To Flip or Not to Flip?

I've been getting some flack lately from the mommy brigade. You see, (GASP) even though the Toddlish is a) now a toddler (duh) and b) fit the forward facing weight requirements when he was a wee five months old, we still have not flipped his car seat around so that he is forward facing. Why you ask? Believe me, I ask myself the same question. Part of it is laziness, part of it is fear that he will no longer easily fall asleep in the car if we need him to. But, truth be told, the biggest reason is safety. So go ahead and tattoo DORK on my forehead.

Now I know how excited every parent gets when they can flip their child around. We all saw the Britney Spears and Sean Preston 'razzi shots of him forward facing too early. I was even in a Mommy and Me class last week where the mother of a 10 month old gleefully announced that the pediatrician said "flip her," because her child was 22 lbs. [She also mentioned that this pediatrician was her pediatrician when she was a kid, so let's hope he's more up-to-date on medical advancements in the last 20 years than he is on the laws of our country]. I was the only room with a kid over 12 months, so everyone immediately looked at me to see how my son enjoys being forward facing and how much it has changed my life. Well... by the time I had explained that the Internet research I did on the subject revealed that size and age really don't matter - but a baby's bones haven't ossified enough to withstand a rear car accident (yes, I know, I was talking ossification) and might not until age 3 or 4... all the mommies were giving me the death stare and had changed the subject.

So today, when I happened to come across an article on car seat safety in "The Costco Connection," (yes, in addition to Kosher hot dogs, cruises, contact lenses and bulk groceries, you can get safety tips from Costco), I just had to share the info with all 10 of my devoted readers. The article mentions that children one year of age and at least 20 pounds CAN ride forward facing. It goes on to say that it is BEST to ride rear facing for as long as possible. What is as long as possible? Well, most experts (i.e. the American Association of Pediatrics) point to the height and weight requirements for an individual convertible seat. In our Britax Decathlon (have I mentioned how much we love our Britax?), this means the Babish can ride backwards until he reaches 35 pounds! and until his head is one inch below the top. Most convertible seats have a rear-facing limit of around 30 pounds (even if the forward facing limit is, say, 45 pounds).

Now I don't know if we'll keep him backwards that long... even now, with shoes on he does kick my nice leather. But - studies by the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration have shown that rear facing seats are four times safer than forward facing seats. And that while there have been numerous cases where a spinal or head injury could have been prevented by a child facing rear, there have been no documented cases of children with broken legs from a crash where they were rear-facing (see the cite below).

For more research (if you care to read about absorbing the force of a crash or find links to crash videos...), here is a great resource: http://www.cpsafety.com/articles/stayrearfacing.aspx The pictures showing the force of crash are credited to the University of Michigan Child Passenger Protection - so I gotta trust the old alma mater here...

So, if you see me pulled over on the side of the road because, unlike the other mommies, I can't just had the Babish his sippy cup through the seats, now you'll know why. Hopefully you'll at least wave when you give me the evil look...

Big Babies Don't Cry

Having a child in the 95th percentile for height and weight has its pros and cons. On the upside, a) I now have more defined arms than when I was baby less and had time to actually work-out and b) surely our son is on the path to a college football scholarship (big 10 or Ivy, of course). One big negative - certain products are just not made for bigger babies and the poor guy outgrows everything long before he should.

So, because one of the reasons I started my blog was to pass along all of my insight and extensive research, I thought I'd share a couple of the items that work for the big[ger] set.

1. The Baby Seat - BebePod Plus

We (read: the little man) were given a Bumbo Seat as a gift. But the seat was blue, and ever the perfectionist, I decided to return the gift for a yellow or green seat to better match my decor. I went to a local baby boutique and was told that they no longer carry the Bumbo Seat, but chose to stock the Prince Lionheart BebePod and BebePod Plus. I asked what their reasoning was. The store clerk mentioned something about the leg openings being wider and the seat back being higher. They had me at wider and higher (and I seemed to tune everything else out). [And I finally stopped having visions of the baby's chunky pulkes getting stuck in the Bumbo seat and mommy trying to lift him out but the seat just won't come unattached]. I chose the BebePod Plus, which doubled as a feeding chair for us pre-highchair at 6 months with its clever tray. Another bonus of the BebePod Plus is that both the tray and pommel come off - so it's even easier to get big babies in and out of the seat. [Note: the pommel does not come off in the original version].



2. Convertible Car Seat - Britax Decathlon

There are two words that describe why this car seat won our big hearts (even if it blew our big budget) - adjustible crotchstrap. For a baby who outgrew his infant carrier prior to his half-birthday, we were only looking at those convertible car seats that could hold up to 65 lbs. But, even among the car seats that go up to 65 lbs., we knew that our vertically blessed baby boy was far less likely to outgrow the carseat with a 3 position crotchstrap (and we knew that daddy was willing to pay top dollar if mommy could sell it to him as protecting the family jewels). We chose the Sahara fabric figuring the lighter color was less likely to get hot in a parked car during the summer. We purchased it on-line, pattern unseen, so we lucked out when it arrived and the fabric was a supersoft plush microfiber.