BabyGearCollector
New member
Hi,
I've just recently joined this site and wanted to say a little about myself and why I decided to join. My name is Dave, I'm 59 and married, and have a girl and boy now grown. A few of you I recognize from the StrollerSwap group. I'm mainly a collector of vintage strollers and prams, but have been looking for an older classic car seat. I've already noticed there's a member who goes by "classicseats" and has a beautiful car seat collection. Hope to get some good input from you!
Now as to the car seat story. My wife and I always made sure our children were securely restrained in their seats. We even went to the expense of replacing a Ford Tempo with a more expensive and larger GMC van after our second child was born for safety's sake. The shape of the Tempo's rear seat back didn't allow for a secure placement of the two car seats now needed to be used. At least it didn't feel right to us, and until the van was purchased we had to keep one seat on the passenger side front bucket seat and the other in the center of the rear with one of us squeezed between door and seat on either side. No fun at all on a longer drive, but at least we could securely attach both seats that way.
Anyway, when we still only had our daughter, my wife was going to a friend's house one day with daughter secure in her car seat placed in the middle of the rear seat facing forward - she being about 2yo at the time. My wife had to make a left at a bad intersection along the way. She started turning when clear and before she knew what happened a car with impatient driver in the opposing side of the intersection quick shot out from behind another car, hitting our car in the rear quarter hard enough to spin it 180 degrees. The car seat did it's job perfectly protecting our little girl from injury. Without being restrained, I have no doubt she would have been ejected through a side window glass suffering serious head injury or death. In fact, my wife later told me our daughter didn't even cry through the whole ordeal since she was protected so well, she just looked around as if she were thinking, "What happened!?"
The attitude of some of our friends towards car seats, on the other hand, were upsetting to us. We were labeled "car seat sticklers" by a few. On one occasion, we were going to ride with them and they actually asked, "do you really need to take the [car]seat?" Our answer: "YES!!!" Far as we were concerned, if they didn't have space for her car seat, they didn't have space for the three of us, period! We didn't need Congress to pass a law when common sense should dictate the safe way to transport children in a car. Our friends should count themselves fortunate they never had a serious accident when their kids were little with their casual attitude toward child safety in a moving vehicle. Our daughter is alive and well today because we took safety serious!
Thanks for reading, and I'm happy to be here.
Dave
I've just recently joined this site and wanted to say a little about myself and why I decided to join. My name is Dave, I'm 59 and married, and have a girl and boy now grown. A few of you I recognize from the StrollerSwap group. I'm mainly a collector of vintage strollers and prams, but have been looking for an older classic car seat. I've already noticed there's a member who goes by "classicseats" and has a beautiful car seat collection. Hope to get some good input from you!
Now as to the car seat story. My wife and I always made sure our children were securely restrained in their seats. We even went to the expense of replacing a Ford Tempo with a more expensive and larger GMC van after our second child was born for safety's sake. The shape of the Tempo's rear seat back didn't allow for a secure placement of the two car seats now needed to be used. At least it didn't feel right to us, and until the van was purchased we had to keep one seat on the passenger side front bucket seat and the other in the center of the rear with one of us squeezed between door and seat on either side. No fun at all on a longer drive, but at least we could securely attach both seats that way.
Anyway, when we still only had our daughter, my wife was going to a friend's house one day with daughter secure in her car seat placed in the middle of the rear seat facing forward - she being about 2yo at the time. My wife had to make a left at a bad intersection along the way. She started turning when clear and before she knew what happened a car with impatient driver in the opposing side of the intersection quick shot out from behind another car, hitting our car in the rear quarter hard enough to spin it 180 degrees. The car seat did it's job perfectly protecting our little girl from injury. Without being restrained, I have no doubt she would have been ejected through a side window glass suffering serious head injury or death. In fact, my wife later told me our daughter didn't even cry through the whole ordeal since she was protected so well, she just looked around as if she were thinking, "What happened!?"
The attitude of some of our friends towards car seats, on the other hand, were upsetting to us. We were labeled "car seat sticklers" by a few. On one occasion, we were going to ride with them and they actually asked, "do you really need to take the [car]seat?" Our answer: "YES!!!" Far as we were concerned, if they didn't have space for her car seat, they didn't have space for the three of us, period! We didn't need Congress to pass a law when common sense should dictate the safe way to transport children in a car. Our friends should count themselves fortunate they never had a serious accident when their kids were little with their casual attitude toward child safety in a moving vehicle. Our daughter is alive and well today because we took safety serious!
Thanks for reading, and I'm happy to be here.
Dave
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