Baby Gear

This probably comes as no surprise to most of you, but babies require a lot of stuff. I am very aware that we don't NEED most of the baby gear out there, but it's easy to see how a lot of it would be really nice to to have. Obviously things like an infant car seat, crib and stroller are must-haves. The "nice to have" baby gear includes baby monitor, child carrier and co-sleeper (small, portable crib to use in our room).

Deciding on which things to buy/register for has spurred Chris and I into full-investigative mode. With our consumer reports subscription in hand we make trips to local baby gear stores and interrogate the sales people regarding safety, durability and function of various items. Chris has become an expert in folding, unfolding and taking apart floor model strollers. We have even been known to ask strangers pushing a stroller we have been eyeing to see what they think of their purchase. Most new parents are more than willing to share their experiences and offer advice, which unlike the random unsolicited advice I've begun to be subjected to, I really appreciate. It's just impossible to know what our specific needs/preferences will be. I am keenly aware that Button is a life-changing event and that while some of these changes (like less sleep) are easy to predict, knowing how a baby is going to impact other areas of our life is more difficult.

We have been trying to tackle one big item every week or so. Deciding on an infant carseat was pretty easy. Graco Snugride got excellent reviews from Consumer reports and many new parents we know have been very happy with that same car seat. It fits well in most vehicles and is relatively easy to install correctly. So we have added that to our registry. That was a relatively easy decision.

Deciding on a stroller has been a much harder task. Most of the parents we know have started off with the Graco travel system. For me, the Graco travel system is kind of the mini-van of strollers. It's bulky and heavy compared to other strollers, but extremely functional and very economical. Maybe it's just that we are trying hard to hold on to our pre-baby ways, but I can't help be cringe at the idea of trying to pull that stroller in and out of my trunk or how difficult it will be to go away even for a weekend because with the kid and dog in the back seat and the car seat taking up 80% of the trunk we won't have space for luggage! I guess this is why so many parents get mini-vans and SUVs. So we have visited just about every baby store in a 20 mile radius. Checking out the various strollers trying not to pay too much attention to the price tag at first, but more trying to figure out what we think we'll need.

Strollers come in many flavors. First off, an infant has very different needs in a stroller than a toddler. Which is why many strollers will allow you to simply click your infant car seat right onto the stroller and you can be on your way. You don't really use the rest of the seat of the stroller until the baby can hold its own head up - at about 6 months. If a person wanted to avoid carrying around the big bulky stroller at this stage, you can buy a very simple "universal stroller" which looks like a mini-shopping cart that doesn't have a seat, but you can clip the infant car seat on to the frame. The big advantage to this is that the universal stroller folds up small and is quite light. The disadvantage is that it's only going to be useful for about 6 months, but it only costs $60 so maybe that's not such a big deal. But it does mean you would be in the market for a second stroller once your child is a little older. Another problem with wanting to go with light weight is that the light strollers in many cases don't maneuver as well as the heavier strolllers. I'm not sure quite why this is, but in our experience this seems to be the case. And many Graco stroller owners told us that they saw the heaviness as a plus, because it made the stroller so easy to push. And finally, seat recline. Many of the light strollers also lack a seat that reclines enough to have enable to the child to sleep comfortably. I don't know much about parenting, but I know that a child without a nap is a bad thing. If your kid is tired, having a napping place is #1 priority. In summary, we decided we wanted something lightweight, but still capable of maneuvering easily, the stroller has to be able to recline and it would be nice if we only had to buy one stroller.

So we decided what we wanted, now it should be easy to just pick out that stroller right? It just isn't so. For one thing after you get past functionality you start looking at the price tag. Ouch. Many of the strollers that had the features we wanted were pretty expensive. You can easily get a Graco travel stroller for $150-200 and that will often include the infant carseat ($80-100 on its own). The two strollers we really liked, the rockstar baby and the bumbleride cost over $400. And just to give you perspective, there are top-of-the-line strollers, like the bugaboo which sell for over $700. The bugaboo stroller is awesome, entirely out of the question, but awesome none the less. So our goal all along has been to find a cheaper version of something like the bugaboo. We really like the rockstar baby stroller. It is half the price of the bugaboo, although still twice as expensive as more economical strollers. But it would be the only stroller we would need to buy. The toddler seat comes off and the frame acts as a universal stroller that the infant car seat can attach to. You can configure the toddler seat to face forward or backward and it maneuvers really well. But it costs $500. Then we found the infinity I'coo. It is the exact same stroller as the rockstar baby except it doesn't come with the bassinet and is only available in green. Orginally priced at $300, we found it on sale at Babies R Us for $160. As it turns out Infinity is phasing out the I'coo and is just going to have the more expensive rockstar baby stroller line. Babies R Us had the stroller on clearance because they were no longer going to carry it. So last night we made our first baby gear purchase, the Infinity I'coo stroller. It has all of the features we wanted: it's lightweight (although still a little on the bulky side), it maneuvers really well, it will function as a universal stroller for the first 6 months and then we can add the toddler seat on later, it goes into full recline and it has several different seat configurations. And perhaps most importantly it didn't break the bank.