Fisher-Price Papasan Cradle Swing, Starlight
by Fisher-Price
|
List Price: Our Price: $129.99 You Save: $40.00 (24%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $127.95 (click here) Category: Baby Product See more product details |
|---|
Baby Products Reviews of Fisher-Price Papasan Cradle Swing, Starlight
Customer Review: A life-saver but quality disappoints.
Summary: 3 Stars
There are a lot of features on this swing that are beneficial to have with a difficult baby. However, don't expect too much in terms of quality. I don't think this would last through multiple children or work for larger, older babies.
We bought the Starlight Papasan cradle swing in a moment of desperation when our son was a week old. It was a life-saver, or rather a sleep-saver. (Thank you Amazon for one day delivery!) Being sleep-deprived and liking the word "starlight," I hadn't realized the colors were purple. When we opened it, my husband said was "there are no gender stereotypes in this house" and built it immediately. Honestly, the color is well-chosen to fit for either a girl or a boy. Our newborn slept in it for several hours a day/night. Eventually we switched the seat position as his preferences changed; the multiposition seat is a big plus for this product.
After a few weeks, we were not using the swing often for naps because we preferred our son to sleep in the crib. However, when he became overtired or had trouble napping, the motion could keep him asleep for 2-3hrs. Now he's almost 4months and possibly teething. He's also started having issues with short naps; as soon as he gets to REM sleep he wakes himself up and cannot fall asleep again. The Starlight Papasan is in full swing again.
I don't like how far the seat reclines, or rather how far up it doesn't adjust to. Though adjustable, the baby is always reclining more than about 45degrees.
He's a large baby at just under 17lbs now. Based on the flexing and motion of the swing, I cannot imagine putting a 25lb child in it as claimed in the product description. There is play in the bolt that holds the seat in place. It's still secure and safe; but I don't like seeing the seat wiggle or tilt. Fisher Price could have had a better design or higher precision machining. Second, the wiggling of the frame during operation is easily noticeable; the top translates 5-10mm during swinging. I can also see the plastic top wobble substantially when my son kicks. I don't have any other swing for comparison though. Finally, the lights have a tendency to turn off during operation and sometimes the rotating toys don't start either. Most likely, there is an issue with the switch turning it on. I've had quality issues with our Fisher Price bouncer too, which we took apart and repaired ourselves. I assume that we'd be able to fix the problems with the lights and rotating toys on the swing if we tried.
Customer Review: Best Swing Ever- No Complaints
Summary: 5 Stars
We bought this swing right before my son was born and put it together right after we brought him home, and boy was it a lifesaver. At first, we put it together and the mobile would not work and made a horrible clicking sound and I was so disappointed. HOWEVER, we figured out it was us putting it together wrong and not the swing's problem. Well, we just had the canopy arranged where it was catching on the mobile and keeping it from moving. Once we fixed that it worked perfect. The speeds are great to me, nothing too fast or dangerous. It takes up a lot of room, but it is well worth it. I love the way it looks and I also love all the features. I call it the cadillac of baby swings. The canopy is a neat feature. It kind of puts my son into his own little cocoon and settles him down. The projector holds his attention. Even when he was only a week or so old he would notice the stars. The mobile he hasn't seemed to notice as much. I think he is watching the projector when he looks up. The speeds are great. The music is nice, nothing too annoying, very calming, puts my son to sleep, and love the nature sounds mixed in. Also, I love being able to set the volume. I also love that it has the option to use batteries or a plug. Trust me, the plug is a lifesaver. One less thing to need batteries. The seat is very soft and cushiony. This swing got my son to sleep and kept him asleep. I could nurse him to sleep and then set him in the swing and he would stay asleep. He is 3 months old now and so far we have not had a problem with any motors or anything. The motor is nice and quiet and rhythmic as far as motors go. The color on mine (the starlight model) is cream, blue, and purple. The purple is a periwinkle type color. Yes, periwinkle is a bluish-purplish color. I used this for my son. For starters, I think it is stupid to fit kids into these stereotypes of blue is for boys and pink is for girls. Second, the swing has blue in it. And third, if you really care about color more than quality, usefulness, and features that your baby will love, well then you have a problem. And yeah, if you sit here and get outraged because someone dared make a swing with blue and purple in it and no son of yours is going to sit in purple while he is an infant, well then you need psychological check. If you are not a psycho and want a good quality swing for a girl, boy, or something neutral, then this is it.Customer Review: Baby and I like this Swing
Summary: 4 Stars
I recently received this swing as a gift for my 2 month old preemie. She LOVES the lights, the rotating stuffed animals, and the sounds. And she seems comfortable in the seat too. The seat snaps into two positions, a reclined position and a sitting position. Additionally, you can set the swing up to go from side to side or forward and backward.
I did have an incident last week where we had some power surges here in the neighborhood WHILE we were using this swing. When the power came back on, I tried all the different switches to turn it on and it didn't work, then later on, it finally did work. This swing has so many switches on it and I admit to being too lazy to read the instructions for all of the functions that each of the switches perform. That said, I don't know if the failure was user error or a quality issue. It appears to be functioning just fine as of this writing so I think it was me.
Another user cites instability of the stand on this swing. I have had no problem with this as I tested it carefully before putting baby in. Also, we leave the swing set up in one place in our house all the time, so we haven't had have to worry about not opening the stand up all the way beyond the initial setup. This might be more of a concern for someone who needs to put it away and take it back out a lot.
I personally like the fact that the mobile, the rocking, and the sounds are independent of each other, so you have a lot of variety to entertain baby with. I LOVE the fact that you can use batteries OR the wall outlet to power this thing. Thank GOODNESS for not being held hostage to battery manufacturers anymore, but having that option if we wanted to use it where electricity isn't available.
I would recommend this swing, but I would check for a reasonable return policy first before buying and keep the packaging for a couple of weeks after you receive it just to be sure you and your baby are happy with it.
Customer Review: Concept Great but Acutal Constuction Failed
Summary: 2 Stars
The swing is fabulous WHEN it functions properly. Fortunately, the swing mechanism has not given out on us...but the mobile doesn't turn anymore, just makes a VERY large clicking noise when turned on (like the belt to turn it is broken or something). Since the light is connected to the mobile, we can't use the light function (which is so sad bc when it worked the first few days, it was such an awesome feature to the swing). So...essentially what we have now is a swing with a net around it. Maybe its Fisher Price...bc our previous Ocean Wonders swing (full-size) died completely (wouldn't turn on at all). We also owned the travel-size Ocean Wonders swing and took it everywhere with us. However, after a few months we found out it didn't "travel" so well (the liquid in the swing arms started to leak out!!).
Anyway, I contacted the company about the problem with the Starlight Papasan Swing. They told me I had to send back the entire seat and netting to get a replacement even though it wasn't my fault and was still within the warranty period. I realize it is the company's way of savings itself from people who think they can fraud them...but not only to I have to hassle with shipping (find a box bc I threw the original away), but we will be w/o the swing for who knows how long. Oh...and did I mention that I am responsible for paying to send the swing back?????
It sucks this swing doesn't work properly...I wouldn't be going through so much trouble if the thing didn't work on electricity as well as batteries. I think it is the only side to side swing on the market that plugs in....and that is HUGE for me bc batteries are so expensive (especially at the rate these swings eat them) and batteries litter up our landfills with toxins.
Fisher-Price Papasan Cradle Swing - Starlight
Customer Review: Returned it.
Summary: 2 Stars
Bought this swing because we had a much older version that was given to us, it ran on batteries and we didn't want to keep buying batteries that needed to be disposed of, so we got this as it had an AC adapter. Our 2 month old liked the old one well enough, and it looked to have a good overall rating here, so we got the updated version.
Out of the box it took a little bit to assemble. I knew it had a bunch of foo-foo baby stuff with it: netting, toys, rotating light up stars, etc... and I can't stand that junk. Plus I figured the net was a hazard, so I left all of it out of the assembly that we could, plus the stars and rotation are just more stuff to break. The seat is a very cozy shape compared to the older bucket seat, we figured our kid would like it a lot. She did.
The bad things were the cheap, tinny music and the fact that once the music timer ran out, the motor would start going crazy. It lost its "timing", would speed up and slow down, clack and grind. All the buttons quit responding, and even turning the swing off and on didn't fix anything. Had to be unplugged to reset. Came on Amazon again and read the negative reviews and saw that several units had this issue, and several almost caught fire - the switch assembly started melting. Also some kids were found hanging by the straps. Read the negs before you buy to be sure this is what you want. We really hoped this unit would work for us because our kid really liked the older one quite a bit. Guess it wasn't our day.
So that was that. We returned it, we don't want a fire hazard in the house, much less something that might harm our child. Only had it 2 days before the chair started having problems.
Got the Graco Sweet Peace instead. Costs more unfortunately, but safety first. She likes it just fine too.