Getting Out of the House

It's so hard to believe that during the first 6 months of the boys' lives, there were sometimes weeks that went by where we didn't leave the house.  In fact the boys never really left the house unless they had a doctor's appointment.  Part of this was because I was so protective of them when they were little.  I didn't want to risk getting my precious and fragile preemies sick by exposing them to the outside world.  And then, of course, the ugly winter came.  Not only did I not want to drag my sweet babies out in the cold snowy weather, I myself didn't want to be out in it.

Then spring hit and everything changed.  I was ready to get these boys out into the world.  They needed fresh air.  They needed experiences.  So, starting in March, I began go on lots of walks with the boys.  A couple times I took our Triple Decker stroller but soon decided I would rather take out the double jogger and wear a baby.

Aside from frequent walks, here are some of the other places we've been in the last couple months:

• Lawrence St. Patty's Day parade/Buffalo Wild Wings
• Mi Ranchito
• Kansas City Zoo
• Bass Pro Shop to see the Easter Bunny
• Consignment sale
• Gracie's first birthday party
• Paige's Baby Shower/Backyard Bash
• March for Babies walk
• Deanna Rose Farmstead (twice)
• Multiples of KC play date

Last week, I had a 8 day streak of leaving the house with the boys.  Some of those were just walks, others were actual outings.  Regardless, I'm really proud of myself that I'm not longer afraid to leave the house with three babies.  Sure, it's a lot of work to get them all packed up to go, and I'm always nervous that someone is going to act out, but so far I haven't regretted a single outing.  And now that I have a nice new triple stroller, I'm sure we'll be leaving the house even more.  I'm looking forward to checking out the OP Arboretum and story time at the library.  My sister-in-law Jen and I plan on taking the crew to the zoo again next Monday.  Can't wait!

First zoo trip of the season

Easter at Bass Pro Shop

Deanna Rose with cousin Dakota

March for Babies

Loving the new stroller!

Fun at Deanna Rose

Too much fun at Paige's shower

Nolan snoozing with Mandra

Ollie's out!

Neighborhood walk

New Triple Stroller

I have a triplet mom friend, Sarah, who is a single mom (by choice).  Her triplets are three.  I can't imagine running after three little ones all by myself. She is a rock star.  I've actually followed her blog since before our boys were born (and before I had even met her in person).  It's a great blog and you should definitely check it out: http://omgtheresthree.com.

One of her biggest hits on her blog is her stroller.  She raves on it.  I sat next to her at one of our multiples meetings and she was telling me all about why this stroller rocks.  It's the Valco Tri Mode Twin stroller with Joey seat attachment.  So it's actually a double stroller that you can make into a triple if you buy the attachment piece.  The stroller itself retails for around $700.  Once you buy the Joey seat and canopy the stroller totals about $850.  Yikes!  I knew right away that we couldn't afford this stroller.

We were previously using the Triple Decker stroller which is just a metal frame that you can click your infant carriers into.  We call it "The Bus" as it is very long.  They boys will soon grow out of their infant carriers and then this stroller will be useless to us.  Aside from these two factors, it also does not have a brake which is really inconvenient and quite frankly, not very safe.  It doesn't have a swivel wheel either, so you have to tip it to make a turn which is super annoying.  So basically, while it's worked fine for us thus far, I kind of hate this stroller.

We started researching affordable strollers online and found two that we could (kind of) afford.  The Foundations The Trio Triple Tandem (or Quad) which is around $400 or the Baby Trend Triplet stroller (inline stroller).  We were leaning towards the Foundations one.  The Baby Trend one had horrible reviews and lots of complaints about the second seat having no leg room.  The Foundations one wasn't great either though.  It had a safety feature hand brake that you had to squeeze with your hand anytime you were moving.  If you let go of it, it would activate the brake and make the stroller stop.  While this definitely makes the stroller safer, I envisioned myself getting carpal tunnel from constantly squeezing the brake.  Overall the reviews for this stroller just weren't that great.

I was starting to feel like we were going to have to throw away $400 on a crappy stroller simply because it was all we could afford.  We started looking on Craiglist for the Valco stroller that Sarah has.  This stroller is apparently very hard to find and we couldn't find it anywhere remotely close to the Kansas City area.  So we expanded our search to all the (somewhat) surrounding states.  We REALLY wanted this stroller!  We ended up finding one in excellent condition for $350 in Fayetteville, AR.  I happen to have a friend who lives there.  I asked her if she happened to be coming back to Kansas anytime soon and she said she was going to be in the KC area the very next weekend!  It seemed too good to be true.  She met up with the seller and bought the stroller for us and delivered it that next weekend.  We were so excited!  We had to buy the Joey seat and canopy new unfortunately, so the stroller ended up costing us almost $500.  We've taken it out a handful of times since then, and I'm very happy with our choice.  I even took it to Deanna Rose by myself and never had any troubles fitting through doors or gates or anything (it's just a little narrower than our double jogger).  It's a great stroller and I think it will work well for us for the next couple years.