next trip.

runyogamom · November 2018

We've done Britax for both. The infant seat was a Britax B-Safe and I loved it. DS was snug in it and I loved the ease of being able to take it everywhere. I had to buy an adapter to fit my BOB stroller but it was cheap enough. We have a Britax Click Tight of some version that I can't recall right now. Which we like a lot. We have three of them, one in my car, one in DH's truck, and one in my Mom's car. Same for the bases with the B-Safe.

I would recommend the infant car seat only because it's sooooo easy to just click in it and go click out and go. I was just thinking this Sunday how much I miss being able to use that with DS. The convenience was worth the extra money to me.

gta4334 · November 2018

@messymyranda I totally get this! We live in NYC and don't drive. When we do it's to the airport and we might as well just use a convertible car seat and check it to our destination. We did have an infant one for my first and will probably use it for my second, only because there's no way I can store two convertible car seats in our apartment at the same time. But the ease of the infant is for getting in and out of the car alot--if you are primarily a stroller commuting family invest in a quality stroller and stroller accessories.

wiseh · November 2018

We’ll be getting the Britax Safe N Sound. It’s 0-12 months infant capsule compared to the typical 0-6 months every other capsule seems to be.

ki1244 · November 2018

Since the Diono one seems to be a heck of a sale this weekend, anyone have any experience with it? The stroller component has no reviews on Amazon, which is odd to me, but maybe not. The carseat that comes with it (the Radian RXT) is rated pretty highly, but it's a convertible one, not just an infant one.

Erin1510 · November 2018

ki1244 said:

Since the Diono one seems to be a heck of a sale this weekend, anyone have any experience with it? The stroller component has no reviews on Amazon, which is odd to me, but maybe not. The carseat that comes with it (the Radian RXT) is rated pretty highly, but it's a convertible one, not just an infant one.

We used the Diono Rainier as a convertible seat for our son after he outbrew his Britax B-Safe infant seat. The RTX and Rainier are very similar in most aspects regarding install, size, etc.

While it is able to be used from birth (5lb minimum weight I believe) it takes up a ridiculous amount of space front to back until baby can sit unassisted and you can use the angle adjuster. For this reason, unless you have massive amounts of room in your backseat, I wouldn't recommend it from birth. It didn't fit in our Tahoe without the passenger seat being unusable without the angle adjuster for reference. It can slightly touch the seat in front but cannot brace against it, and that's also dependent on your car's requirements as well. Some vehicles don't allow for the car seat to touch the back of a seat in front of it at all.

Also, while I never had issues because I stayed informed on it, some complain on the install or the fact that Diono changes their requirements often regarding what things need to be used (shoulder pads for instance). Also, the height and weight limits are over-inflated. It has decent weight limits for RF and FF use but the height limits are overinflated. My son outgrew FF well before he was close to the weight. We did RF him to 3 in it but he quickly outgrew the FF height before he hit 4 years old so we had to get him new seats.

Overall, Diono makes a quality product but there at catches.

kateraid · November 2018

I had the grace snug ride with my son who was born in 2012 so it's no longer usable. My stroller is also an Uppababy Vista 2012 which makes things difficult because they make adaptors for a handful of today's carseats for a stroller that old (of course). I literally just purchased a Maxi Cosi on Amazon (great Black Friday deal) for this bub. It's compatible with my stroller and a decent seat and my cousin used one for her littles and loved it.

pai314 · November 2018

We used the same maxi cosi bucket seat for our two children and had no real complaints. I am planning on getting a new maxi cosi (old one is expired) because there is a stroller adapter for it to make it compatible with the stroller we have/love. (City mini double)

Both our children (6&2) are in diono's now. We switched both around 4/5 months and had the RXT. Our oldest rear faced until 4.5 and our youngest is still rear facing. We just had to replace due to the freak accident we had and I debated getting something different. It was a really hard decision to make especially knowing baby #3 is on the way but in the end we went ahead with new Diono (rainier) seats. There are a lot of complaints (as mentioned above) about install and the company changing things all the time but install is SO easy for us.. we've never had any issues with install. The only issue I have is the seat is so big front to back and even with a van it takes up a lot of space. But knowing these car seats so well and feeling so comfortable with using them I just couldn't convince myself to switch. We love the diono car seats and have recommended them to many friends who all have ended up loving them as well.

luckystar28 · November 2018

Uppababy Mesa for the infant seat
Peg Perego Viaggio for the convertible seat

We did this for my son and will do the same for this baby boy. Any questions about these I’m happy to answer!

tuxielove93 · November 2018

For anyone with limited backseat room, I have and love the Graco Size4Me 65 convertible car seat. All the covering is removeable so you can wash it and it installs super easy.

@carleym93 Never had an infant seat and never regretted it. Those things are a massive PITA to me and there is no way in hell I would have carried it around. I baby wore my son until he was too big, put him in carts after that, and now he walks into
places with me. I still wear him now if the occasion calls for it. I only break out the stroller if I can go to multiple stores at once and he’s gonna sleep through it. But that’s me. I’m a bit anti contraption. I just find them to be much more of a pain and I don’t see the benefit

ganderson2013 · November 2018

I was thinking the same thing. This is my 3rd baby and I want to be intentional and minimilistic about what i purchase.

tsa208 · November 2018

marijaa333 said:

We did the Key Fit and now the Next Fit Zip. Super happy with both (although our son had reflux for a long time so he hated the bucket seat, but I think that was brand-independent). We bought an Evenflo seat for travel and it's not nappable forward facing. We'll try to install it backward facing on our next trip.

Same setup here. We bought two bases for the Key Fit and kept one in each car, since my husband drops our daughter off to daycare and I pick her up. Our daycare is downtown in a high rise building, so it's a bit of a walk to get her there, so he would take the Key Fit out, pop it on the stroller, get her to daycare and then I'd reverse it on the way home.

marijaa333 · December 2018

This may not be news to some of you, but I just found out that Target does trade-ins on old (expired or damaged/crashed) car seats each September and March. I am sure I won't remember this in March, so sticking it here... https://corporate.target.com/corporate-responsibility/planet/sustainable-products/car-seat-trade-in

ShadeofGreen816 · December 2018

We had a Britax B-Safe 35 Elite (I think that's the total name?) for DD and plan to use it again. But, that being said, I didn't LOVE it. It's a pretty narrow seat. She was chunky and I always felt like she was really snug in there and got SO HOT in the summer. It takes up a reasonable amount of space front-back, but I think that's any infant seat. We only used it til 6 months (she had PLENTY of room to grow) because she was heavy carrying it around was a PITA, and because we were travelling for Christmas and I didn't want to spend all the time in the car with my knees in the dash on the passenger side. There is an adapter for our Baby Jogger City Mini GT, which I also like a lot.

We now have 2 Graco Extend-2-Fits (one for each of our cars) and I like it a lot. The cover is removable and machine washable, which is HUGE for me. Especially in a convertible seat because they use it a LONG time. I like that in DH's truck where she doesn't spend much time, she can sit very upright and its very compact front-to-back. She seems to like it well enough.

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