Having lived through hundreds of road trips with dozens of children between us all, we’re no strangers to the joys (ahem) of keeping your child’s car seat clean. Or at least, attempting to. So on behalf or our newest sponsor, Evenflo, makers of some of our favorite car seats, we’ve got lots of great ideas for you, from a few BTDT moms who’ve seen (and smelled and wiped) it all.
Besides, have you seen the new Evenflo ProComfort line of car seats? Gorgeous. And we bet you’d like to keep them that way as long as possible. Especially because this line is specifically designed to keep kids so comfy – and less fussy kids means more parent eyes on the road.
We like that.
Don’t miss a chance to win an Evenflo ProComfort car seat of your own, below – it’s easy!Â
1. Remove the Car Seat Cover
The best way to clean your infant’s car seat is to take the cover off completely and give it a good scrub down. Check the manual that comes with the car seat to learn the best way to get the cover off, and for specific laundering instructions. Or, if you tossed it out ages ago, fortunately you can look up car seat manuals online through the manufacturer’s website.
2. Machine or Hand Wash
Once you’ve got the fabric cover off, toss it in the hand wash cycle in your machine on cold or wash it by hand, then put it in the dryer for about ten minutes (just the cover, not those straps). After that, take it out and let it air dry. Of course, check the manual for laundering instructions first. And be really careful not to damage any of the labels. You’ll be surprised that you’ll still want to check that info when your baby turns into a kid.
3. Clean the Base and Buckles
We’ve been known to fill our bathtubs up with some mild, foamy suds and let the plastic portion of the car seat (not the straps or metal parts, and definitely not the buckle!) soak to really get rid of the grime. If you want some help, stick your older kids in there with swimsuits and some sponges and let them do the hard part for you–they’ll love it. Seriously. If you really need to disinfect it further, you can wipe it down with some white vinegar.
You also want to inspect the crotch buckle on the restraint every so often and keep it clean to make sure you get proper latching. So it’s not just a cleanliness issue, it’s a safety one! You can just place the buckle in a cup of warm water and gently switch it back and forth, pressing the red button a few times. No soaps or detergents! Also, make sure not to submerge the harness strap in the water.
And it goes without saying that all the parts should be dry before you stick your child back in the seat. Mostly because she will hate it, otherwise. Kids are smart that way.
-Keep reading for a chance to win your own Evenflo ProComfort car seat of your choice-
4. Get Out the Stains
Stains are inevitable, but we’ve got some tips for how to get certain messes clean:
Food: We like to give those nasty, smushed, mystery snack stains a good scrub with a product like Honest Oxy Boost for a safe, non-toxic clean. You know, since your kid’s little hands are going to be all over it again later. We also like to keep a handheld vacuum in the garage–or in your trunk if it’s the kind you can charge in your car with an adapter. Or try the Dyson Car Cleaning kit which has the right tools to attach to any Dyson upright or canister vacuum.  This way you can clean up after snacks whenever you pull in the garage so they don’t get pulverized into the seat cushions over time.
Vomit: The trick to cleaning up after a carsick kid is to use cold water. Hot water will set the proteins and you’ll have a hard time getting that smell out. After you’ve soaked the stain, use baking soda and lemon juice to scrub the spot. Good luck. We feel your pain.
Diaper Explosions: The things we deal with as parents, right? As with vomit stains, you want to rinse off the mess in cold water, then soak it in warm water with a good stain remover for a long time–at least 30 minutes. Finally, wash it in the hottest water the laundering instructions for your car seat fabric will allow. Don’t dry the fabric until you’re sure the stain is out.
5. Contain Snacks to Begin With
Let’s be honest–cleaning out carseats are kind of a chore. So you’re going to want to keep it as clean as possible going forward. Keep kids’ snacks contained. We have plenty of ideas for great snack containers for the road. And if you’re letting your kids have a drink in the car, consider limiting sippie cups and reusable bottles to water. If you haven’t noticed, it’s way less sticky than juice, to say nothing of chocolate milk.
(Psst, we happen to love the cup holders in the Evenflo ProComfort Booster Seat, which is way preferable to your kid casually tossing the juice box you will end up giving her anyway onto the car floor.)
If you’ve got a younger toddler, you can also use a bib, provided you put it on over the straps after you’ve buckled your child in snugly. Anything extraneous under the car seat straps creates a loser fit and makes the car seat less safe as a whole.
6. Give Trash a Home
One of the best ways to keep those car seats and booster seats clean is pretty obvious—give your kids somewhere to put dirty stuff besides their laps. You can even let each child have his or her own trash can to create the feeling of ownership over their space in the car.
Go simple with a plastic cereal storage container from the grocery—that pop-up lid works great for little hands to drop messy things in, then close it up tight. You can also get a cute handmade travel trash can to hang over the seat back like these from Marketbags on Etsy, for around $16. Or hey, a plastic bag from the grocery store over the seat is just fine too. Whatever works for you and your kids.
7. Wipes, Wipes, and More Wipes
As most parents know, never leave home without more baby wipes than you think you need. Sometimes an ounce of prevention–i.e. wiping sticky hands, armrests, and car seats–is worth a pound of “what the heck is that stuff that’s ground in there anyway?”
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Thanks to our sponsor Evenflo, makers of three awesome new car seats available exclusively at Target.com and in their stores as of now.
Look for the Evenflo ProComfort Triumph LX Convertible Car Seat; the super fancy Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX All-in-One Car Seat;  and for older kids, the Evenflo ProComfort Amp LX High Back Booster.  The technology and safety innovations are super cool, by the way. You HAVE to check out the crazy awesome demo visuals of the gel matrix cushions that are designed to keep kids comfy longer–and comfy kids means safe kids.Â
EXTRA COOL: WIN IT! We’re giving away one Evenflo ProComfort car seat of your choice–up to a $249.99 value! To enter, please visit the link above, then tell us which of the three Evenflo ProComfort seats you’d like, AND tell us your best kid mess story. Funny, terrible…we want to hear it. Mostly so we don’t feel so alone here. You can enter through Weds, July 30 at midnight PT. One winner will be drawn at random. US only please, one entry per person, void where prohibited. Good luck!
I love the ProComfort Symphony DLX (and will totally keep it in mind when we move to convertible in a month or two).
We’ve just started solids so messy is where we are at right now. As for best/worst? Let’s just say it took all of one day for me to start picking up food from the floor to give it back to the baby. This is normal, right?
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX!
My messiest car seat story actually involves our first Evenflo convertible. I handed my rear-facing 3yo a cheese sandwich to snack on while I drove. She ate the bread but proceeded to complain about the cheese. I thought I was so smart when I told her since there was nowhere to get rid of it, she just had to eat it! The silence that followed assured me I was a brilliant parent. Until I got home and realized she had carefully and meticulously stuffed every morsel of that cheese into her car seat buckle. It was beyond jammed. We had to cut her out and used that car seat as a toy in the house for several more years.
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX. Recently on a road trip my 3 year old stuffed hard-boiled egg into the hole the crotch strap comes out of. Ick, the stench!
After a long car ride to visit my mom in Maryland (we are in Georgia), when we crossed the GA state line from South Carolina I started to notice a funky, nasty smell in the car. I asked my husband if he farted and he said no. I then asked my 2yr old daughter and she laughed and said no. I didn’t think anymore about it, but the smell stuck around. Finally, one exit from our turn off I turned around to hand my daughter a sippy and noticed mass quantities of poop coming out of the legs of her shorts and now rubbed all over the carseat. Yuck!!! We had to pull over early, strip everything off her and the carseat and she had to ride the rest of the way with no padding in just a diaper. Oh, and we rolled the windows down all the way in Georgia in August! Nasty!
AMP lx high back booster is my choice.
I would like to win the Symphony DLX.
We had lot of messiest stories with our 1st kid, but the one I remember the most happened on our way to Niagara from NJ. It was a 8 hour drive and she threw up midway. It was almost dark and we didn’t have any rest area for the next 30-40miles. We had to clean up the mess with lots of tissues, change her and continue the rest of the journey with a smelly baby and smelly car. We washed it after reaching our hotel and imagine what happened the next day. She threw up again. I was almost in tears and swore never to go on long journeys till the kid is much older. Now I have a 10 month old, don’t know what is in store for us yet..
I’d love the Symphony DLX! I love the recline feature.
Until she was about 4, our first daughter would get sick every time we traveled. I got very good at getting out the vomit smell. After that, it was melted crayons. It didn’t take me long to forbid crayons in the car from April to October in the South!
The Symphony DLX would rock the house for us!
The worst thing I’ve had to clean up from a car seat was a diaper blowout that covered the bottom of the car seat and seemed to literally explode on to the door. It was EVERYWHERE! We were out for the day so I had to clean it up using wipes and spare clothing from the car.
The stench was overwhelming but the kid went from cranky to rather pleasant as whatever intestinal distress he had passed.
I would love the symphony DLX.
We have eight (!) kids, so car seats have been part of our life for YEARS. We’ve had some good ones, and we’ve had some real lemons, as far as comfort goes. My five year old has SPD, and the Amp LX high back booster looks like heaven! I think my favorite car seat mess story was the time my toddler tried to shove an entire Cadbury Creme chocolate egg in her mouth at once. We were on the way home from Grandma’s Easter Egg Hunt. It was the size of her whole mouth, and I tried to get her to wait until we got home. But if course she wouldn’t, and of course it was too much, and of course she carpeted crying and then spitting it out! And then, by some perverse reversal of gravity – or toddler action – it was EVERYWHERE. Oh boy, did we get our money’s worth out of that candy! I was amazed at how far that filling spread. The good news is, I got a picture. So someday when she is older, I can remind her how much we love her.
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX… I really thought my 2 year old was a fantastic eater because it seemed like everytime I gave him a snack pack he ate everything in it. Goldfish, cookies, raisins, crackers, etc… Until the day I brought my car to the car wash. .. I took the seat out to remove the crumbs and had millions of goldfish crackers fall all over the ground. It was surreal and there was nothing I could do but laugh. Guess there was a pretty giant hiding hole under the seat cover. Glad they had a vacuum.
Love the Symphony DLX!
I’ve had the poopsplosion that leaks through the cracks of the car seat. I think every single time it’s happened that badly we were on a road trip. Of course!
I would like to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX. The messiest car seat story I have is when my son had an accident on the rode and due to potty training forgot to mention that he had to ‘go’ so he tried to hide the poop in the cracks and sides of the seat!
Would love to win the Amp LX High Back Booster for our toddler who will soon outgrow his current car seat!
My son had begged for a chocolate chip cookie and milk while we were at the mall, so I bought him one and he ate it happily. Then, just as we pulled into the drive and opened the garage, he threw it all up all over himself and the car seat! Wish he would’ve waited the few more minutes until we got into the house… it definitely made for an interesting afternoon of cleaning. It didn’t ruin his appetite for cookies thought! 🙂
The Evenflow ProComfort Symphony. We’ve had a few rancid cleanups following soft serve ice cream. Dairy can be deadly yucky.
Puke in the car seat straps almost did me in twice.
I would love the Amp LX High Back booster with ProComfort. Other boosters seem so uncomfortable- this one looks secure and comfy. The worst thing I ever had to clean up was Cheetos vomit. Our oldest son threw up after a 4 hr car ride on the way to a Texas Longhorn football game. Not the best way to start a tailgate! Oh well, at least it was the right color! Ewww
The ProComfort Symphony DLX. The funniest thing I’ve ever had to clean out of the car seat – and the back of the car – was about 5000 post it flags. My briefcase was on the seat between the boys and my oldest got bored. At least it wasn’t gross!
Symphony DLX baby!!! It looks awesome! I just spent 2 hours with a rented carpet cleaning machine trying to get the URINE out of my cloth seats. Too bad I can’t get it out of the straps of the car seat. I really need this!!! Toddler potty training sucks!!
We have been doing lots of road tripping the past month, just my little and I, So we have had all sorts of mess in the car seat this month. Crackers, string cheese, sandwich, mashed grapes, you name it. I’m so glad that the cover comes off and goes in the wash!
I would love to win the Symphony, every 2 months I try to clean the carseat but it is very difficult
I like the ProComfort Symphony DLX. We really need a “big kid” car seat for our peanut 4 year old. My favorite messy kid is anyone covered in the food of a good meal. That they dog then wants to lick off!
Evenflo® ProComfort Amp LX Belt Positioning Booster
My daughter gets carsick a lot. The worst was lots of yogurt coming at the beginning of a trip to the beach. Wipes can only do so much. My older son was gagging the rest of the trip. Yuck!
Ohh, the procomfort symphony DLX looks fabulous in Cambridge.
My worst clean up was vomit, but the worst part of that was realizing that, even though I had searched for the instructions, they were still hiding in their secret (too secret!) pocket when I put the cover in the washer. They came out in 80,000 pieces over the next few wash cycles.
Interested in the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX! And on a road trip, our little one had the stomach flu and vomited several times. At the time she was in an infant carrier, and all of the vomit leaked through the seat cracks and collected in the car seat base! We also had a few #2 issues as well. There was a god period of time where the babe rode on top of a plastic grocery bag, until her bowels solidified a little.
We would absolutely love to win the pro comfort symphony dxl!
Our most recent backseat mess, that still hasn’t been cleaned up, is the melted chocolate bar smears wiped on the window.
We would absolutely love the Amp LX high back booster! 3 boys and the last one nearly ready for a booster. So ready to be finished with the car seat phase! We have had our share of messes! I think the worst mess to clean up has to be throw up. We just recently found that the commercial vacuums at the car wash are fabulous for a quick clean of the cars seats!
love the Symphony DLX All-in-One Car Seat
I love the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX! Our WORST car seat mess is beyond gross, but since you asked….Our son is exactly one year and 5 days older then our twin girls. Driving home from grandma’s house one of our girls pooped. I pulled over to change her because the smell was horrible and we still had 15 miles till home. I picked her up out of her car seat before I noticed that she had gotten poop EVERYWHERE! Windows, buckles, her clothes, the seat and now me! I gaged just once, but that was enough to make my son throw up! When my son threw up my other daughter got sick as well! So here we were all covered in poop & vomit crying (yes I cried to) in a Cracker Barrel parking lot. NOT MY BEST MOM MOMENT!
Love these products. I would love the all in one seat.
Too, the messiest of stories have to do with a long road trip and potty training…need I say more?
Love the Symphony GLX.
Our almost one year old is mostly messy in the high chair. Throwing and mushin food is her favorite hobby. Once we went to dinner and once we got to the car I realized she had a poopy diaper. I prefer to change her in the car so got started. She was in the flip over and squirm phase so we got a little messy but not too too terrible. I eventually opted to let her stand while I cleaned her off. Finally finished, she peed all over our seats. I’d never been more thankful for leather in my life.
the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat would be best for my littlest! and my 2 year old got sick from some food at a bbq this summer… so in almost 100 degree heat he projectile vomited all over himself and the back of my seat… and we still had an hour to get home… stinky stinky. i stuck the whole carseat in the tub. grossss
I’d love to with a secure kid!
The worst thing I’ve had to clean is vomit. The nail polish and pen were much more interesting!
Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX is just awesome I love the design and safety features of it. So many messes with my three kiddos the worst I think is my daughter was at a friends house and the little girl had given her a bottle of kids hello kitty finger nail polish in a bright blue. I had no idea until on the way I smelled something and pulled over and it had come undone in her pocket and leaked out all over my new cars seats. It took a lot to get that off I was just thankful it was the kids stuff.
I would choose the symphony DLX with pro comfort carseat.
My worst and grossest kid mess story would have to be when my nephew’s diaper had a blowout and he decided to play in it. This would not necessary be too bad of a clean up, however he decided to feed the dog and the dog became sick. So not one mess, but two messes in the back of my car. yuck!
The Symphony DLX ProComfort car seat seems awesome!
Last year, my 3 sisters, my 3 year old son, and I were making our way to my grandpa’s funeral. Just as we pull into the cemetery, my son said he felt sick and before we could park he vomited all over himself and one of my sisters! Fortunately, we had a change of clothes for my son, but my sister was stuck in what she had on!
i like the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat! as for kid messes- UGH there have been quite a few. I do however remember finding a burger underneath the car seat, it had fossilized and shrank several inches. was like a hockey puck.
Wow. The Symphony DLC looks awesome!! Would love to have that for my youngest kiddo (5 months).
My worst carseat clean-up story. Mom and dad being brave, getting ready for a big road trip with 2-year old son. Best of intentions, we start with a hearty, healthy breakfast of delicious, feta and spinach-infused scrambled eggs. Wonderful! Head out on the road….
…
45 minutes later, partially digested egg, spinach, and feta (oh, the smell!) all over the back of the front passenger seat, all over the car floor, and all over our cutie. Unbeknownst to us, he’d caught a nasty flu bug and this was the first sign of trouble. Needless to say, we’d not brought enough wipes with us. Nothing for it but to stop at the nearest gas station and try to clean things up as best we could. Unforgettable trip!!
I’d have to choose the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat in Cambridge
I have 3 children. 7, 2,5 and 6 months and my first mess story just happened last week. My youngest is breastfed and only goes every 3 days. Yup, we were in the car when he went. When I picked him up, it gushed out everywhere. Being on vacation meant we had limited supplies, we laid him on a garbage bag in the car and cleaned him up best we could. Thankfully we were back at the hotel, so I carried him up in just his clean diaper and then gave him a bath in the sink. The car seat got washed as best I could too… So gross, but I threw it in the washer when we got home.
I’d love the Evenflo Symphony DLX All-In-One. My oldest son has the Symphony 65 e3 and we love it! I highly recommend these seats to everyone I know. I’ve had some minor incidents as a mom, but my messiest story actually came before I had my own children and was caring for my nephew. We were riding down the Interstate when my nephew started projectile vomiting. It went all over him, down in his seat, all over the seat in front of him, on me in the front passenger seat…actually, I’m not sure there was a surface that wasn’t covered. He had just reached the stage where he traveled with the bare necessities so there was little to nothing to clean him and the car up. We pulled into the nearest convenient store and grabbed paper towels one at a time from the dispenser. He got a quick sink bath and we rode back home with the windows down! I guess this moment served to break me into the joys of motherhood and spontaneous messes. I have a box in my car with clean up supplies just in case at all times.
Exploding diaper on the bar when we visited a winery, enough said.
I would love the symphony DLX. Ice cream after visiting grandmother, kids got ice cream Everywhere!!
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Triumph LX car seat for my son.
We’ve had lots of sad car-seat mess stories. The saddest involved vomit projected with such force that I needed to wash my hair. The car seat was covered in a cooling mesh-like material and needed to be scrubbed by hand. Then the straps needed to be hand-washed AFTER I removed them from the seat with a Phillips head screwdriver. No sooner than I had gotten the seat clean and returned to the car, he refused to eat the cheese that came in the lunchable and mashed it into the mesh. AAAAAH!
I would love the: Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat. Best messy story was after a couple of days of constant rain, we were all outside and the kiddo was running back and forth with the dog on the run, staying just far enough away from her, somehow she stepped to close trying to avoid the mud and she caught her feet up in the chain and did a flip and ending up covered in mud from head to toy. Of course the dog thought she was still playing and started rolling all around with her in the mud.
I would love the ProComfort Amp LX Belt Positioning Booster. On a road trip, my 1 year old leaned over and somehow barfed right into the speaker on the car door. We cleaned it up as best we could, but there is no way we can get it all out of the little crevices in the speaker. When it gets hot, our car still smells really really bad.
The Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat would be perfect for my granddaughter due in October.
The worst messy story I remember from when my boys were little is my coming home from work to find my husband had made spaghetti, and while taking our 4 year old to the bathroom, had left our 3 and 2 year old sons at the table with their plates. They decided to play catch with their meatballs and then with their noodles. Several months later I was up on a chair cleaning the ceiling fan and discovered some spaghetti noodles hiding on top of one of the blades.
The Triumph LX Convertible would be perfect for my little girl who turns one on Friday August 1st. It’s a massive struggle getting her into her current baby car seat, thank you for doing a review on these car seats,it helps us narrow it down to what we like 🙂 Okay so my messy sorry begins yesterday morning when I was headed to my doctors office. My daring little one decided to have a blow in her car seat I think that’s her way of telling me she’s done with it and wants a new lol. Oh but that’s not all I go to pull her out and of course it’s all over the car seat and her back…. but wait it it’s gets better it gets all over my hand. Once I managed to get to the restroom I’m changing her and of course she won’t sit still because that would be too easier so in my distress and singing lol I give her the cars that she decides she doesn’t want and tosses them and can you guess where they land? yup! in the diaper at this point I started to laugh out loud literally! I finally get her, myself and the keys all cleaned and head into my doctors office. Geeeez if that’s not a mommy moment I don’t know what is 🙂 It’s in her Journal now and when she is older we can both read it and laugh about it all over again 🙂 sorry I hope that’s not too gross.
I would love the DLX All-in-One. My messiest story is when I went grocery shopping with a friend. She had gotten a couple of those cans of puffs for her daughter. The grocery bags were next to her daughter in the car on the way home. Somehow…her daughter got one of the cans, opened it, poured out all of the puffs (trying to eat them) and had them smashed all over the place!
We would love the Symphony DLX, my little one is using an expired seat because we can’t afford a new one. The worst car seat mess was this juicy paste concoction my daughter made. She had a juice drink and snack that she managed to cover herself in, head to toe. The worst part was the aftermath, I carried her into the house and we both were covered in this worse-than-vomit stank. Not to mention the smell refuses to leave the car.
I would love the Symphony. One of my messiest is one of my daughters was about 4. I had left them home with hubby and upon my return I had polaroid pictures shown to me.. she had gotten into the fridge and got a few cups of chocolate pudding out and opened up on the love seat, she and the seat was covered in chocolate.
Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat and We were traveling with my son and he got sick and threw up all over him self , his clothes and car seat. So we stopped at target and bought him some new clothes and cleaned him up and the carseat .
We would love the Evenflow Procomfort Symphony DLX Convertible Carseat! We’re about to outgrow the infant seat. We once went on a 19 hour trip and upon stopping to get gas, we did a diaper check. We had to strip him down in the middle of a gas station there was so much poop. We get going and 10 minutes down the road baby number two has a massive blowout. The worst was we we running out of plastic bags to store poppy clothes in and wipes! I had such a headache from the smell.
I like the Symphony DLX. I don’t have children yet so I have no stories!
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX All-in-One Car Seat for my son.
Once when we were leaving my parents to come home my Mom handed my son his sippy cup which she had filled for the ride which was two hours long. I didn’t ask what was in the cup and just assumed that it was apple juice.
About half way there I hear my son get sick in the car and as I turned to look he told me that his sissy was bleeding. At that time all I could see was red and was horrified with the thought that something had happened.
I found a parking lot quickly and pulled over to find out what had happened only to find that my mom had filled the sippy cup with Hawaiian punch and when he had thrown up he had leaned and she was covered in it.
Needless to say I gladly cleaned every one as good as I could on the side of the road. Till I could get them home and into the tub.
But I was never so happy to see red throw up in my life.
jweezie43[at]gmail[dot]com
The symphony DXL looks super comfy and safe for our little guy!
We’d love the Symphony DLX! We’ve definitely had some icky car seat moments, but consistently it is COVERED in mystery crumbs! Baby girl barely eats in the car. Where do they come from?!
My husband and I are grandparents of two adorable, energetic, and very messy boys. We just watched them overnight and did a major clean up on the car seats. (Please don’t ask me to identify the source of the biohazard!) The little guy’s seat looks brand new. The other car seat is five years old and ready for replacement. A ProComfort Amp LX Belt Positioning Booster would be the perfect choice.
I would choose the Evenflo v Procomfort Symphony DLX.
Recently while out at lunch with my mother, my son had a massive blowout in his infant carseat. We were only about halfway through our food, and no amount of wipes seemed to be making a difference. We quickly wheeled the stroller into the mall’s family bathrooms only to discover a small lake of poo under the seat padding. Thankfully my mom was there to help make me laugh, because I really just wanted to cry.
She later joked that the manager of the restaurant we were at called her up and offered her a gift card… to a different restaurant!
The Symphony definately looks the most versatile and comfy. Although I do like the triumph as well.
Evenflow Symphony DLX would be our choice for our sassy 10 month old girl!!
Besides her normal day to day dumping of puffs all over, and sucking her finger in the sippy cup and turning it over so that it goes everywhere. When she was about 4 months old we were on an putting with an out of town friend. My little girl decided to show our friend exactly what having a baby is all about. Yes she had a blow out! Up her back… And of course as a new mom, the only back up clothes I had were to small.. So she had to suffer with just her zip up sweat shirt, a diaper and socks…
I got into my car one day to the most awful smell! I completely cleaned out the car, vacuumed and cleaned everything, but the smell was still there, still awful. Even a full detailing didn’t get rid of the smell. Turns out one of the kids left milk from a supposedly spill proof cup in the back seat, but the lid wasn’t on all the way, so it leaked into the seat of the car. We had to replace the entire back seat. We now have the back seat covered to avoid these kinds of accidents in the future!
I would love to have the Symphony DLX for my 2 month old. She HATES the infant car seat we have for her that we also used with our now 3 year old. I have been searching for something for comfortable for her and I adore that this seat would last her forever. It seems like a great solution for us. Thank you for holding such a great giveaway!!
I think my son would LOVE the Symphony All-in-One. He currently has no cup holders on his seat, so talk about a mess! The biggest mess my little scooter has made to date is crayon “art” all over his bed sheet mixed in with a little fresh-from-the-diaper poo. He’s my little Picasso!!
I like the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX best. One unfortunate event we had was when our little one decided to let loose when we were on a trip to visit the Grandparents. THe seat got soiled badly and we finally got things under control after pulling over.
I’d love to win the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat.
With 3 kids (6 mos, 2 years and 3 years), we have lots of messy stories. One of the worst was after travelling for 2 days to Arkansas for a relaxing (ha!) family vacation with the in-laws, we were almost there. We had about 2 hours left in our travel, when our oldest got sick. Puke everywhere and a car stuffed to the gills. We were able to stop on the side of a road and get her cleaned up – but the car stunk so bad. And it was pushing 100 degrees outside. A bad combination indeed. We ended up having to drive down the interstate with the windows down the remaining portion of the trip.
I would love to have the ProComfort Symphony DXL!
I don’t have a particularly bad “messy” story. But our car seats are always dirty. My daughter has several severe food allergies, and we love to take road trips. In order to keep her safe at meal time, we often eat at our seats in the car. Everything from apple juice to soy cheese to hot dogs have been ground into the fabric or lost under the seat covers!
The Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat looks pretty swanky! My almost 2 year old would love it.
I have three kids, so I have a lot of messy car stories…I think the worst one was probably when my youngest vomited milk all over the van and we were on an interstate with no place to pull over. I was alone with the 3 kids. We drove to the next exit, pulled into a parking lot and I did my best to clean her up with wipes until we got home and could sanitize…everything.
I think the ProComfort Symphony DXL would work best for us.
Thankfully, I think our kids are pretty clean (as kids go). Of course there’s the random handfulls of cheerios, teddy grahams, and other snacks, but not much that you can’t get out with a vacuum cleaner.
The Symphony DLX All in One looks great!
It would be perfect for my almost two year old. He’s been known to drop blueberries in his carseat and walk around with purple spots on his bottom. Not to bad compared to some other stories, we’ve been lucky so far (crossing fingers).
Be careful of blueberries! See my longer post for why. 🙂
The Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat looks amazing. I guess the messiest story I can think of is when my 3 year old daughter decided to dump an entire bottle of baby powder in the back seat… it was a chore 🙂
When my daughter was 13 months old, we were embarking on a five hour car trip to a relative’s funeral. About one hour into the drive, she projectile puked bright orange macaroni and chewed up veggies all over herself, the car seat and car in general. We had to pull into the first fast food restaurant we saw and try to change her clothes (luckily I pack lots of extras) and clean her hair with baby wipes. My husband did his best to clean out the car seat and car, but the stench was almost unbearable. To top things off, the poor baby puked AGAIN half an hour later.
i will pick Evenflo ProComfort Triumph LX Convertible Car Seat and the worst story i have is lollipops stuck everywhere.
I would love to win the triumph LX!
My messiest car seat cleanup was barf (like a lot of other people’s) but my funniest mess story was when my son used a whole bottle of lotion on my daughter’s head! At least they can’t touch each other in the car yet:)
Mine are so big that the only seat I could use is the Amp LX High Back Booster.
The worst mess I’ve ever had to clean from the car didn’t technically involve the car seat, although I’ve had vomit, poop, milk, and 10,000,000,000 unidentifiable crumbs and Legos there.
The worst was blueberries. I let the kids have some in the car, on the way somewhere. My older “responsible” child closed the plastic box and set it on the floor. When we got in, we didn’t think about it.
Somehow, I have no idea how, it got wedged under the front seat, invisibly.
A week later, my car was full of flies. It was horrible. HORRIBLE. Beyond gross. Creepy. Icky. Disturbing. Awful.
I cleaned the car. I vacuumed the car. I scrubbed the car seats and the regular seats and the floor and the trunk. I applied every cleaning product I could think of using.
Nothing helped but time.
A month or so later, there were no more flies.
Six or seven months later, I was looking for something that slipped under the front seat. I found a container, half-full, of desiccated blueberries. (And presumably, fly larvae.)
The DLX! My most disgusting spill was the typical baby blow out! Luckily she hadn’t started eating food yet!
This post is so timely! My daughter fell asleep in her car seat and urinated all over it. It is the type of seat that cannot be machine washed so I’ve rubbed it down with cleaner and sprayed it with vinegar, the smell is mostly gone, however I still get strong whiffs of vinegar, better than urine I suppose. Anyway, I would love to win the Amp LX High Back Booster, two in one! Nice!
We would LOVE to win the Amp LX High Back Booster! After last weekend, we could really use one! We are in the throes of potty training and had a potty emergency on the high way in the middle of no where. After some quick thinking and use of an empty water bottle, we got the situation taken care of….or so we thought. My husband left the bottle unattended in the cup-holder next to my son’s car seat. One dexterous 2 year old + a full bottle = BIG need for a new car seat!
The Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat looks like what I need, my little boy has brittle bones and has to be in a lower body cast whenever he breaks his legs. One of the problems with that is most car seats aren’t wide enough to accommodate his body cast, this one looks like it would work great! and speaking of messy car seats…a 1 year old in a spica cast for 6 weeks = disaster (did I mention they can’t wear a diaper while they are in a spica cast)
I would love to win the Evenflo ProComfort AMP LX Booster in the Walker color!
My daughter had reflux as an infant so it she went through several wardrobe changes a day. More recently, it’s been abstract artwork on our hardwood floors…ugh!
i would like the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX. my kid mess story is from last weekend. our son ate something made him sick. we couldn’t get home in time and he got sick all over himself and all over the car on the way home from school. it was a huge mess.
I like the DLX all in one carseat.
I like the Symphony DLX. I think it would work longer and my baby could grow up to the 110 pounds before they would grow out of it.
You leave me wheezing with laughter and slightly shell-shocked after this amusing yet ultimately terrifying glimpse into the future. With only 17 months as a mom under my belt, I am afraid I can’t compete in terms of vomit, snack stuffing, crayon melting, or even blueberry zombification. I do have a good car seat mess story, though! It involves…water. Just water. Because after the requisite infant poosplosion, dismantling of entire freaking seat, washing of cover, and watching of three hundred
YouTube tutorials on how to get the seat cover back on with all of the straps in the right place, I was done. I was absolutely NOT going to have to clean this car seat again. No snacks in the car. No bottles. No popsicles. NEVER!
A water bottle should be fine, though, right? Hydration is important! And after all, it’s just water. And besides, it’s keeping her so happy and quiet…
Which it was. Because she’d apparently spent the entire trip painstakingly pouring every drop into her lap. But, good news! Diapers are absorbent! Hers had valiantly tried to keep up…until (bad, bad news)…it burst.
You know how disposable diapers have those little absorbent crystals that turn the pee into a sort of jiggly yellow snow? And occassionally one will escape the diaper and you have to spend valuable wiping time chasing it around their darling tush? EVERYWHERE. It was a yellow snow blizzard. And they turn out to be really hard to clean up. If you wipe them while they’re wet, they break up into tinier and tinier pieces and smear all over. If you ‘get clever’ and let them dry, the grains are so tiny they get lost in every miniscule crevice, seam, and loop of carpet.
Where they STILL lurk till this day, waiting for a damp foggy morning, some dew-soaked shoes, a humid afternoon…ANY moisture at all. Which they then yank from the air and convert into the sweet, glamorous odor of Eau du Really Stale Urine until they dry out again. It’s like bottled Crazy Cat Lady.
In my van.
Oh! And did I mention I live in Seattle?
The ProComfort Triumph LX Convertible would be my choice. I love the idea of pockets to keep the buckles out of the sun…and covers that come off without rethreading drama!
I like the symphony. The time my son pooped up the back of his diaper and down onto my pants and feet….yuck!!
The Evenflo ProComfort Amp LX High Back Booster would be poifect for our 4 year old. As the youngest of three, she has her share of hand-me-downs (including stained and well-used stuff!) and she and her two brothers have been responsible for many a mess in our van. My favorite has to be the mysterious odor of unknown origin which hung around for months until I took the seats out and discovered an ancient vanilla milkshake spill under the backseat. No one copped to this crime, even my middle child, who is the ONLY one who orders vanilla milkshakes!
the Symphony DLX.
they got sick on the highway so I only was able to clean it up
The ProComfort Symphony DLX looks wonderful! Our messiest story involves a dry erase crayon left in a seat and a stop for lunch on a road trip. Suffice it to say that the seat was in the sun, and by the time we came back, there was a dry erase crayon puddle. We cleaned it up as best we could and then washed the cover a week later once we got home, but it still has large purple stains. I suppose that gives it more character.
I would probably choose the Evenflo Triumph LX Convertible Car Seat.
I am colorblind & one day my son came in from playing with blood all over his little face. I was freaking out…I kept saying…”How did this happen? How did this happen?” As I took a wash cloth to his face, gently trying to find the cause of all this blood, he said, “Mama I eat Hershey bar”. Dang!
Amp LX High back booster
I drove 15 mins to the grocery store with my 8 month old and he was very chilled all the way there. I got the cart, lined with the cart cover so he would nice and comfy. I opened the car door and there it was – the biggest blowout of all time. He was wearing just a onesie with no shorts or pants (as it was summer in Texas) and he had them on his hands (yes, hands) and I just prayed that he hadn’t put any in his mouth.
I didn’t have my diaper bag (big mistake), so I had to drive all the way home, getting him to try and clap his hands or holding his hand (at stop lights) so that he wouldn’t suck his thumb. The most stressful 15 mins car ride home. Then i had to dunk him the bath.
NEVER want to have that happen again.
Would love ProComfort Symphony DLX All-in-One Car Seat!
Our then one month old had a liquidy poop explosion and my husband had to rush her into the nearest restroom & give her a bath in the sink. As first time parents, we were flustered beyond belief. However, when it happened the second time during our coffee outing, we calmly cleaned her up and enjoyed our cup of coffee before leisurely heading back home.
I would choose the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat–the reviews are glowing!
Our “best” mess happened pretty recently. My son had a blowout poop experience in the backseat of my car (his car seat was safe). Thank goodness we were visiting a friend and I could just carry him inside and stick him in the shower. Yikes!
I would choose the Evenflo ProComfort Symphony DLX Convertible Car Seat. We’ve been pretty lucky avoiding messes. I don’t like to give my little one food while he’s in his seat but I did it three weeks ago and of course the food got everywhere. I haven’t cleaned it yet… There are dry food stains everywhere. Lesson learned.