Baby’s First Wheels!

Advice from Real Bump Club Chicago Moms-to-Be

By guest blogger: Andrea Winitsky Rubin

When my husband and I decided to trade in our trusty ’99 Saab for something a bit more “baby friendly” it took us only a day to decide on the perfect mom-mobile SUV. Therefore, I figured picking out a stroller for our daughter-to-be (due 11/1) would be easy peasy. Not quite!

We began our stroller adventures at the highly recommended Galt Toys + Galt Baby, where we stood shell-shocked until a helpful sales associate, Sam, rescued us. We filled Sam in about some important deets about our lifestyle:

• We enjoy long strolls with our pup during the few warm months in Chicago
• We occasionally jump in the car for errands and may even start going to the grocery store once we have a kid
• We want a stylish stroller (Ok, that request was from me, not my husband)

I left Galt knowing more about strollers than I do about restaurants in Chicago (a topic I’m very well informed on) and was pretty sure we were going to end up with the Bugaboo Cameleon, one of the priciest of the bunch, but it seemed to meet our needs.

Before making the $1000 Bugaboo splurge we decided to do a bit more research and continued to check out strollers at Lazar’s Juvenile Furniture and Land of Nod. The Bugaboo Cameleon was still looking pretty good, although we questioned if the Baby Jogger City Select would be better since it easily converts into a double. I’m still getting used to the idea of 1 kid, but may decide to pop out another one in a few years. And the Jetson-Like Orbit looked pretty cool, although we didn’t love the idea that it’s compatible with only their car seat.

My husband, who surprisingly is as excited about stroller shopping as he is about new TVs, discovered the website Baby Gizmo where he watched stroller video reviews for days. Based on his video research he decided what we really needed was a cool European stroller like the Mutsy 4rider or the iCandy Apple. I even asked one of my European colleagues to keep an eye out for them on the streets of London.

We took one last trip to the new Lincoln Park location of Galt Baby, to check out my husband’s beloved Mutsy and iCandy strollers. We were informed that they haven’t sold the Mutsy in over a year due to poor sales and they’d even give us a discount on the iCandy since they were trying to get rid of them. The sales rep told us what we really needed was the Bugaboo Bee, which we had been previously told did not fit our needs. Aaahhh- I certainly hope deciding on kindergarten is easier!

After a day of quizzing people on the streets about their strollers (yep, we’ve become THOSE people) and putting our friends to sleep with stroller talk over dinner we walked into a Bump Club registry event at Giggle. It was here we discovered the UPPAbaby Vista:

• Sleek style
• Somewhat easy to collapse (folds with the seat on it)
• Large storage basket
• Less expensive than the Bugaboo Cameleon

One drawback to the UPPAbaby is that it’s a bit heavy so we’re going to purchase the Baby Jogger City Mini as a second traveling stroller. New moms tell me the Graco SnugRider is another must. My husband and I may need only 1 car to get around Chicago, but I have a feeling our daughter mayhave 5 strollers by the time her 1^st bday rolls around.