The Car Seat Conundrum

As parents, we need to keep our children safe.  One of the ways in which we do that is by using car seats.  Car seats are almost entirely plastic and very difficult to get rid of.  Most municipal recycling centers don’t accept them and places that will accept them are few and far between. We had two large car seats that our son grew out of and I couldn’t bear to put them in the trash. What’s the point in using it for a few years and then carelessly adding it to the landfill for all of eternity?  I spent a fair amount of time consulting Google for the solution. Target will take them once per year and give you a discount on your next car seat. We had just missed that and I didn’t want to store them in the garage for the next year in hopes of Target doing the same program. There are companies that will recycle them for free if you pay to ship them there. How much does it cost to ship two large heavy car seats? A lot! I decided to search for nearby recycling centers but none of them listed car seats as something they accept. I again considered putting them into the magic trash portal to send them “away” but my lack of ignorance wouldn’t allow it. I took the time to email Certified Recycling in Burnsville and to my delight, they got back to me and said they would take them for about $10 each. Not too bad. My daughter Esmeralda (not her real name) came with me to drop them off and she asked me why I bothered to make the drive and pay for someone to take my refuse.  I explained that it was the right thing to do and she agreed.  It was an epic Hallmark parent moment. A few days later my husband and I were on a walk and we passed a house that had four or five car seats set out with their trash.  A daycare perhaps? I don’t know. It made me angry that I worked so hard to get rid of ours and someone else doesn’t care or know enough to do the right thing. I wondered why I bothered.  But the truth is that I bothered because I know enough to care. If we love our precious children enough to buckle them into this potentially life-saving device, we should love them enough to dispose of it properly.

https://www.certifiedrecycling.org/