So Big!

We bit the bullet and finally got Audrey a big-girl car seat. Kyle found the most amazing deal on a website that I now check daily, and we couldn't resist (even though Kyle would like to keep her in her infant car seat forever!).

I decided to install it in my car this morning between the light showers that were hanging on from the night before. After reading over the manual, I grabbed all the parts and pieces and headed out to Zoolander. After all, I had installed the first car seat, so how hard would it be? Oh. My. Gosh. What a minimizing thought... it took me an hour! Now, granted, I was out there with cleaning wipes, wiping down the seats that hadn't been exposed since October of last year, but still!

I actually had to install it twice- the first time, I didn't have the reclining bar going the right direction for the seat when it's rear-facing. The second time I had all the parts right, but I forgot to loosen the shoulder straps before securing everything down, so I had to wiggle and struggle to loosen them up without taking the whole seat out again. Did I mention that during this process, it started raining again? Yeah.

Anyho, I finally finally got everything pointing the right way and slanting the right way and tightened down the right way and installed! The funny thing is when I loosened up the shoulder straps, I thought I was leaving a ton of slack, and while I was installing the seat itself I kept marveling at how big it was... then Audrey and I went grocery shopping, and...

...she filled up the whole thing! I couldn't believe it! After all this time, she's still so small in my mind! Not only did she not need much slack taken up in the straps, but I will have to put on the extra head support contraption way sooner than I thought, as her head is almost to the red line at the top of the chair! I'm not going to get to keep her rear-facing for long (look at those long legs), and we all know what that means... uninstalling it, turning it around, and starting this whole process again!