Why do we insist on buying expensive chairs for our children before they are even born?? I am sick to my stomach when I think of the amount of “stuff” we procured, only to see it sitting idle.

Recently – before our daughter was born – we purchased all new furniture for our house, and used an incredible designer (shoutout to Shauna Walton Design). Our house is epic, and beautiful. Our choice of colours, fabrics, and designs were painstakingly selected (more by Shauna than us). So, it seemed natural that when we picked our baby chairs, we wold want something beautiful and sleek to match our house.

We just assumed that all chairs were created equal, so we opted for the more expensive beautiful Danish design. Big mistake.

It seems that when it comes to children’s stuff, the cheaper wackier coloured options are so much better.

We purchased two chairs for our daughter, the Baby Bjorn Bouncer and the 4Mom BouncerRoo. The Baby Bjorn Bouncer costs $270 + $70 for the toy add on while the 4Moms BouncerRoo costs $150 + $50 for the baby insert. Our daughter doesn’t particularly like either, and won’t spend more the 5 to 10 minutes* in either – yes, $420 spent on a couple minutes.

We needed an additional chair for my in-laws house, and didn’t want to spend that much money again, so we decided to get one of the cheapest options available on Amazon, the Bright Starts Safari Smiles Bouncer. This bouncer costs $40.

And, you know what happened?? Haddie could spend an hour in the $40 Bright Starts Safari Smiles Bouncer.

We’ve seen this time and time again – we try to buy something that best suits the style and decor of our house for big bucks, and Haddie doesn’t care for it. We buy the cheapest and most ugly things (not sacrificing safety), and she loves them.

I don’t know the price of other swings, but we inherited a 5 year old Fisher-Price Cradle N Swing, and it was the best thing in the world. It takes up a lot of room, and is ugly as sin, but our daughter loved napping in this thing from 1 week old until 4 and a half months old. We just removed it from our house last week, and it was so sad to see it go. This swing style is a must.

So, to hell with design and decor. To hell with overpriced crap. Give me the cheapest (yet safest) crap out there.

Notes:

* Important note: the Baby Bjorn Bouncer is good for a child up to 5 years old, so there is still a hope that we will get value of this chair later down the road.