Review and Giveaway! Parenting By Nature and Pikkolo Baby Carriers

Today, I'm super excited to introduce you to a site that I wish I had known about long ago, Parenting By Nature. While Parenting By Nature is a retail site specializing in baby carriers, cloth diapering supplies, and a large selection of other baby necessities, even more importantly, it's a site devoted to helping educate parents on two misunderstood and often confusing subjects, baby wearing and cloth diapering.

While I wouldn't necessarily call myself a "baby wearer," with the birth of my second child, it became incredibly obvious that I was going to need to practice the "art of baby wearing" a little more frequently if I was going to survive. With only two hands, there's just no possible way that I could manage both Isaac and Nadia without the use of a carrier. I've used several different carriers over the past year, but never really found a carrier that was both perfect for when he was small, but that I feel I could still be using now that he's older. I knew what I wanted in a carrier, but didn't know how to go about finding the right one. If I had know about Parenting By Nature, I think that I would have found the perfect carrier a lot sooner without having to go through the whole trial and error process.

Click on Read More! below to find out more about Parenting By Nature and to learn how you can win my new favorite carrier, the Piccolo Baby Carrier!

As a resource for parents who want and or NEED to learn more about baby wearing, Parenting By Nature should be your first stop. If you scroll down to the bottom of the home page, there is a section called Baby Carriers 101. You'll find just about everything you need to know about the different types of carriers such as: the history and advantages of baby wearing, pros and cons of each type of baby carrier, tips on choosing the style of carrier that is right for you, and hints and tricks to insure that your baby wearing experience is a positive one. I've never seen a site as comprehensive and as detailed. Defining the pros and cons of each carrier is so helpful, especially if you've never used a baby carrier before.

Over the past three years, I've used a wrap-style carrier, tube slings, a structured carrier as well as the Baby K'tan which is sort of a hybrid of a bunch of different kinds of slings. When I went to the Parenting By Nature site for the first time, I felt like I knew what I was looking for in a baby carrier, but didn't know if it existed. I'm not confident in my wrapping abilities, I've found tube slings to be too limiting because I can only use one of my arms, and anyone who has owned a Baby B'jorn before knows it's limitations. I knew I needed the "security" that I feel when wearing a structured carrier, but I wanted one that would allow both my husband and myself to wear our children facing forward, on our hips or on our backs, but I wanted one that was comfortable and supportive, too. Because I had such a clearly defined carrier in mind, with just one click, I found what I was looking for, the Pikkolo Carrier. Yes, it was really that easy. Thanks to a very organized site, all I had to do was click on soft pack carriers and a complete list of all the soft pack carriers that Parenting By Nature carriers popped up with a brief, yet specific description of each. It was so easy to find the carrier that I knew I wanted, and I haven't been disappointed. But, what if you've never tried out other carriers? With the excellent descriptions and the pros and cons of each carrier written out so clearly by Parenting By Nature, I think that with no previous experience, even a new parent will be able to find the carrier that will best fit her needs.

If you've worn carriers before and hated the experience, my advice is give it another try with the help of Parenting By Nature. Like I said, I didn't really consider myself a "baby wearer" before, but have found that wearing Isaac makes everything go so much more smoothly. Trips to Target are so much less painful, getting Nadia to and from the car to her classroom at school is much easier, and we couldn't have lived without Isaac in a carrier last summer. I wish I had had the right carrier back when he was small because I really think he would have benefited from being carried around more. Perhaps he might have been a little less grumpy. The secret, as Parenting By Nature knows, it is essential to not only have a quality carrier, but to make sure that you have the style of carrier that is going to make the experience enjoyable for you AND your little one.

Now for the review of the Pikkolo Baby Carrier, based on a 4-star scale:

Functionality *** - We are using the Pikkolo Baby Carrier mostly as a back carrier as Isaac is 13 months and 25 pounds. What I love about this carrier is that you can carry your child on your back, your hip, and tummy-to-tummy, but also forward-facing! Plus, it's good from 8 to 40 pounds! Yes, I know about the Ergo and that many of you love your Ergos, but facing out is not an option, and both of my children have insisted on being able to face out from the time that they could hold their little heads up. The straps are made out of memory foam which means they are super comfortable without being bulky. Unlike my Baby K'tan and tube slings, this carrier is adjustable meaning anyone can wear it, not just me. The Pikkolo Baby Carrier also comes with a detachable hood for protecting those delicate little baby heads, too. As a hip carrier, I've enjoyed the Pikkolo as well. We don't have a backyard, but do have a playground right next door, with the Pikkolo Carrier, I can easily just throw Isaac up on my hip and not lug him there in my arms! It is recommended that you wear the carrier up high, around your rib cage. I will say from experience that the higher you wear it, the more comfortable you will be both while wearing it and the next morning. I wore Isaac a little lower yesterday, as you can see in the pics, and I definitely felt him a lot more than I did last week when he was sitting up higher, and my back was killing me this morning. I don't blame the carrier as much as I do my own user error.

My only dislike of the Pikkolo carrier is that I do have to crisscross the straps in front of me when I wear Isaac on my back which squishes my chest a little. Luckily, I'm small-busted, but it might make the carrier a little uncomfortable for some, and probably impossible to wear as a nursing mother. It's not essential that you crisscross the straps, but my shoulders are pretty narrow, and I found that when they weren't crossed, I felt like I was struggling to keep the carrier from slipping off when I wore him on my back. However, with the straps crossed and the carrier up higher around my waist, I'm perfectly comfortable. Melissa gave it a go at the zoo with her little guy facing in last week, and found it to be more comfortable than she was expecting as well. Bear with the instruction manual. It's complete, but mine had some pages out of order making it a little confusing! There's a bit of a learning curve if you've never worn a back carrier before, but it is not nearly as steep as learning to use a wrap-style carrier, and once you figure a system out, it's a piece of cake.

Style **** - The Pikkolo Baby Carrier comes in several very pretty prints and a handful of solids, including black and sand. Much prettier than other carriers I've owned!

Price *** - $150 CAD on the Parenting By Nature site, but around the $130 mark at stores here in the States, the Pikkolo is one of the more expensive carriers. However, you get a lot of versatility for this price. We spent nearly $100 on our Baby Bjorn carrier and it doesn't provide nearly as much versatility, style or most importantly comfort.

Overall Rating *** - I do love this carrier! Isaac loves riding on my back much more than I thought he would, and IF there's a baby number 3, you can guess given his genes, that he'll love riding around facing the world. I know that it might seem a little expensive, but all baby carriers are pricey, and if you want a good one that you're going to enjoy wearing, you're going to have to spend the money, but speaking from experience, you'll be glad that you did!

The good people at Parenting By Nature are giving away a Pikkolo Baby Carrier to one lucky Kid Buy Products reader. To enter, please go visit the Parenting By Nature website and spend some checking out all the site has to offer. Come back here and tell us one thing that you learned whether it's about baby wearing or cloth diapering, or you can simply let us know which product from Parenting By Nature you'd like to try. Your comment will enter you in the giveaway of an in stock Pikkolo Baby Carrier of your choice from Parenting By Nature. All comments must be received by 11:59 CST on Tuesday, March 31, 2009. Winners must be 18 or older and a resident of the United States or Canada to win. Please check out our giveaway rules HERE. Thanks for reading and Happy Baby Wearing!