Am I just super anal about some things?

[colin-mylilguy]

She needs your good influence. She probably doesn't even realize that she should keep her baby RF in the car seat. Unfortunately, she isn't the first parent I've heard of turning their baby before 1 yr, so obviously, the law isn't well known because I think most people would do it, at least to avoid a ticket.

I had a friend that turned her baby FF at 14 months (she would have done it at 12 months but they just hadn't taken the time to turn it ) come over to my house and I said "hey, have you seen this video on you tube?" and pulled up a video on the danger of FF too early and the benefits of extended RF. She was like "Whoa! That is crazy! I am turning LO RFing again!" and that was that. No hurt feelings. I think she felt like she was the one who "discovered" the info and that made her feel good, as a parent. Just try to prevent hurt feelings because that might prevent her from actually hearing the helpful information. Hope it goes well, when you talk to her again.

[catilina]

My daughter just turned 3 and we just had to turn her forward-facing. I really wish she could RF longer, but our seat is an older Britax and only RFes to 33 pounds and she currently vacillates between 31-33 pounds. Since she's probably our last baby and the seat doesn't expire for almost 2 years, we're not replacing it with a newer higher-limit seat. She was always comfortable rear-facing even though she has always been very tall, and on long trips especially rear-facing is much more comfortable for her because her head doesn't drop forward when she falls asleep and her legs don't dangle and fall asleep. I'm really sad that she has to FF now. We RFed our son, who is also tall and was big for his age as a baby, in the same seat until he outgrew it by weight right after his 2nd birthday. My kids have always been comfortable rear-facing, and even if they weren't, their temporary comfort is not worth the risk of serious injuries, to me. Your son will be fine rearfacing as long as the seat allows for it. Check your manual for the weight limits for rear-facing.

As for your situation with your friend, I have no advice. I never speak up about things like that even though I always desperately want to. I just don't feel like it's really my place. I might say something about the law/recommendations (law=rearface to AT LEAST 20 pounds AND 1 year; recommendation=rearface to AT LEAST 2 years and/or to the maximum weight limit of your seat) to make sure they are aware, but after that I really don't feel like it's my place.

With food, we erred on the side of (over) caution, but we also have a lot of food allergies in my family. We waited on all the common allergens like eggs, strawberries, citrus, etc until 12 months+ and waited even longer on some of the more serious allergens (2 years for gluten and soy, 3 years for any kind of nuts). But clearly that is not the norm. The allergen recommendations are just that, recommendations, and they also change frequently, so I would never say anything to someone about what they're feeding their kids.

[Bethany89]

We did foods real early.. We didn't wait for anything. We have no food allergies in the family and she had no reactions to anything

[mom2corag]

Car seat = big deal. Mention it.
Allergens are not always; though I would worry that she did not make the informed decision as many prior posters have mentioned and as we personally did with our family, but just didn't know any different given the forward facing seat.

[deadducky112]

The car seat thing is illegal, is it possible she doesnt know the laws?

The food thing is none of your business.

[mibarra]

The carseat thing I would mention, where I live the law is 20 lbs AND 12 months.

As for the food, after taking DD2 to an allergist, we were told there actually isn't a lot of evidence that delaying introduction of high allergen foods reduces allergy rates. Since we had no family history, he told us not worry about it. I think with strawberries it's more of a seed/citrus type issue? But if her LO likes them and is ok with them I wouldn't worry about it.

[JennTheMomma]

It's illegal to FF until 2 years of age here. I would say something about that.

As for food, I was like that with ds1. Waited until the Doctor said it was ok. But then when I was pregnant with ds2 I did a lot of reading. I do BLW, and realised that if we don't have food allergies then it's likely ok (there are 0 food allergies of anything on both sides of the family). I follow their leads. ds2 wasn't even interested in food until 11 months, but he had all kinds of food, and peanutbutter was given to him shortly after a year, and he's 25 months now and loves PB sandwiches.

[BNC]

Look in the carseat forum for info and pictures on older kids rf'ing. I dont have any pics of mine, but a 3ft 18 month old can definitely still rearface, in almost eevry seat out there.

[Dmpmercury]

These are old pictures. My dd was 4 and my son was 2. Dd rf until 4.5. Ds still is at 3.5.





A recent one of ds

[TwinKristi]

Yeah I'm with most everyone...
Carseat- YES! Say something!!

Foods- No!! That's not really a big deal.