I take my older kids to classes three times per week. That’s three times per week into Manhattan of driving nap bliss. But I digress. This past week I was driving, slowly (because one simply cannot drive fast in Manhattan) when all of the sudden without any warning one of my twins bounded up the aisle in the van and sat in the seat next to me.
I was completely astonished. You’d think I’d know how to put a child in a car seat by now right? After all, according to New York State law, I still have four children who are required to have car seats. When we’re done that will make a total of 13 years in car seats. Thankfully I was crawling so slowly through traffic that I was able to stop quickly, and to the dismay of many a taxi cab driver behind me, re-insert Laura back into her seat. I’m still not sure entirely how she got out, especially without any fuss, but I suspect that I didn’t properly secure the latch in my rush to get going.
But it got me to thinking that if I, a mom who is sort of together at least half the time, and knows what to do can make such a potentially dangerous mistake, how common is it for other parents to do the same thing? I imagine it’s quite common but I was a little surprised as some of the more common mistakes:
Among the top three were facing your child forward too soon, moving your child into a booster seat too soon, and simply not regularly using a car seat. Another common mistake is using a second hand car seat.
I’m sure many of you are traveling this holiday season. Now is the perfect time to do a safety checklist and make sure that your baby’s car seats are in good shape and ready to go.
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