True lay flat?

[CharlJean]

I am a FTM who is due in April and looking for some advice…

Basically due to very close family members ill health approx 6hr drive away from home I am anxious that if (god willing) they are still here when baby is born, they still may not get to meet due to travel advice. ie. The 2 hour rule if we don’t travel up soon after baby arrives.

I have been looking at the true lay flat car seats and comparing these including their ADAC testing scores (thank you google translate) and the maxi-cosi jade scores much better than the others. Does anyone have any first hand experience of using these? Do you think that it’s worth it? It will highly likely get a lot of use from newborn to 6 months as we have 3 weddings and a big birthday party for a relative all over 2 hours away on top of the poorly family.

I have also thought about travelling up by train with baby but then worry about bugs! It really is a minefield.

I bought the joie calmi car seat for the same reason- lots of journeys and a newborn. Baby was fine in her normal car seat but it made me anxious. So glad we went ahead with it now, she falls asleep in the car all the time so this way I don’t have to transfer her from chair to pram when getting out, popping to shops etc. my baby was 10lb when born and quite long so I didn’t think I’d get much use, but I use it nearly every day, as I say- it’s easier than the car seat! Go for it- you won’t regret it, and you won’t feel guilty when your stuck in traffic either x

We had a Jane lie flat car seat which was fantastic and rated extremely well when dd was a baby. Dd was small so when we took it out of the car and removed the liner for night sleeping it could effectively be used as a travel cot for a while.

We also had the Jane lie flat one, it worked really well for a drive down to the south of France. Bought it second hand.

Hi OP,
Have a look at the Avionaut Pixel Pro. It gives excellent support for even the smallest of newborns and maintains a great position with respect to their airway. It’s also really long lasting (13kg or 87cm, whatever baby reaches first).
From what I understand the lie-flat seats are a bit of a gimmick, as they’re not truly flat and the rules around time in the seat still apply. The carry cot style ones are only really recommended if you have a medical need and certainly don’t score as highly in crash testing as a more conventional infant carrier.
I’m sorry to hear about your family member. Would flying be an option? Six hours is a long time in the car for a tiny one.

Problem with flying is even a newborn needs ID for a domestic flight. It sounds like a good scenario for a car cot - it sounds like they will still get a normal infant car seat for day to day drives.

Lie flat in terms of Cybex Cloud etc don't count for this but the Joie Calmi, Maxi Cosi Jade etc do and you can ignore time limits in them.

(I've never used one so can't comment on the merits of individual models, sorry!)