Against Manufacturers Instructions

One of them many "weird" things I'm into is extended rear facing. What that means is keeping your child in a rear facing car seat past the law of 1 year, 22 pounds and walking unassisted. Some people think I'm insane, I think I'm just doing what I think is best for my daughter.

So after I was in a car accident when baby was 4 months old, instead of buying another bucket seat, I bought a convertible seat(a seat that can go from rear facing to forward facing) as it made no sense to buy another bucket that she would only fit for a few more months versus something she would fit for a few years.

I bought a Safety First Air Protect on recommendation of a car seat forum. It has one of the tallest shells on the market(which I need for my off the charts for length baby) a high weight limit(40 pounds RFing, 50 FFing), a continuous harness(which is awesome for easy adjusting), it installed really easy, was fairly inexpensive, and has nice headwings for sleeping.

On suggestions from car seat technicians, I chose to ignore the manual that states you need to have the line level to the ground(a 45 degree angle) to protect the airway of a newborn. Well the bottom slots of this seat are so high there is no way it would fit a newborn. I wasn't using it for a newborn anyway so I installed more upright- closer to a 30 degree angle. I knew it was going against the manual, but to me, if it's good enough for the child of a tech, it's good enough for my child.

Well Safety First just clarified their position on more upright installs. No dice. Well installing my seat with the line level to the ground is closer to a 50-55 degree angle and the seat is practically horizontal when installed in my mid-size sedan. It makes the front passenger seat essentially unusable unless the passenger doesn't have legs. Very frustrating!

So I happen to have a spare seat at my disposal. It's a Safety First Alpha Omega Elite that normally lives in my husband's car. It also needs to have the line level to the ground but for whatever reason, it's line level to the ground seems to be at a true 45 degree angle so I can at least install the thing. Too bad I can't tighten the UAS on my own and even after my husband did it, I'm still not happy with the install. I bought this seat on impulse when I was 37w1d pregnant after having contractions the night before and panicking that we had no car seat for my husband's car. It's on sale! It's the last seat you'll ever need as it's RFing/FFing/booster seat! Ya, not really.

So now I have a car seat I can't use, a car seat I don't like and a baby that I need to get out of the house with. And no money right now to get a different seat. *sigh* I have one seat on a site to sell used items and I hope it will go quickly to finance my new seat, like a First Years True Fit. The things we do to keep our children safe.

There are times when I wish that I didn't know what I know because I would have carried on what I was doing the way I was doing it. Knowledge might be power, but you sometimes have to wish you don't know how to use it.