Rear Facing Question - To What Age?

sholoulou

New member
Since being on this site I am thinking about RF my daughter - again ;)
What age do you RF to? She will be 3 the end of Dec. Is she pass the age to RF? Would it make a difference?
 
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BookMama

Senior Community Member
Since being on this site I am thinking about RF my daughter - again ;)
What age do you RF to? She will be 3 the end of Dec. Is she pass the age to RF? Would it make a difference?

How much does your DD weigh, and how tall is she? What seat(s) is she in? Most people here (myself included) advocate rear-facing until the child reaches the height or weight limits of the seat. :thumbsup:
 

sholoulou

New member
She is approx 33 " tall and 30# she is in a Marathon. I really need to measure and weigh her though to be accurate
 

Judi

CPST/Firefighter
I really don't think she will. I had rear faced a strong willed 3 yr old, and she did great. She forward faced in her parent's cars.
 

3plus2isme

New member
Good for you!!!!! :love:

I could only rf DS2 until he was 1 because he was a TANK (32lbs at 12 months) and didn't know anything about erf'ing with DS1... I'm hoping the next babe is a bit more of a lightweight so we can RF way longer!
 

DahliaRW

New member
Personally, my goal is 4. I'll turn ds2 if he hits 4 and still fits rfing, which I hope he does. Unless he wants to be rfing still.
 

oxeye

New member
Good for you for deciding to turn her back RF! I absolutely would as well with a child her age and size. :) My 4 year old is still RF, though she's closer in size to most 3 year olds.
 

ketchupqueen

CPST and ketchup snob
Staff member
I would too! I just re-rear-faced my 3 year old, who hit 35 at about 2 years old, and FFed then. I have a retroactively 40 lb. rated Radian; I juggled seats (and bruised my knuckles!) forcing a different 3-across so she could go back RF. (I wish I had an extra $250 and a slightly lighter kid; my 5 year old is BEGGING to RF too! It would make her so happy, but I couldn't do it without a CA, which is not in the budget for a 39-40 lb. kid. :( )
 

Jonah Baby

New member
I don't think we should really place an age upon ERFing.
Unfortunately, it is really run by height and weight vs. the available seats.

When I "learned better" I turned my just 2 year old back RF in as many seats as I could - which wasn't all that many actually. I had put him FF since he was just under 11 months.
My kiddo is a big one. He's rode the 94-97th percentile since birth. So, at 11 months he was roughly 25 pounds and roughly 2 and a half feet tall. I felt the "leg crunch" was bad for him, uncomfortable, etc.
So at 2 years and 3 months he weighed in at 33-34 pounds and was 36 inches tall. Of the few convertibles we had, only 2 could RF to 35, and one of them went to the dump due to expiration. Since he was so large, he had been in harnessed boosters for a long time. That's when I bought the MR for my car.

Would ANYONE on here typically advise a parent to FF a 2 year and 4 month old? Not usually. In fact, rarely. Jo doesn't fit this "norm" however and there is NO money for us to get more 40 pound RFing seats, especially not knowing how we will afford an infant seat come spring.

So, I wish I could have a cute little ticker on my signature stating I ERF my baby until age 4 or whatever, but it CANNOT happen for him. RFing him past the weight of a seat would be detrimental in a crash.
Age should not always be the rule to follow.
 

Maedze

New member
If our seats accomodated older kids, age would be the rule to follow, rather than weight. I'd like to see all seats accomodating kids til at least their fourth birthdays.
 

swtgi1982

New member
I will rf her seat tomorrow. I hope she does not fuss!
My three and a half year old did not complain when she was re-RF. But she had been Rf until 37 months and just got a new seat to fit her which had a taller shell and she still fit RF.


My question is though for all of you how long would you RF if you had a smaller child? (Age wise) Assuming you already had a seat.
 

joolsplus3

Admin - CPS Technician
My question is though for all of you how long would you RF if you had a smaller child? (Age wise) Assuming you already had a seat.

I'd go to at least age 3 in a car, and as long as possible in a van. I've had two 3-4 year olds RF and in a car it's a huge, huge inconvenience to get them folded up to buckle them once they are wearing size 4 pants. In a van (Odyssey), we've had limitless legroom and it's as easy as FF.
Just my experience! Some people manage to keep their kids RF longer in cars, and that's a GOOD thing! :)
 

christineka

New member
My question is though for all of you how long would you RF if you had a smaller child? (Age wise) Assuming you already had a seat.

I would rf to 40 pounds or age 6 assuming the kid didn't complain. If the kid complained I'd let them turn around as early as 4.5 years.

I guess in my situation my dd doesn't really have a seat because I had to give it to the 2 yo. Dd made is to 4 years, 7 months and 31.5 pounds rfing. If I was making the choices alone I would have bought ds another radian, but dh gets to help make decisions too.
 

Lea_Ontario

Well-known member
Since being on this site I am thinking about RF my daughter - again ;)
What age do you RF to? She will be 3 the end of Dec. Is she pass the age to RF? Would it make a difference?

If I could possibly RF my DS I would.

He's basically 35lbs (and being Canadian, we do not have any seats that RF beyond that).

He'll be 3 at the beginning of December.

Heck - I'd RF my older kids too, if I could !
 

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