It’s a very exciting time for most people when they discover they’re expecting a little one;
however, the costs involved in looking after babies are far from cheap and easy. One of the main things you’ll have to purchase when the baby is nearly due is a car seat. Bringing your baby home from hospital is a beautiful experience, and the perfect car seat can make the trip back home even better for you and your baby.
Choosing the best infant car seat isn’t easy, but with the right advice and some good tips, you’ll be well on your way to finding that dream car seat that fits your car, your baby and your budget.
The first thing to remember when looking for baby car seats is that you should never take
a second-hand car seat from somebody. The main reason for this is the fact that you just
don’t know the history of that seat. As trivial as it may sound, it’s important because the car seat may have been involved in a crash or simply not have the technology needed to protect your baby in the most effective way possible.
Depending on the age of your baby, you should choose between rear-facing and front-facing car seats. Until your baby is about two years old, you should always buy a rear-facing seat. Seats facing the rear of your car protect your baby so much better, so this is an extremely important factor to consider when buying a car seat.
Finally, take your car into consideration. The seats fitted in cars vary from vehicle to vehicle, so it’s highly recommended that you try out the car seat in your car before purchasing it. The last thing you need is to buy a seat that doesn’t fit in your car when you get home!
This is a guest post.
AnneM says
January 17, 2012 at 10:05 pmI like the first tip you gave! If you can afford to buy a new car seat go ahead. If you get a second hand one, you don’t know how it was handled, it could have fallen down at some point which may cause parts to break. The danger is that you might only know about the broken part after an accident (knock on wood) because it malfunctioned.
Ane says
January 23, 2012 at 5:29 pmVery useful information!
The car seat we bought for Chakai back in 2002 was awesome.. 😛 It doubled as a carrier and the carrier was detachable, so she was able to use it until she was 4 then we had to buy a new one for bigger kids. 😛 Now the old one is being used by Lucas. 🙂
Eric Scott says
August 2, 2012 at 2:02 pmThis is very informative, we just recently bought a car seat. Before we buy the car seat, i stumbled on this one and read it after that it gave me a great idea on how to pic a good car seat. So now we have this good and comfortable car seat.