Somewhere between the ages of twenty months and two years, my son decided that shoving smushed-up green peas and sticky banana goo into the vinyl crevices of our high chair was his favorite form of personal expression. We used the Chicco Polly, which served us well for more than a year, but as soon as I began finding unidentifiable remnants of dinners past on a too-regular basis, I realized I was either going to have to become more diligent about using my fingernails to remove the gunge in the cracks of the chair after every meal or perhaps we should look for a different solution.

I was attracted to the Mutsy EasyGrow because of its apparent versatility and modern look. I also considered the Stokke Tripp Trapp and the Boon Flair. Mutsy is a European stroller manufacturer that has recently branched out to the high chair market. The Easy Grow is designed to grow with babies from infancy through school-age, with removable insterts and straps and an adjustable seat and foot bar.

My child was 22 months old when we pulled our Easy Grow up to the table. Assembly was fairly simple, especially if you’re used to following IKEA-type picture instructions. The chair comes with a foam-like insert and shoulder/waist straps for younger children and an interchangeable eating tray and safety bar. We experimented with all the different pieces since my son was just at the top edge of the size recommendations for the infant insert.

The Good:
The EasyGrow is just as cool and sleek as its photos suggest. It comes in an array of different colors, and while ours is one of the most neutral choices (grey), it still feels like an interesting addition to our kitchen. The lightweight but sturdy chair easily pulls up to our dining table without using a great deal of space in our compact eating area. That’s a big improvement from the high chair which seemed like it was always in the way. And, though there are definitely a few places where smushed-up peas can get caught, the plastic and metal pieces are easy to wipe off, especially compared to the many creases, nooks and crannies of the high chair. My son is comfortable in the EasyGrow; its seat and footrest are adjustable so even his long torso and short legs fit just fine, and I can see that we’ll be able to move the components so he’ll be able to use the chair for a long time to come (the marketing materials say up to 12 years old).

The Bad:
When I first strapped him in using the infant insert, straps and dining tray, I realized how awkward the setup was. The straps don’t work in an intuitive fashion and, in perhaps the most frustrating feature, inserting the dining tray or safety bar between the child’s legs and under the infant insert is a real pain. It’s also awkward to reverse the process and get the kid out of the chair. After we realized he was big enough to do without the foam insert and straps, things got less complicated, but the process of sliding the safety bar up the chair to get him in and out, not to mention fiddling with the mechanism that keeps bar in place while he’s eating, is still annoying. And while this is marketed as an all-ages high chair, I’m not sure I would have felt comfortable with the back support and safety features it provides for a wobbly infant.

Overall:
The Mutsy EasyGrow is a nice step up from a traditional high chair and an attractive addition to a modern kitchen. It’s a good choice for toddlers and older children who like to have their own chairs at the big people’s table. The price ($188-$195 on Amazon) is competitive with similarly-marketed chairs like the Boon Flair ($189) and the Stokke Tripp Trapp ($249). While its smoothness-of-use could use some improvements, its easy-to-clean surfaces, solid construction, and adjustable height mean it will be useful for several years.

Mutsy products are available through online and brick-and-mortar retailers all over the world - check your section of their website for specifics. In addition, Goore’s online store is offering an exclusive discount for Mamas Worldwide readers - receive 10% off the purchase of any Mutsy products by entering code MWMU10 at checkout.

Stay tuned for another Mutsy product review and giveaway later this week.

I have a lot more to say, but PhD in Parenting has already said it all, so I’ll just link to her great post Breaking it down for Facebook.

The Facebook group Hey, Facebook, Breastfeeding is not Obscene, now has over 116,000 members.  Please join up and invite your friends to join, sure, even that surly single guy friend, he can have an opinion on this too!  Before it ran off the bottom of my news feed, I had 13 new sign ups from the invitation I sent to all of my friends, I’m guessing I probably got to at least 20.  And if I Dont care How Comfortable Crocs Are, You Look Like A Dumbass can get 1.2 million members, we ought to be able to get a better showing than just 100,000.

When the Eco-dough arrived, I was impressed that the package was stuffed with old newspaper instead of bubble wrap or foam pieces, so I can recycle or compost it all! The tube and tubs are also compostable.

What I Did Not Like

The tubs that hold the dough do not close easily or tightly and falls off often, which makes re-stacking the dough in the tube a challenge. That’s the only thing I did not like.

What I Did Like

Besides the packaging that I mentioned above, the dough is easy to mold and play with for my two year old.  In the past, we have tried “other” store bought play-doughs, but my son has struggled to roll it in to balls and grew tired of it easily. Eco-dough was much easier for him, and he plays with it for longer stretches of time without needing assistance. We used cookie cutters on the dough, which was also a hit! I also purchased their bamboo roller ($4), which made rolling the dough fun for both of us.

The dough was not crumbly, did not dry out even after we inadvertently left the lid off, and comes with instructions on how to re-moisturize it if it does appear to be drying some (add olive oil).

Overall, I love eco-dough and will be ordering it for gifts and when my son needs more dough.

Eco-dough is available in the U.S. and will ship outside the continental U.S.A.

Coming soon… a review of Eco-paint!

When it arrived, I eagerly started reading, and after only a couple rules, closed it up and placed it on my bookshelf.  I could tell almost immediately that this book was not for me.  I finally decided to pick it up again and read it all the way through to provide you with a review.

My opinion: it is not for parents practicing attachment parenting.  It may be useful to Ferberizer/Baby-Trainer parents.

Here are some of the rules that I most had something to say about:

#7 Almost Always Skip The First Thing That Comes To Mind

As parents, when we see our children falter, so often the first thing that comes to mind is a harsh or judgmental comment.

Oliver is only 17 months, so maybe I’m just too new a parent, but harsh and judgmental things don’t jump into my mind when he falters.  They don’t generally jump into my mind when people around me falter unless I’m already in a pretty foul mood.  I think perhaps it would be better, if this happens to you, to reflect on why criticism is the first thing that comes to mind.  I suggest that the next time it happens to you, try to examine what it is you yourself are feeling, and once you recognize what you are going through, maybe this will help you feel less critical in the future.

#10 Every Day Stay Healthy, Techniques to Avoid the Common Cold

This is one of many rules obsessed with germs and cleanliness.  While I agree that hand washing is important, I’m not going to have my child gargle with mouthwash every time he brushes his teeth (this does not reduce the chance of getting a cold anyways, and if you are using mouthwash with alcohol, could even encourage the growth of more aggressive bacteria in your child’s mouth), I’m not going to turn away another child with a cough or sniffle by giving them a cookie and sending them on their way until they “feel better,” nor will I instruct him to “blow, cough, spit, snort, tongue-scrap, whatever,” all extra mucus from his body as it is “a harbinger of ill health and an enemy of your child’s good health.”  If his nose is running, I’ll wipe it, but this other advice just seems a tad extreme.  Nor will I instruct him, as described in rule #12 No Hands To The Face or rule #13 Why Germs Love Money, that he should stay healthy by never touching his face or handling money.  Kids need to be exposed to some germs in order to develop healthy immune systems.  I believe that a harsh, anti-germ, philosophy of child-rearing is what has led in recent years to the increase in allergies, as the immune system starts attacking the allergens due to a lack of anything real to fight.

#15 The Excellent Question Game

I was driving my son Thomas to baseball practice a few years ago.  He was digging around the backseat of the car for change among the cookie crumbs and finally he asked me how much money I thought he had found.

Not intending to be mean or diminishing, I responded, “Well, that’s not really an excellent question, is it?”  He asked me, “Why not?”  I said, “Because you already know the answer.  An excellent question would be one where you do not know the answer.”

The author goes on to describe a game played with his extended family where the children asked questions and he would rate them as “Okay, Good, Great, or the ultimate ‘Excellent question!’”

While I think it’s great to encourage your children to be curious and question things, something about this rule rubs me the wrong way.  Maybe it’s that I’d like my child to come to his own conclusion about his questions, in his own time.

#23 Kids Court

Kids Court should be run like a real court.  Be incredibly just with your questions as well as your verdicts.  Be formal and respectful.

Kids court makes you the judge and jury in your children’s disagreements.  I don’t like the encouragement of adversarial roles nor the placement of the parent as the authority over the children.  This is because I believe in attachment parenting and that children and parents should work for a compromise together.  Solutions should be something all parties agree to, rather than there being a judgment on a winner and a loser.  That’s my philosophy and I’m not saying it’s right for everyone, but it is for my family.

#25 The Other Side Of The Freeway

This rule tries to teach your child to measure feelings.  One example the author offers is the day that he needed to drop his son off for a sleepover at a friends and there was a traffic jam on the other side of the freeway:

Knowing that I was now going to be very late for an appointment back at the office, I sighed and leaned over to my Sam.  “You see that mess over there?  I have to drive back in all that—just to get back to the office.”  He looked over at the backed-up freeway and said, “I’m so sorry, Dad.  You don’t have to take me…”  I smiled and said he could measure my love for him by looking at all those stoped cars.

After his son threw a Hooked on Phonics card at his face:

I did not say the first thing that came to my mind.  I did not say anything for ten seconds.  I did not raise my voice.  When I dabbed a spot of blood from my face, I looked over at him and whispered, “If I was a hitting daddy, I would be hitting you right now.”

While I like the idea of trying to give your children an idea of the size of your love, I find the freeway example loaded with guilt.  And the second example, I just find downright threatening.  I would respond in this situation by saying, “OW! That really hurts!  I don’t like it when things are thrown at me, it really hurts to get hit in the face.”  Instead of focusing on what could be happening to them, they are forced to focus on how their actions are making you feel, which is an important lesson, I think.

#27 First Bite/Last Bite

In this rule, the child is asked to take one bite of everything on offer, in reward for doing this, they get to take the last bite of anything on your plate that they wish to.  I disagree with rewarding a child with food.  We just enjoy our meals, escargot, goose liver pate, and Thai red curry included, and if Oliver wants to try them, he can, if he doesn’t, we don’t make him.  More often than not, he’s happy to eat everything we do.

#56 Five Very Effective Nonviolent Punishments

1. The Silent Treatment - child should be forbidden to talk or communicate in any way

2. Do NOT go to your room - make her room off limits

3. The writing punishment - have him write [a brief sentence] over and over and over

4. Make him apologize to the whole family

5. Have your child run laps

Social ostracism, drilling, embarrassment and corporal punishment do not fit into my philosophy of discipline.

What do you think of these rules?  Do you disagree with me?  I’m still a fairly new parent, so I’d love to hear your take.

Boon has a preview of their upcoming new additions to their bath line.  There are quite a few interesting and unique bath toys shown in their Facebook gallery.  Boon will be selling rubber ducks that are PVC, phthalate and bpa free, and the item I am probably most interested in, Scrubble (shown above).  The Scrubble squirts water, but unlike other similar products, the Boon version comes apart to dry. The tops and bottoms are also interchangeable. 

More to come, I am sure!

Hoppediz Products - I’ve already described the carrier that I love by Hoppediz. I recently came by a catalog for their products, and I found a few other great products from them.

• Wickelmax is a compact changing pad with pockets that hold everything you need to change the baby. It has Velcro straps to hold it together, and I have been just strapping it together over my purse strap. There may be more prints available than the one in the image - I chose that one because it was so much fun.
• The Fleece Cover is a nice added layer of warmth if you are carrying in the winter in Germany, for example. A friend made an insert to my jacket so now it closes over the two of us, but as the baby is growing, her feet are starting to stick out under my jacket, and this fleece cover keeps her feet warm as well. I am still getting used to using the cover, but one added bonus is that is has a little dicky to keep my neck warm in the gap between the baby and me.

Diapers, Diapers - So much time and effort goes into taking care of baby poo! I am hapy with a cloth diaper system and the disposables we use as well.

• Fuzzibunz are an American made pocket diaper. They function much like disposable diapers, which is one of the reasons I went with them. The shell has a soft microfiber outside and a kind of rubber coated inside. There is a microfleece material between the shell and the baby, which is really soft. You stuff the pocket with absorbent inserts.
  
  We couldn’t use the small size that we ordered straight at birth. She was about 6 lbs 12 ounces (3060g) and there was gaps at the legs (after having pooed all over daddy a few times, we switched to disposables). However, about a month after her birth, we could use them. Since there are snaps to hold the diaper together, they are adjustable, and we still have quite a way to go before she will need an upgrade.

  
  It took me some time to realize that they work best with an ‘add-in’ on top of the regular insert. The add-in is a smaller absorber that I put directly under her to absorb the majority of the urine. The diaper is a lot dryer as a result. With just the one insert, the entire diaper would get wet. With the add-in I make fewer diaper changes because they stay dryer longer. I noticed that once we started using the Fuzzibunz, the baby had much less redness around the anus. They claim that the diapers prevent diaper rash, and I believe it. We haven’t had an diaper rash issues in the first three months (knock on wood). We use a paper (100% biodegradable) natural fiber sheets in the diapers as well. This basically acts like a sieve for solid material, and it makes cleaning a bit easier.
  

  The draw back for international moms is that they are made in the US so shipping is a bit more expensive. There are European brand pocket diapers as well - Popolini, Bumgenius, for example.

• Moltex diapers - These are the disposables I chose to use until the cloth ones fit. We also use them at night (mostly because my husband does the night diapering, and he thinks they are easier than the cloth). They are as environmentally friendly as disposable diapers get, in my opinion, but I am no expert. The packaging is even compostable, which I thought was pretty cool. A friend had given us some pampers that had been unused by her recent addition, so that is the only comparison I have. The Moltex fit much better than the pampers did in our case, and we had less leaks as well. If we use only the disposables for a period of time, I do notice some redness around the anus, but aside from that, we didn’t have any problems.

Boobs - another very important topic of motherhood.

• Medela Freestyle Hands-free pump - A friend recommended this to me, and I am so happy I took her advice! it is a bit expensive (I paid around $350), but the price may be going down as it is rather new on the market. It has all of the strength of the regular Medela pump, but it is much more compact. I comes in a nice black bag that looks like a big purse. The pump itself fits easily in your hand, and it comes with a belt that you can latch it onto if you want to move around while pumping. The hands-free component involves some rubber straps that fit onto most breast feeding bras, so you can walk around looking very much like a caw as you pump. It was invaluable in the first few weeks after the birth as we were trying to get the breast feeding to work. it also did a great job of building up my milk supply. I can usually pump one or both sides in about 10 to 15 minutes. I don’t know how that compares with other pumps, but it is faster than I expected. I am not working at the moment, but this pump seems like it would be great for a working mother who is continuing breast feeding. The same friend who recommended it to me ended up buying it because she needed something compact and portable for a conference.
• Lansinoh Disposable Nursing pads - I planned on using cloth nursing pads, but as my milk came in, I would soak them within an hour. I ended up finding these breast pads by accident, and they are better than other brands I tried. They can handle the amount of milk that I leaked. A things start to equalize, I am beginning to use the cloth ones instead, but these are still useful at night.
• Boob Organic Maternity and Nursing clothes - this was a recent discovery on my part. It is a Swedish brand that is produced in Europe (by workers who are treated well, and using environmentally friendly practices). I have been searching for turtle neck breast feeding tops, and theirs was the only one that I found. They have nice designs, and the material is very good quality. I also like some of the clever names for products such as the ‘boob warmer” (a fleece hoody). They are pricier than some products I’ve seen, but I am willing to pay a bit more for the kind of product that they are making.

Take the time to send a card for a good cause. Your friends will smile, and needy children will get some shoes!

According to the German consumer ratings magazine Stiftung Warentest, these are the top five car seats in each category that have earned either a “good” or “very good” quality rating.  The number in parenthesis is the score received, the lower the score, the better the car seat did in tests.  When fewer than five seats are listed, that means that no other car seats in that category received a “good” or “very good” rating.

Note: Isofix is the international name for an anchoring-type car seat installation.  The term LATCH is often used for this system in the US and LUAS or Canfix is used in Canada.

Group 0, up to 10 kg (22 lbs)

1. Römer Baby-Safe Sleeper* (1.8)

Group 0+, up to 13 kg (28.7 lbs)

1. Maxi Cosi Cabriofix with Easyfix base** (1.4), without base (2.7)
2. Römer Baby Safe Plus with Isofix base* (1.5), without base (2.1)
3. Recaro Young Profi Plus Isofix (1.7), without base (2.0)
4. Storchenmühle Twin 0+ Isofix (1.7), without base (2.0)
5. Graco Logico S HP with base*** (1.8), without base (1.6)

Group 0/I, up to 18 kg (39.7 lbs)

1. Wavo G 0/I with Isofix base (2.0)

Group I, 9 to 18 kg (19.8 to 39.7 lbs)

1. Kiddy Infinity Pro (1.6)
2. Maxi Cosi Priorifix (1.8)
3. Chicco Key1 Isofix (2.0)
4. Römer Duo Plus* (2.0)
5. Römer Safefix Plus Isofix* (2.0)

Group I/II/III, 9 to 36 kg (19.8 to 79 lbs)

1. Kiddy Comfort Pro (2.1)

Group II/III, 15 to 36 kg (33 to 79 lbs)

1. Römer Kidfix* (1.7)
2. Maxi Cosi Rodi XR (1.8)
3. Concord Lift Evo PT (1.9)
4. Bébé Confort Moby (1.9)
5. Cybex Solution X (1.9)

* Römer, also spelled Roemer, is the same company as Britax, but the seats sold under the brand name Britax do not appear to be identical to the seats sold under the brand name Römer
** Sold in the US as the Maxi Cosi Mico
*** Sold in the US as the Graco Infant SafeSeat, is also identical to the Teutonia Tario.

Cool Mom Picks has put up a Save Handmade page, to spread the word about how to encourage the U.S. Congress to amend the act before it goes into effect in February, “so that we can both keep our children safe and protect the handmade toys and clothing that we love so much. ”