As the National Weather Service predicts high temperatures in the teens today, Washington County Emergency Management wants to remind parents to make sure their children are staying warm and safe when on the road.

Emergency Management Coordinator Marissa Reisen says during cold winter days parents should plan for an early start, and keep the carrier portion of infant seats inside the house when not in use to reduce the loss of a child’s body heat in the car. Reisen recommends not only dressing your child in layers, but making sure one particular layer isn’t worn under their safety harness, “It is not recommended at all to put your kid into a car seat with a big bulky winter coat. There are all kinds of like homemade cape kind of things that will go over the car seat which are a great thing to use especially as you transition. That way you can put that cape-like thing on them as you’re getting them loaded into the car and take their big bulky coat off, because you don’t want them to not have the coat because it’s going to be cold.”

Reisen explains that wearing a bulky coat when buckled into a car seat will prevent the harness straps from being secure enough to prevent injury in a vehicle incident. Reisen says she likes to keep warm fleece blankets in her vehicle to make sure her children are kept warm over their seatbelts, and she reminds parents not to forget hats, mittens, socks or booties, and to keep an extra pair of mittens handy in case the first pair gets wet. When this happens, Reisen says the wet mittens will make your child colder rather than warmer.