Carseats and my 3yr old

Ok! So those of you who have an older child and had to obviously move them to the back of the car when the twins arrived, did you do this before hand and if so when? We have an Odyssey and so of course my toddler will go to the third row. I don't know if we should move him a little early or just wait until after the babies are born. I know we have some time to worry about this but I don't want him to feel like he's being kicked out of his seat either.

 

We kept our DS in one of the captain's chairs in our Toyota Sienna and then put one infant seat in the other captain's chair and the other infant seat in the 3rd row. It actually work(s) a lot better for us b/c the older child is forward facing and it is seems to be more of a pain to buckle in a FFing child when they are in the 3rd row. With a rear-facing seat in the 3rd row, you can just open the back door, climb in, put the baby in the seat and buckle them in fairly easily. My boys are 2yrs 8mos (still rear-facing) and this is the arrangement we still have. When I move them FFing, our oldest DS will probably move to the back b/c he can now buckle himself fairly independently.

Good luck!

 

Thanks for the advice! I think since we have a van that it might be easier to just take out the middle seat in the second row and push the two captains chairs together for the babies and then my son can just jump in the third row on that side leaving us plenty of room to buckle him up? I'm sure it's going to be a trial and error kinda of thing.

 

we have an odyssey and took the middle console out of the 2nd row(we have a touring model) and moved the passenger side captains chair over. We kept our toddler in the 2nd row so we can buckle him easily. We have the twins in the 3rd row because they just ssnap in to the bases so no need to buckle and with the captain chair slid over its easy to reach back there to snap them in. When they outgrow their infant carriers and cant be easily snapped in then we will move the toddler to the back row and put the twins into the 2nd row. Originally I had the twins in the 2nd row and my toddler in the back row and it got old really fast! He cannot buckle himself yet - he's only 20 months.

 

You can also check the website www.car-seat.org they have plenty of advice and good info!

I'm trying to fit 5 car seats in my 2009 town&country and the forum has helped me a lot into figuring out how to do it...

Good luck!

Mag

 

Thanks! I'll have to go check out that site

 

Our nicu actually told us to put the babies in the back row. (At the time I had a 5yr old and 2 yr old obviously still in car seats). They said that was the safest spot for them. Of course we argued how to we pick who to put in the safest spot in the car? We ended up putting one baby in 3rd row with my 2 yr old and in the 2nd row we put my 5 yr old and a baby (captains chairs). That way at least one could see why one of the babies were crying and could hold a bottle for one if necessary!
And I would do it sooner vs later so that he gets used to it?
Good luck!

 

I never thought this would be such a hard decision to make!

 

I plan on putting a 3 yr old next to each baby. I hop they can help with the babies to talk to them and put in binkies or whatever. I also plan on moving my 3 yr olds to boosters before the babies so they can at least get out fo the buckles even if I have to help buckle them.

 

When we had the twins my oldest was a bit older, she was 5, but we made a big deal about her moving to the back row (we have a Sienna mini-van) and that it was so neat and so special that she would have the whole back seat to herself!! We did move her before the twins came, she actually wanted to once we started talking it up to her.