by S. Frushon

Created on: November 11, 2008

Houdini Car Seat Band.

Many parents who purchase car seats do not know that the center chest clasp is meant to move up and down on the shoulder harness straps. It is not until their own child figures this out, by sliding down the center harness chest clasp and then wiggling out of the top of the car seat- many toddlers will tap their parent on the shoulder, as if to let the parent know they have just mastered the great Houdini escape.

Parents must then find a safe place to pull over and put the child back inside the car seat and continue on with their drive. Until it happens again and again. Most parents will replace the car seat, thinking the car seat they originally purchased is not a safe car seat. Some parents resort to yelling, threatening, spanking, scolding out of pure and total frustration.

It is at this point I was, close to 9 years ago, this was when my now 11 year old daughter figured out how to perform the great Houdini by escaping her car seat every single time I tried to go any where in the car. She would escape and then I would feel that small, slight tap on my right shoulder. After purchasing 4 more car seats for her, it was no long before she figured out how to escape every single one.

I had been purchasing car seats since the early 1980's. I had watched car seats change from plastic seats with plastic inserts, to the t-bar to the fold down bar over the seat. I watched as they changed the plastic, the mold, the fabric and everything else but the one part I was having trouble with "The Center Sliding Chest Clasp". Yes, it is meant to slide down the harness straps. But if you are a parent like I was trying to figure out how to keep my child safe, it carries beyond the financial end to the safety end when you have tried everything and nothing works.

In 2004 I gave birth to my last son, it was not too long after this he too figured out how to slide down the center chest clip and get out of his car seat. I didn't have a cheap car seat either. And it was right then that I decided, after having three (3) children who figured out how to escape out of their car seats, that I needed to take matters in my own hands and see if I could not invent something that would deter my own son. My first son, he was three (3) years old and had mastered how to get out of his car seat, it was at the worst time too. I was pumping gas 21 years ago in the cold dead of the winter. I had an old 1976 car at the time, and the heater took a long time to warm up the car. So I pulled

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