Child car seats !

Why are these things so complicated!!!

This brings back memories! Buying a pushchair in 1964, when we were expected to fold them on buses ( even if the baby was too small to stand or asleep) I wouldn't leave the shop until I had successfully folded and unfolded it without help. The assistant found this very amusing. It took about half an hour.
My daughter once struggled for 20 minutes to get her stiffened son into his car seat. Later she was told or read that there's a remedy: blow on their tummy!!
Doing nursery duty I totally failed to uncouple pram body from base. So did nursery staff and several mothers. Relieved to find I wasn't the only one!

Haha! Mine too grannylyn. Oh what a relief to be free of that dreadful rear facing baby seat.

In fact, we went back to Mothercare because finally the seat became permanently fixed to the isofix base and no-one could release it. I was about to change my car and needed to get the dratted thing out of it! After much struggling and phone calls to the manufacturer, the assistant at MC managed to release it, but not without a nasty bruise to her knuckles . So we got a full refund in the form of a gift card (over £200).

And then as luck would have it, our son was replacing his 2.5 year old's car seat as he'd grown out of it, so we now have that one, a Britax model which is the one recommended by Ford for my car! Never mind all the warnings about second hand car seats - I know this one's history, less than 2 years old and never been in a collision of any sort.

So the gift card is gradually being spent on both my daughter's little girl and my son's little boy when they need something. Perfect

Udate! dgs has grown out of it and I have purchased a new, simpler one!!!!!

I have honed to perfection the puzzled, slighty pathetic and elderly personna!!

That's another Good Point Indinana. My daughter and her partner spent a lot on their pram, not least because the car seat can be fitted into it, making shopping trips (they hoped) easier. I can't remove the seat from the isofix base and my daughter, like yours, finds it tricky.

Why oh why is 'stuff' getting more complicated rather than easier.

On a different tack we had real difficulty finding CD/radio type electrical equipment for our elderly mothers. Many of them seemed to require you to have a perfect memory and excellent eye sight in order to listen to a talking book.

As DD doesn't drive, I'm the one who has the car seat permanently in my car, so I am now, after 5 months, thoroughly familiar with it. However, getting it off the isofix base can be very challenging as it has to be held with one hand on the hood end with thumb on top and all four fingers pulling up a bar just under the hood to release the mechanism. With my arthritic hands, this manoeuvre is simply impossible sometimes. Even my DD, with no arthritis whatsoever, sometimes finds this tricky.

vegasmags, sounds like a queue to become a muddled gran and suggest the patronising scary woman the job of collapsing it. Just say it's beyond you and smile sweetly (I know I know, doesn't come easily to us but I'm sure we could develop it where necessary)

I borrowed a pushchair for 2yr old GS in the summer from my niece. I returned it to her so she could lend it to a friend. I am so glad I wasn't there when she gave it to her friend and, on showing her how it all worked, found a mouldy partly eaten sandwich in the folded up hood !!

I admit I was surprised when this thread took off, I really thought it was just me, and I honestly panicked when I couldn't fasten b? straps
Watced Dil achieve in micro seconds
Thank heaven no pushchairs involved!
Many years ago I had to wrestle 2 toddlers
on w i d e double buggy onto a country bus to go shopping!!!

I go down to London every fortnight to do 2 days childcare and so I take my DGD out and about whilst I'm there. Getting on a London bus with the pushchair is such a strain and a stress. I take the little one to Messy Play one morning and was asked, nay commanded, by the scary lady in charge to fold up the pushchair so as to leave more room for others - although there was tons of room. I replied feebly that I didn't know how to do it, so she gave me a patronising smile and said: 'Do you think you could learn how to do it for next time?' Grrrrrr.

This is such a reassuring thread. We have a pushchair for the days we look after our precious one. All went well until I added one of those snuggle warm things for him to sit in. How to get the push chair reigns through the various holes, how to extend them so they're long enough to fit through the various places they're supposed to fit. I made the mistake of putting the baby into the snuggle thing before I'd worked out how to do the reigns. Crying baby, hopeless gran, grandad called in as emergency fixer and he was baffled as well.
I had to remove the car seat over the weekend because I was designated driver for a group of friends. I am so not looking forward to putting the thing back

Well we bought a pushchair and car seat in the hopes of getting used to them and making it an easier operation.

We have mastered the pushchair as it was on the lines of the old style buggy that we had for our own children. Mind you it generally takes both DH and myself to erect it and do up DGD who does her best to undo all the straps.

The car seat is another mission. It can take 10 mins or so just putting that in the car let alone DGD in it. Because we don't have her on a regular basis we forget between times how it goes. I have now managed to persuade DH to leave it in the car so that alleviates one problem.

At least that makes you feel a little less than an idiot!! DS managed to 'unfix' his own DS car seat, he showed remarkable restraint, so as to speak!!!

Yes grannylyn! I keep making it shorter too. Had to get DD to sort out the right length before I collected GS the other night. Thankfully she had a problem too.

Yes its the confounded bits you have to fit together before slotting into clasp. Then I tried to lengthen straps but managed to make them even shorter, the directional arrow was useless!!
Oh well, few more practice runs and he will be pushing my wheelchair!!

I got a car seat for my own car so that I did not have to do rushed transfers & had plenty of time to practise. Good luck

My granddaughter 4 is autistic so she can't sit in a booster seat. She also has EDS (hypermobility) and can get out of baby seat harnesses we had to get a Houdini jacket for her (to stop her escaping!) but as she dislocates her joints we do have to be extra vigilant. So we are now looking at larger seats with integral harnesses which are £600 and should last until she is 12? but apart from that I agree with you car seats are awful but as long as the little dears are safe a few broken nails and frayed nerves aren't much to ask

Meadow gran, great idea, to photograph the wretched thing in situ.

I wonder if any mums netters have seen this thread. I do hope not. My daughter doesn't like mumsnet, thankfully!

My DGS1 specifically asked for Nana to put him in the car seat the other day, so I wrestled ineffectually with it as his mum dealt with DGS3. After much fretting and fumbling about from me, the sensible boy was obviously concerned about his own safety and instructed me with a smile to get out of the way, Nana, so that mummy can do it properly. He's very perceptive for a 2 year old!

The Fisher Price Animal Train is the most fiendish revenge tool you can buy! Hehehe.....!!

I eventually got how to fit the Britax car seat in my car after DD did it. My trick was to take photos of exactly how the seat belt threads through and I keep the photos on my phone. Although it's very fiddly and not to be attempted when you are in a tearing hurry at least I can now put in and take out the car seat. BUT DGD has grown and the last time she used it I could barely fasten the buckle with the awkward bring the two bits together thing. I recall that the last time my DD lengthened the straps it took hours and I have a horrible feeling I might have to do it next time. Now I have 2 DGDs but luckily the much younger one is almost the same size as her older cousin. As for the bugaboo buggy I have no idea how to collapse it I tried lots of ways and in the end I had to put in the boot as it was.
And rain hoods how do they fix on? I recently had to do an entire hours walk in pouring rain on a windy day trying to hold the rain hood on with one hand and hold an umbrella with the other whilst not waking up DGD. In doing this because my hands were wet I hadn't realised that I had cut my hand quite badly somewhere on the pram and it was only when I got back to DDs that she shrieked that my coat was covered in drops of blood. I think she may have thought momentarily that DGD was injured.

Does anyone remember those ?Melody Trains in the late 70s and 80s they made the most dreadful noise tooting out tunes.

I think they had a sort of plastic disc with tunes on (like a pianola.)
Buying one of those for a grand child would be one way of getting your own back on your own children.

Revenge vegasmags, I'm waiting for the day I can by a drum kit

Glad you managed it Iam. Doesn't it all just about drive you to drink? I do feel I have got a little bit of my own back as I have just ordered a toy trumpet for DGD as one of her Christmas presents