Shopping with Kids Made Easy

Sometimes, as a mom, I find myself torn on baby items. On the one hand, I'm a big believer in less is more and that you don't need every new and amazing baby gadget out there. Like the shopping cart cover, I mentioned in my 10 Most Useless Baby Items post. But on the other hand, there are some really cool baby gear items out there - items I don't necessarily need - but that do make life just a little bit easier. And now that I have a toddler and a newborn to take care of, I'll pretty much do whatever it takes to make doing things out the house easier for me.

As a parent of a newborn (or a baby who still travels in their bucket seat), I find shopping to be one of the most challenging things to do. The timing of it all has to be perfect in order to count on a successful outcome: nurse the baby, burp the baby, take toddler to toilet, get toddler's shoes and coat on, change baby's diaper, put baby in car seat, check that diaper bag is stocked, put my own shoes and coat on, run back to the pantry for extra snacks (god forbid you forget the beloved fruit snacks!), grab a water bottle, haul everyone out into the car, clip baby's car seat into the car, run around to other side and put toddler into his car seat, then finally, buckle myself in. Phew. And we haven't even made it to the store yet!

Then, once you get to the store, after you've bribed your toddler with aforementioned beloved fruit snacks to ride in the front seat of the cart, and after you've put your baby's bucket seat into the cart, you realize there's not a lot of room left to actually buy groceries. Which is the whole point of all this effort in the first place. Yes, sometimes I baby-wear and sometimes, I wait until the weekend so I don't have to lug around both kids, but more often than not, I don't have the energy nor the time to unbuckle my sleeping newborn to strap her onto me in order to go grocery shopping. It's also winter out in my area of the world, so if it's a particularly cold day out, I prefer to keep my baby nestled in her covered car seat.

Shopping with kids is tons of fun!!

Then I started seeing these shopping cart hammocks all over my social media. I'm not a fan of having to haul extra things around with me, but the more I saw pictures of cute babies hanging out in these hammocks, the more I was sold on how genius the idea was. These shopping cart hammocks from Binxy Baby are designed to be used in two different ways: 1) you can place your baby (from newborn  until they can sit up on their own) right into the hammock, or 2) you can strap your bucket seat (up to 50lbs) into it.

The premise behind it is to make space in your cart for whatever it is you're buying and to promote car seat safety while shopping. There are two things that I'm very passionate about when it comes to my kids: car seat safety and shopping cart safety. I know we've all done it, or have seen people do it, but you cannot balance your bucket car seat on top of the cart. If that cart were to tip over (which is easier to do than you think it is), your car seat will go flying. I can't even begin to imagine how horrifying that scenario would be. Luckily, you don't ever have to put yourself in that situation if you have a Binxy Baby.

The Binxy Baby is super easy to use - it just clips on to the sides of the cart and then secures with a strap and Velcro. If you're putting the bucket seat right into it, then there's a third strap that secures the seat into the hammock. If you're putting baby right into the hammock, then there's a seat harness to secure baby. The hammock also folds up and easily fits into your diaper bag.

I've tried the hammock both ways now, and you know where my favourite store to use it at is? Winners & Homesense (TJ Maxx for my American friends)! Their carts are ridiculously small and a bucket seat does not fit into the holding part of the cart well at all. Plus, even if you do manage to cram it into there, you literally have no room left over for your diaper bag or things you want to buy. And I'm pretty sure no one leaves Homesense empty handed!

If you're not a fan of baby-wearing, and your baby doesn't like to shop while in it's bucket seat, or maybe you just hate hauling that thing around anyway, then I think you'd love the Binxy Baby Shopping Hammock. You can even use my referral code to save 10% off the purchase of one (and I'll receive $5 in return). These would make a great baby shower gift!

*I received the Binxy Baby in exchange for this post,  but as always, all opinions and reviews expressed are my own. 

Thank you for supporting the companies that continue to make this hobby of mine possible! 

Would you use something like this?

Moms, what's your preferred method of shopping with a newborn? Baby-wear or keep baby in car seat?