how old are your kids and are they front or rear facing in their car seats?

[hohohobitches]

just that

Daughter is 5 next week, rearfacing with no plans to turn forward facing until she reaches maximum weight limit of 25kgs.

3 and rear facing, hope to keep rf till at least 4.
Everyone I know has had their dc forward facing since about 1, so I think they probably think we’re being a bit precious, but I personally don’t think it’s worth the risk.

All front facing.

21 months and rear facing - probably will be until she's around 3 or 4 but haven't really thought about it.

15 months, rear facing. I'll keep him rear facing until he outgrows his 25kg seat. Then move him to a high backed booster. He's a tall boy though so I suspect he'll be around 4.

1yo and 2.5 yo both RF and will be for the foreseeable future.

1yo has just moved up to the 18kg 360 seat which we use RF only. 2.5yo has just gone up to an Axkid Move which is RF to 25kg. We should get about 3 years out of this arrangement, then the eldest will go in a HBB whenever one of them reaches the height/weight limit for their seat.

DS about to turn 2 and is forward facing.

Almost 2.5 and still RF. We had to buy an extended rear face seat up to 25kg as DS is over 18kg. Were hoping to RF till age 4.

I do get what others are saying about the 25kg seats though. If DS has been under 18kg till around age 3.5 we'd probably just have kept the joie 360 as its great!

20 months, rear facing. Although he hasn't been in a car for months as we live in a city and walk everywhere.

8,5 and almost 2 and all FF.

he's 4 months so rear facing, he's massive so we're going to have to get the britax 25kg seats to get him to rear face past 2 as he's that big.

Dd 1 2 years rf when she outgrew it (university as only designed to be until 15 mos but she was small, no seats eg any longer then) dd2 about the same as she too was petite.

Dd1 was involved in a motorway high speed crash in her ff harnessed seat and was fine - police said that the seat was fitted correctly saved her life. Make sure whatever style of seat you have it fits your car, fits your child and is installed correctly, this is far more important than rear facing a child who doesn't fit properly at 5 years. Also never have thick coats on, use a blanket over it in winter.

6yo is forward facing and has been for about 18m. 3 yo is rear facing and will hopefully last a bit longer because he is a lot smaller than his brother.

3 yr old rear facing in an Axkid Minikid so hoping to keep him rear facing until he’s 5-6 yrs old.

Four months old rear facing in infant carrier then will go into an Axkid too, around 12 months old until 5-6 yrs.

Extended rear facing is something I strongly feel needs to be normalised. I know so many people who turned their kids around at 1-2yrs old and it worries me. I wish everyone would at least aim for 3-4 yrs.

For those on this thread who turned their kids forward facing at 1-2-3, I'm interested to know if you understand why some of us are horrified by that and how do you feel about it? I don't want to start any kind of argument, I am genuinely interested in the answers.

7 year is forward facing and was from 11 months old. In hindsight I hate the fact that I forward faced him so young, but I just didn’t know any better then.

My 3.5 year old is rear facing and probably will be doing for quite some time yet.

@SharpLily For me a lot of it depends on the safety features of your car. I’m keeping DD RF to 18kg and she’s not big so will probably be nearer 4 than 3. But we drive EV’s that are almost impossible to crash with all of the tech and have so many safety features. If I had an old banger I’d feel differently.
I wouldn’t FF before 3 but I’m not obsessed about RF 3-4.

4 and 18 months and both rear facing and will be as long as possible.

5 year old FF (rear faced until 4.5 and went straight into a HBB). 2 year old RF, hoping to keep him so until he’s old enough for HBB too!

Mine will be 3 in summer and is rear facing. However she is small (25th centile for height and weight), has no travel sickness and is generally fairly relaxed in the car. If any of that was different maybe I would forward face her, who knows.

I have a 3yo & 19 month old, can anyone recommend a RF car seat for the eldest? He’s quite tall but weighs 22lb,

My children are now 16,13,9&6 so all are forward facing. The youngest two are both in HBB.
The 13 & 9 year olds both rearfaced until they were 3, the 6 year old rearfaced until he outgrew his 25kg seat at 4.5.
Would never put a child younger than 3 forward facing now, it’s so dangerous.

As an aside, when can they go in a high backed booster? DC2 will be born when DC1 is just over 3 and we are wondering if we will need another car seat over and above the infant carrier or whether DC2 can then go in to DC'1s current car seat and DC2 into a high backed booster at e.g. 4/.4.5 or is that too early?

2.5yr old is RF in a joie 360 which has been great for my back. She's 2nd centile so will stay in it until she hits the limit. If that's before she is 4 then we'll get a larger ERF seat. I switched to a bigger car to accommodate the Joie when she moved out of the baby seat.

OH is a paed surgeon and is very safety conscious with this stuff so I'm guided by him

18 month old rear facing in an 18kg limit seat. I'll keep him rear facing as long as possible but he's already 14kg so if he follows his growth line he'll be 18kg in about a year's time at 2.5.