Originally published at https://parental.guidanceguide.com, Child Passenger Safety Technician and mom, Erin Brill, shares her thorough and informative review of the Shiverless:
Shiverless – Car Seat Onesie
The Shiverless is a one piece “suit” designed to provide warmth without bulk addressing the safety concerns regarding thick/bulky fabrics inside car seats!
The very first thing I noticed about the Shiverless was the quality of the fabric. As a skier I can appreciate the benefit of warm yet thin materials. My tall 19 month old son wears 18mo pants and 24mo/2T shirts and the 12-24mo size fits him perfectly. The best thing about the Shiverless is how thin but warm the material is. It adds warmth without bulk, which is not only great for my little one’s mobility, but amazing when it comes to putting him in his car seat.
While there’s no official testing for products like this, as a general rule, bulky/puffy fabric shouldn’t be used inside car seats. When you’re trying to keep a toddler warm and safe, this can be a challenge but the Shiverless addresses this problem head on!
The Shiverless has optional hand and foot covers. The hand covers are great since my son won’t keep mittens on. I’ve also used the foot covers and just put his Stonz boots right over the Shiverless. We’ve used the Shiverless in temperatures down into the 20’s (it’s been pretty warm here in Colorado this winter) and with only one thin clothing layer underneath he seems pretty warm. It’s also easy to add a coat over the top if needed if it’s extremely cold.
I tried the smaller Shiverless (0-6mo) on our newborn car seat training dolls as well as a friend’s 3 week old daughter. My initial concern was that the excess material from the oversized suit would cause issues with proper harnessing, however I was pleasantly surprised to find that really wasn’t the case. With the excess material a bit strategically placed, it was easy to get a proper harness fit. I tightened the harness to pass the pinch test and then removed the suit (without loosening the harness) and found that the harness still passed the pinch test with no suit on! I’m trying my hardest to pinch webbing and I can’t get ahold of any of it…it slips right out of my fingers.
The one issue I did find with the smaller babies is that the “neck” of the suit came up and potentially covered the mouth, or the hood fell down over the eyes. I probably wouldn’t use this product for such a young baby but for a child closer to the size of the product (clothing size 3 months or larger) it would be a great option. Obviously this photo is the extreme but you can see it doesn’t provide a very practical fit for a tiny newborn.
The Shiverless retails for $115 and can be purchased online at www.shiverless.com
USE THE COUPON CODE guidanceguide FOR 15% OFF YOUR PURCHASE THROUGH 1/31/18.
Thank you, Shiverless, for providing these products for my review.
