Hellobee Boards

We had the Marathon. I think it's the best blend of safety and value of all of them unless you want really giant side protection wings, which some kids hate.

It's easy to use. But we actually had to get another one to keep our very tall-torso son RF past 21 months. So if you want to rear-face until after 2 and have a tall kid, look elsewhere.

I was able to rearface my average sized kid in a Boulevard until 30 months, so when we switched him forward facing and put him into a harness to booster seat.

I love them and we have 2 Blvds and 2 Marathons. My LO is on the shorter side and she is still RFing at 2.5 with plenty of room to go.

@Mrs. Yoyo: thank you, I'll add those on my list of seats to research!

@MoonMoon: We have the Peg Perego convertible. Car Seats for the Littles has a list of recommended seats here: http://csftl.org/recommended-seats/

We have the pavilion. We loved our britax infant seat and the britax convertible fits well in the back of our Prius. We also like the extra side impact and safety features of britax.
I believe the only difference between the pavilion and the less expensive model is the "click" noise it makes to tell you that the straps are tight enough. I didn't think it was necessary but the sales guy at bbb totally convinced DH and now I'm so glad we got it. I love that when LO is being antsy and fighting being put in the seat that I know when it's tight with one quick pull.

I have a chicco nextfit. LO is tall with a tall torso, and he outgrew his infant seat at 9 months (only 29 inches, but one inch from top of shell). It is good for fitting into smaller cars, it has a lot of reclines. I think the graco mysize is also good for that. I did not consider the foonf because of price, and the Diono radian did not appeal to me. Tightening the harness can be tough, but I have the old shoulder pads, and the new ones are supposed to be better. It was really easy to install.