Review: Mothercare Madrid Car Seat

I'm not going to lie, the world of car seats is a minefield to me and when it came to choosing Ava's next seat I was stumped. There are so many seats out there, each with different features and ranging from budget to eye-wateringly expensive. We plan to buy a new car soon, and didn't want to spend a fortune only to realise the seat wouldn't then fit in our new car but unfortunately we couldn't keep Ava in her infant carrier much longer. That girl has got to be sitting up and seeing what is going on in the world!

 

 

 

With that in mind, we eventually settled on the Mothercare Madrid Combination car seat, which retails at £90 (but was a steal at £45 when we bought it!). This is a group 1 seat which is suitable from birth to 18kg (approx 4 years) and can be either rear or forward facing. With new guidelines coming into force requiring children to rear-face until they reach fifteen months, I knew I wanted a car seat which would allow this, and then further use once Ava is ready to face forward. The seat has a five-point safety harness, with individual harness tensioners for added safety and extra deep side wings for impact protection. It also reclines on it's own axis, and has three positions.

 

The installation instructions are my biggest gripe with the seat- they are rubbish! There are no words, just pictures which are quite obscure and hard to make sense of! I ended up watching a tutorial on Youtube, and googling for further explanation. As a result, the seat took much longer than anticipated to install but I think this would easily be fixed if they just added some text to the instructions! This isn't an isofix seat, so the belt does obstruct your way when getting the child into the seat. At the moment this isn't a problem as Ava is small enough to fit through the top gap, although when she's bigger I'll have to put her in from the other side. Saying that though, by that point she will probably be ready to forward-face and there wont be an issue, but keep it in mind in case you maybe also have another car seat at the other side.

 

 

 

Once (finally) in, the seat does feel really secure and looks protective. The cover is well padded and seems comfortable, and there is a removable insert and headrest for younger babies. I will say though that the seat is very upright, so personally I wouldn't use it for a newborn. Ava has just turned 8 months, and has been sitting up confidently for about 2 months so it is perfect for her, but I'd be hesitant to use it before six months. At the moment we are rear-facing, and I can only get the seat to recline into one position, but Ava has fallen asleep a few times and it's been perfect- her head doesn't fall forward which is something I worried about. The side wings are perfect for this too as sometimes her head will fall to the side slightly, but these support her and prevent it from falling too far. I am looking forward to trying out the rest of the recline positions once we move to forward facing, although it'll be just my luck that she stops napping then!

 

 

 

I think the seat looks great too, and definitely more expensive than the £45 we paid for it! It is also available in red (although be aware that I've seen this in real life and I'd definitely say it is pink). The cream insert can be separated, and the whole cover is removable so can be washed if any accidents occur. So far, both Ava and I are loving the seat, and she is thoroughly enjoying being able to sit up in the car. I actually wish I'd moved her a little earlier and saved myself some moaning car journeys!

Pros
- Price
- Can rear or forward face
- Can use from birth if required
- Removable, washable covers
- Five-point harness, easily adjustable straps
- Deep side wings
- Comfortable
- Reclines ( three when forward-facing)

Cons
- Can only recline once when rear-facing
- Instructions difficult to follow
- Seat belt causes some obstruction when putting baby in
- Bulky (base also takes up some of the middle seat)

My Sunday Photo: Chocolate Cake

This is a face that says 'No Mama, I simply cannot manage lumps of fruit as they make me gag but that chocolate cake will go down just fine!'

 

 

 

 

My Sunday Photo: Park Life

We first took Ava to a park to try the swings when she was around six months, but she wasn't a fan. She enjoyed sitting in them and watching the other children play, but would freak out if we gave her a little push. She's quite a timid little thing, so I think the motion scared her a little but after a few visits she has slowly improved and is now loving them! Now we just need some better weather so we can take advantage of all our local parks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ava's 8 Month Update

Eight months old! And what a month it has been- crawling, talking and teething!

 

 

I still haven't had Ava weighed at the clinic, but I did weigh her myself at home and she's around. I know it's not particularly accurate, but it gives me a rough idea. She is still wearing size 4 nappies, and 6-9 month clothes, although I have had to move her into 9-12 month leggings since she's Little Miss Long Legs!

Weaning is still going great, and she seems to be getting better with lumps and finger food which is a huge relief. I was worried that by using purees at the beginning that I'd put her off learning to chew but she has grasped the concept now. I can't think of anything she dislikes at the moment, and she'll happily sit and eat three main meals and several snacks throughout the day. She is loving toast at the moment, as well as cheerios, strawberries, bananas and baby biscuits. As before, she is still loving her main meals to contain meat- she's a proper little carnivore, although she'll make the exception for cauliflower cheese, which is still her absolute favourite!

 

 

 

We seem to have settled into a routine of getting up around 6am, napping at 8am, 11.30am and 3pm and going down for the night at 7pm which is working quite nicely! Naps are still only lasting around 30 minutes though as madam is just too nosey and can't bear to miss anything.

As I mentioned, Ava started crawling on the 31st May at 7.5months old! Now there is no stopping her and she is a little speed machine. She is so pleased with herself and it's hilarious to see. Other milestones include kneeling up, putting in her own dummy, gives kisses when asked and finally being able to handle her own cup. She adores being around other children, and especially watching older kids running about.

The first tooth has come though as well this month and I must say that it caused minimal fuss! Ava has been wearing an amber teething necklace for the past few months, and I'd highly recommend it! Obviously I can't say for sure whether it worked its 'magic' but it certainly doesn't hurt to give it a go!

Ava's 7 Month Update

After months of effort we have finally mastered rolling! Ava first rolled from back to front on the 26th April and hasn't stopped since! Nappy changes have become very tricky indeed! She can now roll and get herself up on her knees ready to crawl, but hasn't quite worked out how to move haha. She is sitting very confidently, and never spends any time on her back. Sadly she has started to outgrow her jumperoo as she hates being contained in any one place. The jumperoo was our trick to allow us to have dinner in peace, so we'll have to think of a new tactic fast!

I haven't had Ava weighed recently, but I can see she's putting on weight so I'm happy with that. She is still comfortably wearing 6-9 month clothing and size 4 nappies. She is now only having 3 bottles during the day (7oz) and a dream feed when we go up to bed of a couple of ounces.

Weaning is going fabulously and she absolutely loves her food! I don't know what I was so worried about! Ava is now on three meals a day as well as two snacks, and we're doing a mixture of mashed food and baby-led weaning. Now she's nearly seven months we have introduced meat and dairy to her diet and she loves both. Favourite meals at the moment include cauliflower cheese, salmon and broccoli risotto, spaghetti bolognese and lamb hotpot. At first, I made all of her food from scratch, but as her palate has become more accustomed to complicated flavours we have started to introduce some jars and pouches to allow her to try out new flavour combinations.

Ava is still going to bed at 7pm, but has started waking earlier due to the light mornings and we've had a couple of 5am starts. These don't benefit anyone though as we're all still tired so we have bought a Gro-blind in a bid to get her to sleep a wee bit longer. We had planned to move her into her own room in April during my OHs week off work but I couldn't bear to part with her! She hasn't outgrown her Snuzpod yet, so I'm just going to keep her in that for as long as possible and then move her. I don't want to leave it so long that it will cause problems, but at the same time I don't want to let her go!

Ava's 6 Month Update

April 2016

 

Happy half birthday little one!

At 25 weeks Ava weighed 16lb 3oz, and is becoming such a little chunk! We moved onto 6-9 month clothing soon after she turned 5 months, and are still using size 4 nappies.  Her hair is beginning to lighten and has become super thick on one side! My gran is always saying that she must have been lying in the womb on her thinner side and that's why the hair is slower to grow there!

We started weaning at 22 weeks using vegetable purees and it was most definitely the right decision! I was so hesitant about it and had actually put it off for a couple of weeks despite feeling that she was ready but I wish I'd gone with my gut now. The change in Ava was almost overnight- she had become pretty fussy in general (probably because she was hungry but didn't want milk) but is now SO contented and happy, it's unbelievable. Her first taste was baby porridge at breakfast, but she wasn't keen so we switched to giving her a cube of veg puree at dinner time. At the moment she dislikes anything green, but is loving sweet potato, carrots, parsnips and turnip. We are just about to introduce a second meal each day and see how we get on. We are still giving five bottles a day, but the mid-morning one is reducing slightly each day.

Now, we don't know if it's coincidence or not, but after weaning for a few days Ava started sleeping through the night! We have also started getting her down earlier at night, and she is currently sleeping from 7pm until around 6am. The night feeds didn't bother me (I secretly loved those sleepy cuddles!) but it's wonderful to have a couple of hours in the evening to just chill and spend some time as a couple again. Ava is still napping 2-3 times a day, but only for around 30mins each time. We can't really complain though seeing as she's down all night!

She has managed to roll from front to back a couple of times, but I think that's just determination as she hates tummy time! She is still trying hard to get from back to front, and is very nearly there. She is sitting up fairly steadily now though, and is happy to use the playmat again as long as we don't lie her down on it! Now that she's sitting, we no longer use our Angelcare bath support, and she sits in a proper little seat instead. This causes a fight when I'm washing her hair though- it was so much easier to rinse off the shampoo when she was reclined in her support!

What were your little ones up to at six months?

My Sunday Photo: The Big Girl Seat

This week Ava moved into a Group 1 car seat and is loving it! The infant carrier was restricting her view, and she was desperate to sit up straight in it which was causing stressful journeys if we were in the car alone! We settled on the Mothercare Madrid seat which can be used from birth to four years, and either rear or forward face. I'll do a full review on it once we've given it a proper go, but for now munchkin seems very happy!

Ava's 5 Month Update

March 2016

 

Five months old. How is that even possible?! I swear it was only yesterday I was five months pregnant!

Ava turned five months old on the 13th March, and at 20 weeks (2nd March) she weighed 15lb 7oz, placing her in between the 50th and 75th centile. She is still wearing her 3-6month clothing, although I think we'll have to move her up to the next size soon, especially in leggings. She clearly doesn't take after her mummy with her long legs!

Milk-wise, we are offering five 7oz bottles in the day although she seems to have gone off milk completely and each feed is a real battle. She was ill at the beginning of March, so I'm unsure whether it's due to that, or if she's looking for something else. For that reason I'm thinking of starting to wean her a teeny bit early because I just feel like she's hungry but not being satisfied by milk. Sleeping is just the same as the last couple of months- down at 9pm and up around 3ish for a bottle and then straight back down again with naps roughly every 2hrs after waking throughout the day.

As I mentioned, we had our first proper bout of illness and it was bloody awful. Poor little miss had an ear infection at 20 weeks and ended up on antibiotics. These quickly cleared it up but the first couple of days when she was in pain, lethargic, not eating and sleeping constantly were such a worry- especially as we didn't know what it was and if it was something more serious. Thankfully she's right as rain now and we'll be able to recognise the symptoms right away if it ever occurs again.

Developmentally she is working hard at sitting and rolling, although hasn't quite mastered either yet! She is raring to have some more freedom though and gets so frustrated if she's left lying on the floor or playmat for longer than two minutes!

What were your little ones up to at five months?

Ava's 4 Month Update

Tomorrow our little munchkin will be four months! I remember it feeling like an eternity to reach four months pregnant, yet this last four have just whizzed by! She is getting so big now, looking at her newborn pictures make me so emotional!

I haven't managed to have her weighed this month as the clinic was on right after her injections and she just wanted to sleep, but I did a quick estimate with our scales at home and I reckon she's around 14lb 1oz, keeping her on the 75th centile. We have moved up to size 3 nappies this month, and she is comfortably fitting her 3-6month clothing.

Feeding wise, we are now on a 4hr schedule. I was finding she wasn't properly ready after 3hrs and was wasting a lot of milk, so we started leaving her a bit longer and she's now draining 7oz at a time. We also switched to the stage 3 teats as she seemed frustrated while feeding and would lose interest quickly and these seem to have done the trick nicely.

In the past few weeks Ava has become much better at napping through the day, and we now have a bit of routine going which allows me to get on with some things. The house is looking marginally better on a day-to-day basis! Usually she will sleep for 45mins at 9.30am, an hour at 11.30am and two hours at 3pm, although I do wake her from the last nap so she's ready for bed. The 4 month sleep regression has hit us at night unfortunately, and she will very rarely sleep through now, but can only stay awake long enough for a couple of ounces of milk. We've had a few awful nights where she's been up four or five times and will only sleep in my arms. Of course, she only does this through the week when it's always Mummy's job to get up! I think her teeth are contributing to this, so I'm going to try an amber teething anklet on her and see how we get on.

She seems to have moved past her clingy phase thankfully, and will quite happily be held by anyone although she does still look to make sure I'm there. She has become really cheeky in the past month and has learnt to blow raspberries and takes her dummy out to throw it away when she doesn't fancy going for a nap! She is also squealing and shouting to get her point across! She is very close to sitting up unaided and rolling from back to front. She has let out a couple of sniggers lately, but we are still waiting eagerly for a proper giggle!

She's definitely fallen out of love with her playmat and I can only manage to get her on it for five minutes at a time so I think that will be packed away soon although she is obsessed with her Jumperoo! We now put her in that at dinner-time and can actually eat together. She has also become more co-ordinated with her toys and will grab them and bring them to her mouth.

This month will be a big one for her: she is off to her first sleepover at Gran's while we go to a wedding. I'm dreading it already, although I know it'll be good for both Ava and us. We are also going to start swimming with her next week and I have her booked on to a few baby groups to cure her mid-morning boredom.