Car seats and cars and cribs oh my!

I have been so bad keeping you updated with everything lately. It has been so busy. Nothing has really changed with me or the babies; we are still doing very well. This past week, I have been very busy researching and shopping for the much needed baby essentials.

I guess my week started with crib shopping. My mother in law and I spent an entire day shopping for only cribs. I did find one I like. It is nice looking, sturdy and of smaller scale. It isn't a mini crib but it doesn't have a lot of fancy headboards that would take up a lot of space. I found this crib in 3 different locations, but haven't decided which store I am going to go with.


This is the crib and the color I think we are going to go with. Let me just tell you about my crib experience with this one store. We had been shopping around and came across this store in Richardson called "You and Me Babe". We had already seen the crib at another store in Plano but it was more expensive. The Richardson place had the lowest price, but I was so suspicious of her. My mother in law mentioned that we had seen the crib elsewhere and the lady started with the 20 questions. She kept asking us over and over again... "where did you see this crib? What is the name of the store? Where are they located? What was their price?" Over and over again she kept asking me the same questions. She was VERY pushy which completely ticked me off. I didn't think it was very professional of her to question her customers so many questions like we were on trial or something. Actually, I think she was suspicious of us. I think she thought we were her competition spying on her to get her prices etc. We left there and there was no way I was doing business with her. Of course, Craig wanted to put up with her to get the better price. Which I said, "when the deal goes south because she is shady, you can deal with her, not me." Sometimes in the long run, it is worth paying a little more for good service; the best deal isn't always worth the hassle. A few days later, I called the woman to find out how much she requires down when ordering the beds. And once again, she would not give me a straight answer. I think I forgot to tell you earlier that when we were in the store, I asked if she gives a discount for multiples (because most places do) and she would not answer my question. She kept dancing around it saying "that is the best price you will get. You won't beat that price." I kept asking her again and again..."but, do you offer a discount for multiples." I just wanted to know if her price included a discount or not. Anyway, back to the down payment part... I called the store first and got two different answers from a different lady who answered the phone. First she told me they require payment in full, then she said 50% down. When I talked to the owner a little later, she danced around it for a while, rushed me off the phone to call the manufacturer about my cribs and when she called me back she had already ordered the cribs even though I hadn't told her to and still didn't know what the down payment policy was. Then, she finally tells me 75%, which I of course was leery about. She tried to justify the 75% by telling me the beds would be in in a week, but I don't believe that. Two other stores told me 6-8 weeks on that crib. So, when she told me she put the cribs on the order, I told her I wasn't sure I was ready to order and I was going to possibly order the changing table also. Then, she said she could call them back in the morning to add to the order. At that point, I knew she had just lied to me because at first, she led me to believe she already placed the order (maybe to push me into the sale), then when I mentioned adding the changing table to my order, she changed her tune saying she could add to it the next day. I went ahead and ordered it verbally over the phone and called her back a little bit later to see what her return policy is. Considering I am still in my first trimester and carrying triplets, I thought asking about the return policy was a legitimate question. So, I asked her how she handled that situation if a customer had a miscarriage and had to cancel their order. Most people have some sort of restocking fee ya know... When I asked the question she sat there in dead silence for a few seconds and then danced around the question again. She said she has never had a problem with that before. WHAT? She is going to try to tell me in the 20 years she claims to be in the baby furniture business that nobody has ever had to cancel. I don't think so. I guess I might entertain the idea due to the fact that most people probably don't order so early in their pregnancy, but most aren't carrying triplets either. At this point, I cancelled my order (and she gave me the guilt trip because she had already ordered it) and told her I would wait a few weeks until I was past my first trimester and give her a call. I found this awesome book called "Baby Bargains" and it has really good information about everything from cribs to car seats to strollers to bottles and formula. It gives really good information about how to shop for these things, what to look for in each thing a baby needs, what to watch out for with consumers etc. Prior to my last conversation with this lady, I had just read that the norm for buying and ordering cribs is 50% down and anybody who asks more than that is desperate for money and you should be suspicious of. It also talked about how these specialty stores can get so hostile if they think you are price shopping. I think that is ridiculous because regardless of what you are shopping for, you are going to try to find the best deal unless you have all the money in the world which we do not. So, we will not be buying our cribs from her; it will be one of the other places. Sorry this got so long, I thought it was worth mentioning so hopefully anybody else who needs to do some crib shopping will have a heads up.

I have also been researching car seats a lot this past week. Reading some consumer reports and the Baby Bargains book has really helped me a lot. There are so many to choose from and it is probably the most important thing we will buy. It can be very overwhelming. I think I have narrowed it down to two--the Graco SnugRide or the Baby Trend Flex Loc. These car seats got the best rating and still passed Consumer Reports crash test at 35 mph which is not the minimum requirement. Also, these aren't the most expensive car seats on the market but seem to be the best so that is a plus.

As you know, we have also been car shopping for the past 3 or 4 weeks now. It has been very stressful because we couldn't decide what we wanted to buy and Craig and I couldn't agree on how much we wanted to spend. We started out planning to buy a minivan but then decided against the minivan because the biggest minivan on the market is the Dodge Grand Caravan which doesn't have comfortable seats and the third row seats are made to sit at an angle (the part your butt sits on, not your back). We had also been told by numerous people that they had a lot of problems with those cars breaking down etc. and that the third row was a nightmare for car seats with the slanted seat. Basically the seat isn't at a 90 degree angle like most cars, its more like a 45 degree angle. Then, we drove a Chrysler Aspen which we liked but decided against because of the price and we weren't comfortable with buying Chrysler. Then, we drove the Nissan Pathfinder which we really liked everything about it except the seat was too small for Craig. The seat wouldn't go back far enough for his legs to not be cramped up. They told us they could take the seat out and re-bolt it down further back but that wouldn't leave enough room in the back for the car seats. We then drove a Nissan Armada, Craig loved it but it was too big for me. I literally had to guess where the curb was in the parking lot because I couldn't see over the dash. It was huge! We drove a used Dodge Durango at the Nissan dealership which was in very good condition but the seats were uncomfortable, just like the minivan, it drove a little rougher than the other large SUV's, it had more road noise and it had a nice little annoying rattle in the car. By this point, we did know one thing for sure--we were not buying anything Dodge/Chrysler. We drove a used Tahoe that Craig saw for sale (for sale by owner). We really liked it, I could see over the dash and everything worked for both of us. I thought we were going to buy this Tahoe because it was in our price range but it was a very basic model. We would have to add several things to it so Craig continued on researching. We went to a Chevrolet dealership Saturday and drove a couple of new Tahoes and we really liked them, but of course, it didn't go through because we couldn't agree on a price. We headed to another Chevrolet dealership to see what they could offer us. We couldn't find the dealership right away, but we saw a GMC dealership and stopped in just to see what the Yukons drove like. We knew the Yukon is practically the exact same car as the Tahoe, so we felt were sure we would like them. We didn't figure we would be there very long because we can't seem to get what we want for the price we want. Much to our surprise, they had a Yukon with lots of upgrades that fit our needs perfectly. We were able to get a very good deal on it, so we bought it! We found a car!! What a huge load off! I am so glad the car shopping is over--all the walking, the heat, the car salesmen, the haggling back and forth, the long hours. We were car shopping for 10 hours Saturday and only went to 2 dealerships. I am so glad that is done!

Here is a better picture.




We are selling our Jeep Cherokee ourselves, so if you know anybody who is interested, send them our way. It is an 03 with 70K miles.



Also, my 11 week belly shot...it still looks about the same.