Brigala
CPST Instructor
... as well as my first car seat check. I'm a lot better at smiling and being polite with strangers misusing car seats than I am with my own family, I'm afraid.
My parents and nephew brought my baby to me today at lunch time to nurse. I had installed my infant seat in my mom's car and I thought I'd covered all the bases. My son (turns 16 tomorrow!!) taught my niece (15) how to use the seat and all week they've been the ones buckling the baby in with no problems except maybe the occasional slightly low chest clip.
Today, my son buckled my daughter into the seat but my parents and my nephew made a stop by their church for a while before bringing the baby over to the fire station for lunch. I went out to their car to get her out, and my mom and nephew had very carefully contorted the baby into the seat so that she was sitting ON the leg-portion of the 5-point harness. :doh: It was almost impossible to get her OUT of the seat because her legs were through the harness straps after it was unbuckled! I'm like, "SH__, Mom, What the hell did you do to my baby?" Thank God this was the last day of CPST class and I don't need to leave her with my mom anymore. She was very sorry, and just said it didn't "look right" to have the straps over her legs like that, and she and my nephew (age 12) had worked very hard to get it "just right" because they knew I'd yell at them for doing it wrong. I told her if you have to twist the baby like a pretzel to get her into the seat, you're doing it wrong. After lunch, I buckled her in and asked my mom to take her STRAIGHT home and not take her anywhere else until I got home tonight. I didn't even want to send her home with them I was so pissed off. But I didn't have any other good options, and I figured there would be no more opportunities for them to screw up the car seat.
I shouldn't be surprised that it's harder to bite my tongue with my family. Most of my career has been in tech support and I have a lot of training and experience politely explaining simple and complex concepts to people who have no idea what they're doing, but I can't seem to explain anything at all to my dad without wanting to write him off as a total lost cause.
My parents and nephew brought my baby to me today at lunch time to nurse. I had installed my infant seat in my mom's car and I thought I'd covered all the bases. My son (turns 16 tomorrow!!) taught my niece (15) how to use the seat and all week they've been the ones buckling the baby in with no problems except maybe the occasional slightly low chest clip.
Today, my son buckled my daughter into the seat but my parents and my nephew made a stop by their church for a while before bringing the baby over to the fire station for lunch. I went out to their car to get her out, and my mom and nephew had very carefully contorted the baby into the seat so that she was sitting ON the leg-portion of the 5-point harness. :doh: It was almost impossible to get her OUT of the seat because her legs were through the harness straps after it was unbuckled! I'm like, "SH__, Mom, What the hell did you do to my baby?" Thank God this was the last day of CPST class and I don't need to leave her with my mom anymore. She was very sorry, and just said it didn't "look right" to have the straps over her legs like that, and she and my nephew (age 12) had worked very hard to get it "just right" because they knew I'd yell at them for doing it wrong. I told her if you have to twist the baby like a pretzel to get her into the seat, you're doing it wrong. After lunch, I buckled her in and asked my mom to take her STRAIGHT home and not take her anywhere else until I got home tonight. I didn't even want to send her home with them I was so pissed off. But I didn't have any other good options, and I figured there would be no more opportunities for them to screw up the car seat.
I shouldn't be surprised that it's harder to bite my tongue with my family. Most of my career has been in tech support and I have a lot of training and experience politely explaining simple and complex concepts to people who have no idea what they're doing, but I can't seem to explain anything at all to my dad without wanting to write him off as a total lost cause.