With this being our first LO, and not being around a whole lot of (young) kids, I'm pretty clueless when it comes to rear-facing carseats.

I guess I had always assumed that the child sits rear-facing in their infant bucket seat, and then when they outgrow the infant seat, you put them in a regular seat that faces forward. But I'm hearing more and more that rear-facing is better for longer, and I'm just curious.

Do most carseats (convertible) face back and forward? We were given one that our good friends bought last year (and moved countries), and their little one was 18 months-2.5 years old in it, always rear-facing.

Can someone give me a little insight?