Can we get away with a carry cot and fixed car seat, or do we need a removable infant car seat?

[NatW11]

Hello!

First time parents and trying to navigate all the travel systems is mind blowing!

So we’ve found a few prams we like with carry cot and we really want a 360 car seat for ease of use, but they’re quite pricey.

To try and make it more worth the money, we were looking at 360 seat without handle, so it would stay in the car and be suitable up to 3/4 years I believe?

We then thought we could use the carrycot that comes with the pram bundle to carry the baby for the first 6 months then after that we’d carry them or transfer to pram.

Does this sound realistic in practice or is it worth spending the extra and getting an infant car seat and upgrading later when they outgrow it?

Thanks in advance

Nat x

Dpeneds on your lifestyle. I used the infant car seat carrier function very few times. Some people use it daily.

What do you mean by use the carrycot to carry them? You can just carry them in your arms/sling from birth.

I had a lie flat car seat that remained in place so had to move DD to her carrycot on the pram whenever I took her out the car seat.
It was fine, she would wake up if she had fallen asleep but I think she would have done that anyway when I moved the car seat and they can't sleep in the car seat for very long anyway so it wasn't really an issue. The only down side really was the space that the pram and carrycot attachment took up in my tiny boot! But otherwise all good.

I guess we just meant to carry them from the hospital and then house to car etc but you’re right we could just carry them in our arms, I think I’m overthinking it!

We have a fixed car seat that stayed in the car and a Babyzen YoYo with the newborn nest so no carrycot/bassinet either. It’s absolutely fine. If you need to carry baby into the house do so in your arms!

And I pushed mine out of hospital in the pram!

Having a car seat that fitted onto our buggy is still useful now and DD2 is 14mo. If she fell asleep in the car and I know I’m only going to get her out for a short time (no more than 20 minutes), I’ll leave her in her car seat.

I used the sling wherever possible but we also used the carry cot on the buggy too until she outgrew it. I couldn’t have carried her in it though.

For the buggy now, we have the toddler seat which did DD1 up until she was around 3 or 4.

We love our travel system and having a 360 never appealed considering the cost. We just use the 3-point harness and don’t have an isofix base either so we can just turn the car seat ourselves.

Certainly plenty of people do that. I think it maybe depends how much you'll be driving. We lived rurally so had to drive everywhere, and my kids inevitably fell asleep in the car a lot. Being able to bring the carrier inside without waking them was quite useful,l. Having said that, we had a driveway right next to the front of the house, so I also wasn't averse to leaving them to sleep in the car with the doors open for a bit too, so that functionality wasn't always needed.

Once they get to a few months old it's sort of more trouble than it's worth carrying the car seat with them in it, though - it gets so heavy!

It all depends on how much the baby will be in the car for the first few months, and whether you will need to swap between cars much? I live in London so we own just one car, and we don’t drive very often, so we got fixed car seat - there was no value to be had in making the transition in and out of the car easy as we just don’t use it enough. But, if you drive a lot, then being able to keep them in the seat would have more benefit (when you go shopping for example). It all depends on your lifestyle, but yes, it is perfectly possible to have a fixed seat from birth.

We never had a carrycot either, but just to flag that you won’t be using it anywhere near 6 months (hence why we never got one - we didn’t think we could justify the price). They soon outgrow them. As another cost saving device, we brought a buggy you could use from birth till they basically stop needing one around 3/4 (the silver cross reflex), although in reality, DD was in the sling for the first 4-months, and only after that did we use the buggy.

So, again, it’s all up to your lifestyle. We never had a portable car seat or a carry cot, and in our case, neither were needed and would’ve been a waste. However, others would find use out of either/both. There is SO much ‘stuff’ marketed at first time mums, so you need to have an honest think about how you live your life and what is actually needed before buying anything (90% of what is marketed is not needed!)

I used the portable car seat a lot on its own to bring baby in and out of places.
I rarely used the Carry cot, particularly after couple months when they get bored of it ans prefer sitting in car seat to look about.
Also they’re so small and light you don’t really need 360/spin function just yet.

So I would say get a portable car seat as well.

But as PPs say, also depends on your lifestyle I guess

I also attached the car seat to the pram until they are big enough for the main pram seat.
My boy didn’t like the carry cot much so it’s good to have options.

I have a Joie Spin 360 and just used the pram bassinet. Baby shouldn’t be in a car seat for long periods of time so she is either carried in a sling or flat on her back in the pram.

We took her out of hospital in the pram.

We have the maxi cosi mica car seat. It’s 360 rotate from birth but stays in the car. It’s been fine. Tbh I couldn’t really justify the price of the others as they need car seat and base and only last a year approx.

Our parking is a garage, down the road and then up slope and steps to house. It hasn’t been an issue just carrying Ds in arms. Sometimes I just assembled pram again with carrycot and brought him up in that as he napped daytime in it anyway so didn’t leave pram in car.

Ds is now 18 months, I think the car seat with him in would have been too heavy for me to carry from car if it wasn’t on pram frame after a few months max as he was 4kg born and even the lightest car seats were 4-5kg empty.

It depends. I used the travel system car seat all the time to go in and out of shops, the Dr, baby classes etc. So glad I had it. And I was careful - never let baby sleep in it outside the car (it's dangerous - slightly compresses their airway which can drop oxygen levels. A study found increased SIDS risk overnight for babies that had been in car seats for extended time in the day). They're so tiny they're easy to get in and out at that age without it spinning.

I also used the bassinet loads - we had one that was suitable for overnight sleeping and when he refused to sleep in his next to me he'd still sleep in the bassinet - I think it was familiar. We used it as a travel cot and for naps for the first 6 months as well. Then DS got too big for his infant seat and we bought a Joie iSpin 360 which is a lifesaver with a giant baby! It's suitable up to 18kg (higher than other spinning seats) and had the best safety ratings.