KidStyleFile

Today’s post written by Miki

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There comes a time for every parent – often when the baby has reached about six months old – when they realise that their gorgeous but heavy pram is just too unwiedly to lug in and out of the car five times a day.

Now that the baby no longer needs to lie flat all the time it’s a great chance to invest in a good quality lightweight stroller.

I keep my lightweight stroller (a Quinny Zapp, see below) in the back of my car where it’s brilliant for quick trips in and out of shops.  My son can happily spend up to a couple of hours in it and there’s room underneath for plenty of shopping.  My ‘big’ pram now lives at home where we still use it daily for our walks on the beach, which means I can get it as sandy as I like without having to worry about putting it in the car.

Below are some of my picks for the best lightweight strollers on the market (and a couple which are soon to be released).

Mountain Buggy Swift

Mountain Buggy – www.mountainbuggy.com.au – is a hugely popular pram brand, and deservedly so.  A New Zealand brand, their prams are rugged enough for bush-bashing and walks on the beach while still managing to be good looking enough for the city high street.

Mountain Buggy’s new lighter-weight ’stroller’ is the Swift.  In essence, the Swift is a smaller, lighter version of the Mountain Buggy Urban, with a few key differences.

First of all, it doesn’t have the option to attach a carrycot or car seat as the Urban does, although it does lay back flat so it’s fine for a newborn. The front wheel doesn’t lock into a fixed position so it may not be as good on rough terrain.  The swivelling wheel is brilliant for maneuverability though, so you’ll be fine on surfaces as long as they’re not too rough.

The Swift is 4.5cm narrower (64cms) across the back axle than the Urban and 1.5kgs lighter at 9.5kgs, which doesn’t sound significant.  I had a play with one a couple of days ago though, and although it doesn’t look much different from the Urban when it’s in the upright position, once it was folded it was quite a bit smaller.  So for those of you who don’t have much boot space or use public transport a lot, this could be the ideal stroller/pram for you.

It has already been released in New Zealand and should be released in Australia within the next month or two.

See Mountain Buggy stockists here.

Bugaboo Bee

Bugaboo prams – www.bugaboo.com – are at the top of the market in Australia, and for good reason: as far as quality goes, you absolutely can’t go past them. Currently Bugaboo have two products on the market: their pram, the Cameleon and their lightweight stroller, the Bee which is due for Australian release in March 2009.

The Bugaboo Bee is what I’m really, really coveting. It has many of the features of the Cameleon but is considerably smaller and lighter, and has a much smaller fold too.  The unique suspension swivel wheel system means it’s incredibly easy to drive and best of all, the seat can be reversed meaning that the baby and you can face each other.

The Bee weighs 7.7kgs so nice and light, and the seat reclines right back which makes it ideal for a newborn or an older toddler who sleeps in the pram.  The shopping basket is nice and big and the hood is even bigger, affording excellent weather protection.

The Bee is due for a March 2009 release in Australia.

See Bugaboo stockists here.

Maclaren Strollers

While British brand Maclaren – www.maclarenbaby.com – do make very good prams (my friend Mel is extremely happy with her Maclaren MX3), they really come into their own with light-weight strollers.

Popular models include the Quest and the Techno (both are available as doubles too) and feature very light weight (around the 5.2kg mark, depending on the model!), easy albeit quite long fold, generous shopping baskets, good reclines and even better looks.

Maclaren often teams up with renown international designers including Kate Spade, Lulu Guiness, Juicy Couture, Philippe Starck, Lacoste and Burberry – and that’s by no means a full list!  The result is a huge range of strollers which look fabulous, in a range of designs to suit both boys and girls.

As there are so many gorgeous Maclaren strollers I won’t even attempt to tell you about them – but do check out the Maclaren website if you want more information about any particular model.

Quinny Zapp

Now we come to my stroller – the Quinny Zapp – www.quinny.com.  There are loads of things I love about my Zapp, but I’ll try to keep my gushing fairly concise.

First of all, it’s brilliant to drive.  Everyone who pushes it comments on how lovely it is, and I never get tired of it.  I can literally drive it with one finger (while the other nine try to control the rampaging toddler).

The Zapp has one of the smallest folds in the market, measuring only 69×29x30cms. For my money, this combined with it’s light weight of 6kg makes it an excellent stroller to keep in the car boot for quick trips and for travelling.

It comes with some accessories, namely a rain cover (pictured), travel bag and sun hood.  A shopping basket is sold separately.

The one downside of the Zapp is that it doesn’t recline at all so it’s not suitable for newborns.  Once a baby is sitting up confidently on its own then the Zapp is perfect though – after about 6 months in most cases.

Please see individual sites for stockists, pricing and delievery information.