Breezing through a quick grocery run is so much easier when your kids are contained in a shopping cart, but hoisting big toddlers into those carts can be killer for your back (especially if you have have baby in a carrier, too). One mom’s viral shopping cart hack is an unbelievably simple way to get your kids into them with ease.
Houston, Texas mom Laura Castrillo recently took to Facebook to share her clever parenting hack for getting her son into the shopping cart without throwing her back out. Instead of lifting him up and over the shopping cart handle and putting him in, she simply lifts the front panel of the cart up so he can crawl in on his own. Um, genius.
Castillo explained that she learned the hack from another mom with a special needs son. “I started doing it with my own kids because lifting them into a shopping cart can be difficult,” she told POPSUGAR. “They’re heavy, and I’m very short in comparison to a shopping cart, since I’m only 5 feet tall.”
We hate to be the Debbie Downers here, but while this hack is incredibly clever, we’d be remiss if we didn’t say that it might not necessarily be the safest hack. According to an American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement on shopping cart safety, kids should not ride in the basket section of a cart.
It’s also impossible not to point out the obvious fact that with your kids in the cart, there’s less room for food. Plus, if your tots get antsy, that hack might not prove as handy when your toddler inevitably wants to get out halfway through the store with a fully-loaded cart.
—Shahrzad Warkentin
Featured photo: Rawpixels via Unsplash
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