Hello mamas!
I was wondering...my 8 month old daughter is still in her infant seat and well within the height/weight requirements. In fact, if she continues at the rate she is, she'll be within those parameters well past her first birthday, which I'm totally ok with, that's why we bought the seat we did. My question is: she was blessed with long legs, so even though she still has several inches, her feet will soon be hanging off the end of the seat. Is that ok? I'm just curious to see if any other mamas have noticed the same thing and what you did about it.
My daughter is 4 1/2 mo. old, and her legs are already hanging out past her car seat, she is quickly growing out of her seat though, but we ended up buying a convertible car seat one of the biggest they make because her legs were so long. She could probably stay in her infant one for 2 more months, but her legs are so long it made us nervous so we got the convertible which gives her a ton more room.
go to carseat.org for more info. the legs are fine if they are against the back. In other countries they rear face until a child is 3 or 4. The problem is a childs neck and spine arent strong enough to withstand a head on collision when they are front facing and they can internally decapitate. You CAN switch the seat at a year and 20 lbs but that doesnt mean you should. look at the site and you tube the crash test video that shows 2 exact crashes in the different positions. you will want to keep your child rear facing as long as possible!
My son is 7 months and his feet are now starting to touch. We went to look for a new car seat, and decided to wait until the winter is over (because while they are in rear facing seat they should not have a coat on). There are car seats that are rear facing that are bigger than the infant carrier. And they go on to being a foward car seat and booster seat. We are waiting a few months and then moving my son into a rear facing seat that stays in the car. We were told not to put him in foward facing until at least 1 year old. We put him in the new one at the store (babies R us has a mock car seat to test some of the child car seats) and he looked so small in it. So there is going to be plenty of leg room. Good luck.
My daughter's legs hung off for months.... I assumed it was safe.
We also went to front facing a little earlier. Our daughter was 10 months old and her legs were long too and she was kicking a ton. She would be pushing the seat back and like another mom wrote would loosen herself a bit which really scared me. Plus she was hysterical facing back (I wrote for advice on Mamasource!). Once we turned her around with the new seat, everyone's happy. She stopped crying and stays snug.
If I am reading right your daughter is still facing backwards. If this is true be careful. We had to move my son to the front facing booster harness at 6 months because his legs were so long that when he stretched and kicked the back of the "real" car seat he loosened his infant seat strapping. I checked with the fire department and they approved it for safety since we couldn't keep his seat tight enough. Something to think about down the road also is when you move on to a regular booster you MAY need to adjust her seat again. I had to take my son out of his booster seat at 7 because he was so tall that the booster seat raised him too high and his head had no protection from whiplash (partly due to my car having lower backs on the seats). Again I took him to the fire dept just to make sure that it was okay. I am NOT advocating ignoring safety regulations but with extra tall children the regulations don't always offer the safest options.
My son is also very tall like his daddy and his legs were hanging off the edge quickly, when he was able to sit up well we bought a bigboy car seat. This one was able to seat backward, tilted from full recline to full-upright and when he met the requirements we switched the seat to forward facing. I wish I had known about it beforehand, I wouldnt have purchsed the baby carrier type at all. Being a first time mom I thought the baby carrier type would last longer for us but it didnt!
perfectly ok and not an issue ever - there are people that extended rear face until the kids are over 3 yrs old, and they are perfectly safe folding up their legs. NO potential danger.
Please do make sure that the torso doesn't outgrow the seat though. The straps should be below her shoulders rear facing and her ears should be below the top of the seat. Once her ears get above that level then even if she is under the weight limit she needs to go to a new type of seat.
My son has long legs too. We purchased a convertible seat around his first birth day. He continued to face backwards until he reached the weight requirement to face forward. It seemed as though he gained a bit of leg room with the new seat (a Britax Roundabout)
HI D., my daughter is very tall (always has been). By 8 months old her feet were hanging over the edge of the infant seat. So at 9 months I put her into the covertible carseat, backward facing of course and to my surprise she loved it! She was so excited to have more room and to sit up a bit more. Then when she was a year and I turned her seat around, she was even more excited. I think you just need to move her up to the next car seat when you and she are both ready.
