Car seat for plane, rental cars w/14 mo old

U

Unregistered

Guest
We have a three-week long domestic trip coming up next month. We'll be on about a 4.5 hour plane ride each way, then in rental cars as well as family members' cars.

We are in business class on the flight. We do not have a seat for DS, so we are not taking the car seat onto the plane. (I know we could have all traveled in coach and gotten a seat for him and still paid less money. He won't sit in the seat if he's awake anyway, and this way we'll have some room for him to stand in our row. We've always gotten a seat before and barely used it. I do know it would be safer.)

At home, we use the Orbit toddler seat with the base (RF) in DH's car, and a Britax Boulevard (RF) in mine, because I hate the Orbit toddler seat (which is a shame, because I thought the infant one was fantastic.) We very briefly had the Radian XT, but it wouldn't install in my car rear facing, so I returned it.

I'm debating whether to get a lighter, less expensive seat to check for the flight and use on this trip and any others in the next year or so.

Would you:
1) Take the Boulevard, given that we already have two car seats?
2) Get a Safety 1st Avenue or a Cosco Scenera specifically as a travel seat? Is there another lightweight seat you'd recommend? I want something that will work rear-facing, so the Radian is out, sadly, based on my previous experience. A friend recommended the Go Hybrid seat, but I don't want DS forward facing and I'm not confident we'll always have top tether available.

Thanks for your help!

I actually don't know DS's exact height and weight, but I would guess he's maybe 24-25 lbs. and 30" tall, so any convertible seat should work for a while.
 
ADS

LEAW

New member
We got our Scenara when dd was 9 mo old JUST for travel. Dh flew out ahead of us, got the rental car, and met us at the airport with the seat installed almost correctly when we flew in 2 days later.

It's small enough to fit nicely on most small strollers to cart it around, and it's cheap. She fit in it on every flight through 3 when she was too tall (she's tall for her age) so for the cost we really did get our use out of it.

Just pack a noodle in case you have a steep seat to help with RF recline. We ended up rolling a sweater once, and using a towel another time (borrowed from the hotel until the last day).
 

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