“Moooom! Where’s my motorcycle?” hollers the three and a half-year-old.

“Up! Up! Up!” begs the eighteen-month-old, pulling at my shirt.

Another active day has already started at our house, and I’m doing the best I can to get everybody dressed and out the door in time for our playdate. Being a #boymom and chasing a toddler and preschooler around can make it hard to keep up. This is where babywearing saves the day–every. single. time. I grab my diaper bag and our standard and toddler Tulas, and off we go.

Now, if you caught that – I have a standard size Tula, which I use for my eighteen-month-old toddler, and a toddler size Tula, which I use for my three and a half-year-old preschooler. As you can see, the name “toddler size” for the Tula (or any other soft structured carrier or "SSC") can be deceiving. Though they are meant to give general guidelines for caregivers, a “toddler size” carrier may or may not fit a child best as soon as he/she starts toddling around. It can be even trickier when you start comparing the differences in dimensions between various brands of “toddler size” carriers. So how does a person know what size Tula (or other SSC) to get? The magic answer is to know what to look for in fit for your SSC. If you keep these key concepts in mind, finding the right size for your first Tula will be easy peasy, and you’ll also be confident in knowing when the time comes to size up. 

Key Concepts for SSC Fit

A soft structured carrier (SSC) supports your child how you would naturally hold him/her.

The next time you pick up your child and hold him/her to the front of your body, take note on where your two hands end up. It’s likely that one hand is under your child’s bottom and the other is between the shoulder blades, somewhere around the middle upper back. A SSC is designed to “hold” your child at these same locations, providing support across the bottom/thighs and at the upper back, resulting in a comfortable seated position for your child. 

Are you both comfortable?

Is my Tula too small?

If you think that your Tula is too small, i.e. the body panel isn’t tall enough for your 90^th percentile in height toddler, first do a quick check on your waist belt positioning. You’ll likely be most comfortable positioning it at your natural waist, slightly above your hip bones, tightening it until it’s nice and snug. If the waist belt is too high – a common problem that I’m guilty of in my early babywearing days – it will shorten the body panel of the SSC. This is because the body panel will fold over the waist band as your child sits in the carrier, leaving less of the body panel to cover the child’s back (see photo below). You can see how a small adjustment in the fit of the SSC can make a big difference in ensuring that you have the right size SSC for your child.

Is it okay if my Tula is a little too big?

He/she will be bearing their own weight with their arms at the point where their arms are hooked over the body panel, instead of in their bottom/thighs across the base of the body panel. This switch in location of pressure points to the arms can cause two problems: 1) atypical wear/damage at those points of the SSC, since the carrier is not designed to bear weight in that manner, and 2) discomfort for the caregiver due to the child’s weight being carried in a different manner and at a higher location on the body.

What if my child is in between sizes?

If your heart is set on getting a Tula and you’ve tried on both a standard and toddler size and still can’t decide which fits your toddler best, you’ll probably notice that these key concepts for optimal SSC fit can be achieved in the smaller of the two sizes, but not the larger of the two. This is often times due to the body panel width being too wide to allow for your child’s knees to bend and legs to dangle freely in the larger size SSC. When considering all of the key concepts of SSC fit discussed above, in most situations, the standard size Tula would provide the most comfortable fit for both you and your child during the “in between” period of your toddler’s growth. I’d guesstimate that this “in between” time will last a few months for most children, some more, some less.

There are other magical answers to get you through this in between time too: 

• If your standard Tula is fine in height but your child’s legs are dangling down to your knees, check out the Tula Free to Grow Extenders. They provide extra padding and support to the width of the body panel, allowing our long-legged toddlers a more comfortable seated position in the standard Tula. I used these on our standard Tula for my oldest son because even though his long legs fit in the toddler Tula, it was still several months until he was tall enough for his head to clear the body panel in the toddler Tula.

Tula Free to Grow Extenders

Tula Free to Grow Extenders

What's the Answer?

After all of this discussion, the answer to your question "How do I know what size Tula to get?" really comes down to one three-letter word: fit.

Now that you know what to look for in SSC fit – in a nutshell, that your SSC is designed to keep your child in a comfortable seated position (the same position that you would hold him/her in your arms) – you can take this information and run with it! Because, let’s face it, we spend a lot of time every day running after those sweet little faces.

Find the Tula that fits you best and run with it! 

- Kimberly Peterman

Kimberly Peterman is a stay-at-home mother to her two sweet, active sons in Columbus, Ohio and has been babywearing for over three years.  She helped start up a local BWI chapter when living in Illinois and is recognized as a Volunteer Babywearing Educator with Babywearing International.  In her *spare* time, she is a LuLaRoe fashion consultant, speech language pathologist, yoga instructor, and nature lover.

#purpleelmbaby #babywearing #toddlerwearing #toddlertula #standardtula #babywearingftw #boymom