So anyway 24 days left till due date and we have had all our furniture etc delivered.
This includes the shiny new pushchair / pram / carry-cot / travel system (I never know what to call them)
We were looking around for a while for something that was easy to use with one hand. The problem is most prams, for safety, like to ensure you use both hands to do everything. For someone with the lack of use of both hands, this is very annoying.
I want to be able to do everything myself, taking the pushchair out of the car, assembling it, adjusting it, using it and taking it apart. So I did a lot of testing.
The main issue was folding the pushchair with one hand. My wife and I had great fun in various shops trying to fold things up, take them apart with one hand, which did mean we got a few odd looks but to be honest all the staff were very helpful. Several pushchairs needed three hands from what we could work out, but there were a few designed as one handed.
Thinking of how able bodied mothers might be holding a young baby, or a toddler with one hand, I'm slightly surprised there aren't more one handed pushchairs around.
The first one we saw was one that I can't actually remember the brand. (From Toys 'r' us - but their website is down so I can't double check) To close you had to do some funky grip, slide the thumb, twist the wrist in one swift move. This was not that easy as I tried several times before I even did it once. I think though the seat folded with it so you didn't have to remove anything.
The next one we looked at was the Baby Jogger. This has a patented folding system, which I must admit, was really good.
You just moved the baby, then pulled the handle on the seat and the whole pushchair just folded in two. Very easy to use and close, and not too heavy either. The only slight issue we had, was that the lay flat mode (pull a cord at the back and the seat falls back) doesn't look very flat, or that comfy.
The last two we looked at were the iCandy Peach and iCandy Strawberry - They like their fruits.
The Strawberry, which was very similar to the Peach, didn't seem as sturdy, and you couldn't use a chair and carry-cot at the same time - if we have a 2nd child, which you could with the peach..
Now the Peach comes with a different carry-cot and then chair that you can swap out. Which you need to take off before folding. This has two buttons either side to allow you to lift it off, but theses can be done one at a time I found out, so easy enough for me to do. Once the cot/chair is off then its just a pull and slam of the handle before putting over your shoulder with a shoulder strap.
I learnt pretty quick that which ever pushchair I got, I wouldn't be able to do all the adjustments with one hand, they all seem to want two hands, although to be honest most of the things such as seat angle and foot rest isn't something I'd need to change that often.
Overall the easiest and quickest to fold was the Baby Jogger, however as the pushchair needs to be more than just easy for me, it also needs to meet the requirements for the baby, we decided to chose the iCandy Peach. I've played around with it today in the flat and still very happy with it.
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