Item Number 1: The Folding Carseat
Carseats are for keeping kids safe while riding in cars, right? Well, yes. But, once you have kids you realize just how useful they truly are. Imagine you're on a long flight. There is a 2 year-old sitting next to you. The child enjoys exploring the world around her. She has just discovered a shiny buckle that has a latch and... freedom! Suddenly the child is climbing out of the chair, onto your tray table and OOPS! There goes the class of red "Chateau Thames Embankment" that you paid $7 for during the only drink service in economy. You decide the child should sit in her chair. She decides to run down the aisle to the back of the plane to "wash the hands" in the airline bathroom sink. You chase after the child, pick her up, return her to her seat and buckle her in. A tantrum begins. Then she unbuckles herself again. This happens for the next 6 hours.Now, image you have brought a carseat along. The child cannot unbuckle herself and instead must be content with watching "Finding Nemo" a few times and eating mass quantities of goldfish crackers. That's great, right? Well, sort of. The carseat is HUGE which means lots of fun dragging it through the airport. Not so great.
There is a harness type device called the CARES harness which is fantastic but unfortunately not allowed by many European carries so it isn't really an option if intra-Europe flights are on the itinerary (I will discuss the CARES harness at some point in the future because it really is an awesome product).
Enter the middle ground... the folding Sunshine Kids Radian carseat. Yeah, it's pretty darn heavy (about 23 pounds). But it folds and you can wear it on your back like a backpack by attaching 2 carrying straps. Also, it's prefect if you have an unusually tall 2 year old who isn't heavy enough or old enough for a booster seat, but is too tall for a typical 5-point harness seat. This thing is good for a child up to 65 pounds and approximately 49"!!! It also has a steel frame as opposed to most carseats that are just molded plastic. As well, it is quite narrow which means it fits nicely in small cars and EconoAir seats.
Item Number 2: The Potette Plus
It seems that someone finally came up with something less eco-friendly than disposable diapers. It is a kids' potty that is lined with a shopping bag that contains an absorbable diaper-like pad. It is great if you are stuck somewhere without a bathroom and your potty-training 2 year-old really has "to go". It also converts into a typical kids' seat to put on a real potty. I think the photo explains it fairly well. It is great for toddlers and people who are frightened of public toilets (and who can fit a size 3T jean).I am still waiting for some Greenpeace protesters to show up at my door with photos of tortured baby seals for purchasing this thing. Does it help if I mention I also bought some reusable "training pants" at the same time? I also drank some soy milk later on that day...
Item 3: The Netbook
I followed the crowd on this one... RedFlagDeals style. A few weeks ago I managed to get an Acer Aspire One for $199. It is the one with the 8 GB SSD (so it is somewhat slow) but it is portable and has a card reader. For some reason Firefox grinds it to a hault but Internet Exploder 8 works great. This is the opposite of what one would expect. Oh well. Someday I may even try to "Hackintosh" it. I think it would also serve well as a portable heater in the winter time.
Item 4: The DVD Player with 6 Hours of Battery Life and "Finding Nemo"
... See item 1 for the use case.
No comments:
Post a Comment