Pregnancy diaries – Mothercare parenting event

Steve and I recently attended a parenting event at Mothercare and thought I’d share our thoughts.

These events are held in store and are free to attend but you must sign up either in store or via the website in advance.

We booked onto this one when we went shopping with Steve’s parents for baby things on Easter Saturday.

On the Friday before I received a courtesy reminder call from the store and on Saturday I had an email reminder and a text too with all the details and a way to cancel if necessary.

The event kicked off at 10am with the store not properly opening until 11am as it was a Sunday.

We enjoyed the demonstrations and safety talks. The first aid one was particularly useful.

Seeing the different types of prams and travel systems in use was really helpful as we had found out the week before that there was a safety issue with the system we’d originally ordered from a different store.

We were given a 10% discount voucher to use which lasts for the entire month but on the event day itself, they offered the discount on bundles and items already discounted which meant an extra saving.

Choosing a pram travel system was no easy feat for us.

Steve isn’t the best at making decisions quickly (most of the time) and with baby’s due date looming a decision was going to have to be made quickly.

We spoke to a really helpful sales advisor who asked us what we will be doing once baby is here day to day and explained it was important a pram and system fits into our lifestyle as well as of course being safe for baby.

So we tried a few different prams out, folded them, used the different types of seat etc and then tried them outside too.

This was really helpful to see how different prams handled in the real world and how heavy they were to push and to get up kerbs and so on.

We really liked a particular Silver Cross but it was so bulky it took up my entire boot once folded and it was heavy too.

So it was back to the drawing board.

After a bite to eat at the nearby McDonald’s we went back to Mothercare.

We tried out a Mamas & Papas flip xt3 pushchair in and out of the store. It felt nice to push, it folds really compactly and it passed the boot test fitting in really nicely with space to spare!

We had the car seat and base fitted into the car and thankfully it was all fine so we decided to place an order.

Unfortunately the discount code wasn’t playing ball with the order system and our poor sales advisor spent a lot of time trying to get it all sorted for us.

Thankfully the manager was able to override something on the system and we saved the additional 10% discount on the bundle price which was also at a lower price that weekend, so it was a really good deal.

Once the pram was sorted we perused the rest of the store.

We picked up some bedding for both the Moses Basket and cot, a special device for checking the temperature of the room, a travel changing mat and some really cute cotton hats.

So after about five hours in Mothercare and lots of deliberations we left really happy.

I’d 100% recommend booking yourself onto a parenting event at a store near you.

They have extra staff on hand so you’ve more opportunity to have one to one conversations and get that much needed advice and information.

I found the demonstrations and talks really useful.

They also had small stands for local businesses too which we took advantage of as I’m keen to get baby swimming early on so chatted to two different groups that offer lessons.

Our pram system arrived on the following Wednesday and the car seat and base the next day.

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Make sure you keep up to date with my pregnancy diaries series where I discuss the ups and downs of my pregnancy.

Have you attended any parenting events? Have you got any advice for us as new parents? Let me know in the comments below.

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Other related posts

Here’s how we found out we were expecting a baby – letting the cat out of the bag

Pregnancy diaries – the first trimester

Here’s how I got on modelling maternity sportswear

I had a fantastic Maternity VIP Experience with JoJo Maman Bébé 

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