There is a price to be paid however, which is our reliance on these technologies. Many parents have become dependant on their cool gadgets and that can spell trouble, particularly when it gets in the way of living life.

They’re Everywhere, They’re Everywhere You can find a million products to help keep an eye on your baby in their crib, it feeds our parental need to know what our baby is up to every second.

New parents are the most succeptible and often receive these as gifts early in their baby's life. The assumption being that they will need to monitor every movement.  While we have them on camera all day taking pictures and video of their latest tricks, we seem to want to extend that obsession to night time.

A Watched Pot Never Boils

I won’t argue that they are certainly very helpful to keep an eye on your baby’s sleep habits without disturbing them, especially if you are transitioning them to their own room for the first time.

But at the same time, there is also a downside to these constant surveillance techniques.  It can keep us from allowing them work things out on their own. Hearing every grunt or movement can also be a hindrance to parents trying to learn how to get their baby to sleep.

Alternative And Freedom

I’m not saying that you should close the door and ignore your baby, but at times it might be a good idea to turn off the monitor and just let your baby relax on their own.  (Also, new parents need to relearn how to relax.)

There comes a point where all this staring into the baby monitor is more stressful and sleep-preventing than helpful for your baby. The baby will do what they are doing and you hearing every sound they make at night can keep you wide awake with the anticipation of more cries or demands from the crib.  I know I slept better when I didn’t hear every sleep disturbance amplified through the static of our monitor receiver!

If you find yourself hovering over your baby monitor, breathlessly waiting for the next squeak or squawk signaling wake-up, just turn it off (or at least turn down the volume) and try to read, talk to your spouse or just get some sleep.

Sit 'N' Stroll

The Basics

We just took a trip to Hawaii this past summer with our 9 month old daughter.  We got several recommendations from friends and family to try the Sit ‘n’ Stroll convertible stroller made by Triple Play Products.

After looking it at it online it satisfied my requirements which were:

• To have  a child safety seat on the plane. No way am I traveling for 5 hours with a baby on my lap in knee-crunching coach class.  Way too dangerous and way too uncomfortable for everyone.

• We had scheduled a lot of tours that required bus and cab travel on the islands. So we definitely needed the car seat here.
• Lots of walking on these tours so a stroller was again needed.
• We would be dining out a lot so we liked the idea of using it as a booster seat.

After deciding it would be way too hectic to carry a stroller and a car seat through 2 airports it was an obvious choice t spring the $250 or so dollars for the seat.

The hard part? Locating a seller who actually had this product in stock. I guess since it has no competitors there is a high demand for it and consequently most places seemed to be out of stock indefinitely.  I was nervous I wouldn’t get it ordered in time, but at last I was able to order it from Amazon.com. (If I did it again, I wouldn’t wait until the last minute to buy it!)

Tip: One week before you go on your trip, take it out of the box and use it at least once daily for a walk or something to break it in a bit and get used to using it.  It’s not difficult, but getting the hang of collapsing it and expanding the wheels smoothly takes a bit of getting used to especially with twenty pounds of baby in it.  You don’t want to be figuring this out as you get in the security line.

My Experience (Week 1):

Airline flight

Since it was our first flight, I felt a bit nervous wondering if this somewhat large stroller would fit through the tiny tunnel of the X-Ray machine.  I was relieved to see it emerge out the other side and we didn’t get any questions and went on our merry way.

Boarding was interesting and we did get a lot of suspicious looks from the flight attendants who wondered if a) the stroller would fit down the aisle or  b) if it would fit in the seat.

It turns out the stroller/seat was a bit too wide for the aisles (on United Airways at least) and I ended up lifting up over the seats and the targets heads of the nervous passengers already seated. The attendants seemed a bit flustered until we actually got the seat installed. The good news was that it did fit (snugly) in the passenger seat.

Note: They required we use a window seat for the baby-seat. I don’t know if it’s a regulation, but they were definite about that.

We tried it facing backward as in a car, but that didn’t work out too well and we turned it around to face forward.

Tip: The seatbelts for UAL are very short were just barely long enough to fasten the recommended way but we were able to after a bit of struggling.

Tip: The shiny buckle turns out to be an intriguing toy. A great hint my wife discovered was to put a sock with the toe cut off over the buckle keeping the germy thing from being touched and also reducing the likelihood of having to refasten it a thousand times during the flight.

1 Week Hotel Stay

The week was spent driving to a lot of destinations during the day and going to dinner. So the experience was pretty routine, but we did try what the instruction manual suggests and got a “water noodle” and cut it down to size to prop up and level the baby seat while driving. This seems like a design flaw and I would hope a newer version might address this issue.

We went to many restaurants, but we never did use it as a booster seat. It seemed like overkill.  I suppose if you have a toddler this might be more useful, but it seems a bit cumbersome to have on a chair.

Based on the feel of the thing, I would follow their recommendation and not try to lift the front wheels up by pressing down on the handle. It feels as though this would break it quickly.   I ended up just lifting the front with my hands while my wife lifted by the handle.

Week 2:

7-Day Cruise

Bus Travel

Typical of cruises, there were a lot of bus tours in Hawaii and we spent several long days traveling to destinations.  In general, most buses don’t have seat belts and we just wedged her in the seat and hoped for the best. I never did feel comfortable with this, but we lived with it.

Security

Getting back aboard a cruise ship these days seems to be almost as harrowing as air travel. We had to go through a security line and the worst one was on ????. We finally got our baby to sleep in her stroller and they would not allow us to go through security without having to remove her (waking her up) and inspecting the thing from top to bottom.  Really annoying, so be aware of it as you make your plans.

Airline Flight Home (Hawaii -SFO – Denver)

The flight home was a bit more interesting than our first one.

First, the stroller got stuck in the x-ray machine. So they had to hand-inspect it.

Then, there must be some residue on these strollers from manufacturing, but they swiped it and found some explosive material(!) This is definitely not going my way.

Okay, so they hand inspect it looking for who-knows-what and they tell me they have to search me, my wife and our baby. That’s right, they actually patted down our 9-month old baby.  I guess I could’ve gotten upset about it, but it was so ridiculous I could only laugh.  I could tell the security woman felt a bit stupid having to frisk a baby.

So, lesson learned, it might be a good idea to wipe down this stroller before you do any traveling. Just to be safe.

Summary:

I would recommend this product mainly because it’s the only one that I have ever seen like it. I think it could be better, but it got us through our 2 week trip and that was all I expected. So it didn’t disappoint.

Pros:

• Designed to be the do-it-all product, will replace your stroller, child seat, booster seat.
• Seemed to be durable enough, but doubtful it would handle any real punishment.
• Lived up to it’s functionality.

Cons:

• Sometimes can be hard to lock into the stroller position or collapse fully into a seat, especially if your child is in the seat.
• Not the most durable stroller in the world, the handles would likely be the first thing to go if you don’t follow recommended usage.
• May not fit down the aisle of all airplanes, requires heavy lifting if child is in the seat.
• May make TSA and airline attendants nervous.

Where To Get One

To buy this stroller you can find it here http://www.babyearth.com. (This is a sponsored link which means if you go there and buy it I get a small amount of money. The price is the same either way, but if you don’t feel comfortable with this, here is the non-sponsored link.)

Please leave a comment if you have any questions about this stroller or if you’ve used it and have a differing opinion, I’d be happy to hear your experiences.