Sleeping arrangements for holiday

[Marne]

We are going on holiday in april and will be staying in a mobile home, last year we went to the same resort and dd2 slept in her travel cot.

At home dd2 (ASD) sleeps in a high sided bed which is low to the ground (she has no sense of danger and tends to fall out of a normal bed). The beds in a mobile home are thin and high up, i'm worried that even with a bed guard she will manage to climb/fall out so do i...

a) Risk just taking a bed guard and hope she doesn't fall out?

B) Try and fit her into a travel cot? (she will be 3.1)

[misscutandstick]

Is it a private static, or a holiday park? I think that some parks provide 'cot' sides as opposed to just the bed guards, which are a bit higher and a bit more rugged.

[misscutandstick]

incidentally i had this same prob last year, DS5 is a bit of a night time rambler, he fidgets, throws himself all over the place and usually has limbs hung out of his cotbed! the normal bedguard worked fine even tho it didnt cover the bottom half of the bed at all. I was very surprised there were no 'thumps' in the night.

[r3dh3d]

In the same situation, I found a bog standard cot mattress (bigger than a travel cot and long enough for a 5 year old so should be fine for 3.1) exactly fits a babydan babyden if you make it rectangular not hexagonal. If you ask enough friends who have had kids someone should have one in their loft somewhere, they are pretty ubiquitous.

They are a bit more heavy/bulky to transport than the travel cot, but safer I think. The mattress would go straight on the floor so no issues with weight and support.

[silverfrog]

yep, at that age, we did the babydan cot shape (I think followign your tip on here r3dh3d ) and it worked brilliantly.

how tall is your dd2? some travel cots are quite large (my dd1 would have fitted into her travel cot, but had decided she hated it, so we tried the babydan thing rather than have her scream the place down, and she is very tall for her age)

is there any way you could rig up a side hammock on the bed? using a strong bit of material, fixed under the mattress and at either end, to provide soemthing she could roll into safely? (like they use on berths in sailing boats sometimes)

[Marne]

misscut- its a holiday park, i think they will provide a cot but the prices i think there is a charge for the week, she's only just gone into a bed (4 months ago) so would be ok in the travel cot if she will fit. I was hoping to not have to take a travel cot as it takes up a lot of room in the car. Dd1 slept ok in the beds last year she was 4 (AS) and we used the guard (and will use it again this year).
I just don't want a week of her being unsettled , she's not very keen on being away from home so i could do with her being relaxed at night, i'm thinking she might feel a bit safer in a cot.

[Mitchell81]

What about a mattress on the floor?

[Marne]

Its a possabilty, though i'm not sure if she will stay there.

[r3dh3d]

Silverfrog's idea re: lee sheets - thanks to the wonders of Google, I have found a picture of a lee sheet in action. Here it is, sorry it's a bit of a small picture, so I will explain as well. It's a piece of canvas, with a double hemmed edge through which a piece of rope is threaded. The sheet is something like 1.5 or 2 times the width of the berth. You put the sheet under the berth (tucking it if possible down the side or something so it stays in place underneath, insert child, and then tie the sides to some random part of the mobile home for the evening. Best not to tie it to the loo door, though!

[silverfrog]

oh lee sheets*. thanks, r3dh3d couldn't for the life of me remember what they were called (and I'm a former ocean racer )

[r3dh3d]

Gosh how cool. But you guys all use hammocks and pee in buckets, no? Lee sheets are a bit beneath you. As it were!

[monstermansmum]

Please dont flame me but we used www.petplanet.co.uk/product.asp?dept_id=151&pf_id=8693 this untill recently. It is exactly the same size as a travel cot, we used a folded quilt as a mattress, Zips open/shut fully on top, long side and a short side, so you can have it as open as you need (or as enclosed as nec!!) My Ds LOVED it, but he is used to a very high sided bed. IF USED APPROPRIATLEY it would work really well. It would fit an average 5 yr old if they dont mind small spaces, it did a good job for us whilst Ds fit in it. Cost about £70 online and when we used it at the ASSERT (Angelman's) conference, soooo many parents liked it and said what a good idea it was. Folds completely flat and fit in the car boot aswell.

[silverfrog]

r3dh3d - we did have bunks, but luxurious they were not . And lee sheets saved many a tumble (although i was usually in the "coffin" bunk part way under the storage bits so at least I had solid sides). we even had loos, but still had to "bucket and chuckit" for anyhting even semi solid (sorry,TMI) as they were prone to blocking! (and using a bucket was sometimes easier and more comfortable than using the heads (less to fall against when it was rough!)

monstermansmum - that is brilliant! wish we'd known about it when we needed it, but thankfully dd1 has now gone into beds ok.

[fatzak]

We had this dilemma when DS2 was getting too big for his travel cot and we were on holiday in a tin shack mobile home in Italy. We literally "padded" him in using the cushions from the seating in the living area. It was all held with velcro so you could pull it all off and then we put it all around the floor, wall etc- the back parts were only low so it wasn't like he was too enclosed in.

[fatzak]

Grr, try to be smart and cross out and it never works