PSA: Car Seat Safety

I realize I am probably the last to know but...you know the JJ Cole Bundle Me things everyone who lives in the north puts in their car seats in the winter. They look so comfy and warm. Baby is surrounded by nice soft fleece and all zipped up. Turns out they aren't safe. Not even a little bit safe. Unsafe like your baby might fly out of the car seat in a crash. Yep, my baby has been riding around in that thing for the last 3.5 months. Awesome. Seriously though, what the hell? As if being a new parent isn't hard enough, companies have to sell you crap that isn't safe. Come on give us a break. We are sleep deprived and busy, we don't have time to research every stupid baby product to make sure it won't kill our kid.

Don't get me wrong, I am not the safety police. We do questionably safe things a lot. What is life without risk, right? But this one is legit. If you can't get the straps tight enough because of the bundle me, which it turns out you can't, the baby could get chucked from the seat in a crash. Super not cool. Turns out you can make the bundleme safe. You just have to cut it up. Yep, cut up your beautiful $40 blanket so there is no fabric between baby and the car seat. Or you can buy a different product that only goes over the top of the car seat. Of course you can buy something else. I will just cut ours up, or just use a damn blanket it's pretty much the same thing. But seriously, can people please stop selling me stuff that might kill my baby. "You are only supposed to use it when you have the car seat in a stroller." Are you flipping kidding me. That thing is a pain in the butt to put on the car seat. No one is going to put it on and take it off to use the stroller.

I will note that JJ Cole stands behind this product as being safe, and say they have voluntarily tested it with car seats. Though no one knows which car seats have been tested, with what size child, in what positions. So, really it is hard to put a lot of stake in the testing. It seems that car seat companies and car seat safety inspectors agree that it is not safe to have anything between the baby and the car seat. I think I will side with the car seat safety people on this one, but feel free to google it and make your own decision. If people would just stop selling unsafe stuff we wouldn't all have to spend so much time googling shit.

I am done ranting now. Here is a picture of our kid in her not-at-all-safe-for-the-car car seat. Don't make the same mistake we did!

Looks warm and cozy right?