Car accidents are the number one killer of small children, though safety seat use has helped a lot. I am passionate about car seat safety. Using car seats properly and appropriately is a relatively easy and painless step to take to try to keep our children as safe as possible. I wish that more people would research car seat safety and keep their children rear facing as long as possible. Convertible car seats have high rear facing weight limits in an attempt to keep children in the safest position. Unfortunately, too many parents think that turning their children forward facing when they turn one is a milestone. It’s not; it’s just a legal minimum. One year AND 20 pounds is the minimum to legally turn children forward facing. I want better than minimum safety for my children.
I now find myself the mother of an infant and a toddler and too many car seats. The first Britax Marathon and the Britax Marathon we added when we needed two convertibles. A Cosco Scenera that we got so the CPS worker who transported Pumpkin would keep her rear facing after she outgrew the Graco Snugride infant carrier. I just won a Britax Frontier 85.
When Baby E joined our family she was too small for the Snugride. I did all that was safely allowed to make the seat fit her, but it didn’t work. Grammy and Poppa bought us the Chicco Keyfit infant carrier and Cortina stroller. We took the old seat and Graco Metrolite stroller to trade in against the new items.
I have enough seats to move Baby E up when she becomes uncomfortable in the Keyfit, which goes to 30 pounds. I think I’d rather trade all of them in for a new convertible seat with a higher weight limit.