Sometimes I am amazed by the advancement of baby products since LilZ was born. I fell in love with the bumbo seat and carried it everywhere for months. Our current backpack carrier beats the one I had for LilZ by leaps and bounds. Namely - it keeps Nikki far enough away that my head that my scalp doesn’t become her newest chew toy. The clothes seem to be cuter, the furniture more modern…it all just seems better.
Then, there’s our high chair.
I would link to it, but the things I hate so much about it? Are on every model of every other high chair in the mainstream (affordable) market. I hate the reclining function that has so many settings that a few excited jumps at dinner and Nikki is back in the infant position. I hate the grooves on the legs that allow it to be adjustable because they are impossible to clean. The “dishwasher safe” piece that fits on the tray got tossed a long time ago because it also adds notches to hold smooshed carrots. They have so many “parts” and “settings” to allow for use at different heights/ages that they almost require an engineering license to operate. What happened to the plain, solid wood, one-setting high chairs from when we were kids? Do you know how tempted I am to buy this? REALLY DAMN TEMPTED.
I am thinking about getting her a different high chair for her birthday. One that is made of wood, has zero settings, and few grooves to hide food in. Pretty much the kind Pa Ingalls had for half-pint. Zero fancy. Zero plastic. Do you have any suggestions? Or should I order the “restaurant style” one? Because at this point? I’m just holding her in my lap when I feed her. It’s easier than trying to clean the high chair. I only need a good shower to get the sweet potatoes out of my crevices.
And yes, I’m well aware that a high chair is not that great of a birthday present. But she’s turning ONE. I know she doesn’t really care what we get her, so we might as well spend the money on something we’ll all enjoy. MrZ and LilZ would love to know they don’t have to hear me scream profanities at inanimate objects any more. Besides, we ordered her one of those personalized books for children. Those are better this time around, too. They offered me one to review and it came this week and it’s the coolest thing. They colored the main character’s hair and eyes to match Nikki’s and they included all of their classmates names in the story. Seriously. Way better than the ones from when LilZ was a kid. With his, you only picked the name to use, and the gender was neutral so it would work for all kids. I’ve been asked to check out gobs of kids’ books, but this is the only one I’ve actually liked enough to tell you guys about. We even brought it to daycare this week so Nikki’s teacher could read it to the class. It’s totally rockin’.
So, she’ll have at least one “real” birthday present. And we’ll get her a few other things I’m sure, but I really want to get her a new high chair as her “big” present. And if you send me links to ones that fit the bill (read: Does Not Make Me Yell) - then I may order it before her birthday so that the violence against household items can stop in my home. One more night of kicking the high chair (without the baby in it, calm down) and screaming, “QUIT WITH THE DAMN RECLINING ALREADY!” and my family may leave me at the curb with the high chair.
http://babystyle.com/common/dProductDetail.asp?pmid=20170&dept=36
am i allowed to leave that icky looking link there? anyway, this is the stokke highchair that can be used up to like 150 lbs! all friends have and love them…
Hi there! I LOVE your blog, but have never posted cuz of the whole “feeling a big dork” thing. Anyway, we also HATED the high chair and got the Eddie Bauer Two Level Wood Booster Seat and it’s AWESOME! We got it at Babies R Us, but I bet they have it at Target. There are still areas that can be hard to clean (the piece on the armrests where the tray slides onto) when they start to self-feed, but all in all it’s been great! And for $40, you can’t beat it! We used it as a “high chair” for a while, but now that he’s older (19 months) we just push the chair right up to the table so he can eat with the rest of us. I wish I had just gotten this when my three year old was a baby instead of getting a regular high chair.
http://www.stokkeusa.com/tripptrapp.htm
Lovely, simple chairs, adjustable and modern design, fits nicely in every kitchen.. Oh, hear me sound all salesperson-like….:oDD
For my kids I used the same high chair my mom used with me and my brother. Boring. Wooden. Indestructable and easy to clean. It now faithfully displays a large potted plant, waiting until the next generation of kidletts need it again.
Before buying new, cruise the second hand or consignment (?) shops. You might be surprised.
Now, I’ve only been in the mommy business for six weeks now, but we looked at lots of highchairs during the fun baby-registry time, and finally I opted to just use MY old wooden high chair - my grandparents still ahve it in their house, and 27 years later it’s still in great condition. I thought I would go for something fancier, but many people told me many of the same things you are saying about your current chair.
I really like to resturant style chair you linked to, if I didn’t already have one on hand ready to use, I would strongly consider that, or one of those deals that hooks to your table directly.
And I don’t know, but there is just something I really like about the simple wooden high chair.
Yeah, I hated my big, clunky high chair too. The replacement I got was like this:
http://www.epinions.com/kifm-B-BEquip-NF-High_Chairs-Cosco_Basic_High_Chair/display_~reviews
and I paid something like $25 for it.
I also recommend this since she is getting bigger and this is a convertible model:
http://www.target.com/gp/detail.html/ref=br_1_8/602-5128860-2773413?%5Fencoding=UTF8&frombrowse=1&asin=B000BFKHCU
You just hook it up to one of your own chairs and it was easy to clean. Plus, you can take it around with you to the in-laws, etc. I loved it.
oh my god…i soooo can relate. i bought a peg because it was THE high chair to buy and i hate, hate, hated it…that when my third was born, i went out and bought me a fisher price - it was like $50 and i love it! it’s amazing.
Shortly after my son’s first birthday we switched over to a booster seat that straps onto a regular chair. He loves sitting up at the table with us at dinner time and it makes clean-up much easier. I think I bought it for about $15 at Wal-Mart.
I’m cheap and I hate to clean. So when I traded up/down my highchair for an easier model I went completely for cheap and easy. I wanted all plastic so I could take it outside and hose it down — but NO moving parts. My origianl highchair was wood and a bitch to clean. This is what I ended up with — and I loved it. And less than $20 for the whole thing lights my fire.
http://www.ikea.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?topcategoryId=15567&catalogId=10103&storeId=12&productId=53018&langId=-1&categoryId=15667&chosenPartNumber=30069724
Good luck.
I have some of the same complaints that you do about your high chair. However, it still works for us because it has wheels and we move it around alot - even outside when we eat on the deck. So for now, it is worth it. However, because we eat out a lot and go places a lot we also have the Healthy Care Booster seat (link: http://www.amazon.com/Fisher-Price-B7275-Healthy-Booster/dp/B0000DEW8N/sr=8-6/qid=1158090226/ref=pd_bbs_6/002-7225873-0561616?ie=UTF8&s=baby-products ) which I love, love LOVE. Eventually, this will be the one and only high chair because it is THAT convenient. It is very simple and doesn’t have all the grooves and such that you are talking about. I am not ready to give up the wheeled high chair just yet. But I am getting there.
Svian - plain, wood, not cheap, but worth every non-plastic penny.
We didn’t have enough room for a high chair so we feed the boy in his bouncy seat until he could sit up enough to stay in one of the booster seats that you strap to your dining room chair. The seat was height adjustable and you could take it apart and PUT THE WHOLE THING IN THE DISHWASHER! Loved it.
I’ll second Cagey re: the Fisher Price booster seat - it’s easy to clean, and when we travel we just fold it up and take it with us! It doesn’t take up valuable kitchen floor space, either, since it’s just strapped to one of our kitchen chairs.
We have the fisher price booster seat and I like it. We also have an unfinished furniture store wooden one. It’s the one with the top that is attached that flips over the back. It does have some finish on it, so we don’t have to do anything to it to use it. But you could paint it or stain it however you wanted.
http://tinyurl.com/kef2k
It’s the high chair with flip tray on the third row on the right. It looks nice and it’s all one peice.
Since TP and I have had a lot of experience babysitting/nursery work/daycare work, we have tested out a lot of different products and we both hated the regular highchairs.
We have a wooden high chair w/ plastic tray from community playthings. It’s used in a lot of high-end daycares and I loved it when I was a teacher. It’s been through my 3 kids and still looks almost brand spanking new!
http://www.communityplaythings.com/c/BabiesToddlers/HighChair/index.htm
I will THIRD Cagey on the Fisher-Price Health Care Booster. I bought it just so we’d have something portable for going out or on vacation, and I loved it so much that I immediately relegated our “big” highchair to the attic, and the booster is now the only thing we use. It’s very easy to use & easy to clean, and did I mention it’s easy to take with you? Like, it folds and stuff?
The tray was handy while my son was still wiping pureed foods around, but once he moved on to finger/table foods, we dumped the tray and started just pulling up the chair to the table so our son can eat with us.
Love, love, love this booster. If I had it to do all over again, I wouldn’t buy anything else.
Good luck!
Another vote here for the Fisher Price Healthy Care seat. Abby is 9 1/2 months old now and it’s the only high chair we’ve ever used. She loves that she’s sitting at the table with us, I love that it doesn’t take up half the kitchen and that it’s a snap to toss in the car when we’re headed off for the day or the weekend.
Also, it doesn’t SAY you can do this, but I can vouch for the fact that if you find yourself so irritated at a particularly messy meal that you just cannot STAND it, you can actually throw the WHOLE ENTIRE THING in the dishwasher and it will be just fine. (I did turn off the “heat of a thousand suns” drying temperature. I am easily irritated, but not entirely stupid.)
I do know some people who have the Eddie Bauer wooden high chair from Babies R Us and they like it a lot too. We have a teenytiny kitchen, so we went with the “zero floor space needed” option.
I got a similar one to that Target one at IKEA.
I had a wood Pa Ingalls type high chair for my first 5 kids. Then it got kinda yucky and I decided to replace it. I HATED the plastic one for all the same reasons. WHy all the grooves? Why does it recline? Why can’t I clean it with anything other than a hose hooked up to a fire hydrant and a toothbrush?
Finally one day I got so fed up I tossed it outside and began using one of those hook on seats.
I have the Eddie Bauer one from target. It’s all wood with a plastic tray and removable washable seat cover/cushion (kind of like a really nice looking restaurant one). I LOVE it. It sounds exactly like what you are looking for, so check it out.
I just looked around for one like the the one we used, and WOW, when did they get so complicated and… and… frilly!!! We had a plastic chair with 2 setting, a plastic “cushion” and it was garden hose friendly! I’m all for a restaurant style highchair… some of those things are insane!!!!
My niece loves her booster seat. We bought it because it was cheap, portable and didn’t take up too much room. It’s been a great purchase.
we switched to this http://shop.nurturecenter.com/metooporhook.html when my son was one. It’s SO much easier than having to clean the highchair all the time and takes up ZERO room.
Since TJ and I decided to start trying to have kids recently, I’ve been looking at things like car seats and high chairs. Good to know that I shouldn’t waste my money on those crazy million setting hightech all plastic crazy ones. But the wood ones look like the kid could slip right out. Let me know what you decide on!
After my first, I did away with high chairs completely. I just got this:
http://www.target.com/gp/detail.html/ref=br_1_22/601-8573645-8112145?%5Fencoding=UTF8&frombrowse=1&asin=B000056HKJ
Each of my girls has one, and now that the oldest has outgrown it I’ll hang on to it for baby #3. It reclines for the infant stage and sits up straight for when they’re older (trust me though, no amount of jumping will make it recline on its own. Not the easiest thing to do). It comes with a flat tray with no cracks or crevices which I use for the young-toddler years, but as they get older I just use the booster and have them eat at the table. I liked that this one had padding so it wasn’t a hard surface for them to sit on. And it comes off easily to toss it in the washer. If you have an extra chair at the dining table to strap it onto, I’d say this one’s the way to go!
I was going to mention the Eddie Bauer seat, but someone already did.
However, I also wanted to add that my husband takes Alex’s highchair out in the backyard and sprays it off with the hose on super-sonic jet setting.
It was getting gross and I came home one day and it was sparkling clean!
Alex also has a seat similar to the one Cagey posted that I took to his babysitter’s house because they didn’t have one for him. I’ve considered getting another one for home use.
I JUST got back from Target where I bought the Fisher Price Space Saver High Chair, because I had had ENOUGH with our cutesy plastic one with the cushion thing that never stayed in place, and the little seatbelt that was a JOKE because she could still stand up and twist all the way around.
The Fisher Price one has a FIVE POINT RESTRAINT harness in it. It does recline, and it does have the removeable tray, but it also converts to a booster chair. Plus it was on sale for $39.99.
I do love those plain wood ones, though. Last week we ate at Cracker Barrel and I asked if the highchair was for sale!
Pick up the kind that attaches to the table. I chucked our high chair into the back yard one night, I think it is still there…It’s replacement was a little booster type that folds up to take with you. And you can shove it in the dishwasher if you really want it clean. I found mine at the used baby store for 12 bucks. I have seen the new ones online made from cloth that is machine washable. With any luck she will be eating cheese sticks in the living room soon anyway. and the real question will be why is there cheese melted onto the couch cushions?
Yeah — went with the plastic travel booster seat/highchair the second time around and let me tell you….that is SO much better than the big hunkin chair with all the grooves and cracks and the recliner and junk. The whole thing fits in the dishwasher and just straps onto a regular chair and is so convenient and easy to clean. And only like $15 at Target.
Really wish I could go back in time and buy this the first time for my son. Would have saved so much time cleaning and hauling that thing back and forth to/from the table.
This is coming from a mommy to be so take it with a grain of salt but Eddie Bauer makes a wooden high chair with a plastic tray. My SIL has it and loves it. I’m seriously considering it as an option. Target sells it as do other places.
I also hate high chairs and all the damn cracks and crevices to clean. I have a 13 month old and have been using the Fisher Price Healthy care booster. I put a new towel under the booster to keep the chair clean and then throw the towel in the washer at night. The tray goes in the dishwasher at night. This chair is so easy to keep clean.
I also hate high chairs and all the damn cracks and crevices to clean. I have a 13 month old and have been using the Fisher Price Healthy care booster. I put a new towel under the booster to keep the chair clean and then throw the towel in the washer at night. The tray goes in the dishwasher at night. This chair is so easy to keep clean.
After I read this, I visited Nadine/Sweety’s website and saw a photo of her son’s new high chair. Don’t you wish you were in Holland right now?
http://www.helloworlditsme.com/archives/000757.php