Keeping kids safe under canvas

[Twiga]

Hope this isn't too daft a question and I realise I'm prob being a worrywort with this one but any advice welcome - even if it's don't be daft !

We're taking our 2 dc's (2.5years and 9.5months) camping in June, bit of a cheat as a pre-erected tent but thought would be a gentle intro. My concern is this, it would be easy for someone to get in at night when we're sleeping, is there any kind of alarm type thing you can attatch to zips so you know if someones come in at all? The other half of this concern is that our dd (2.5) does sleepwalk at times and although she's never left her room I'd want to know if she left the tent doing this.

In reality I know this is all very unlikely, but it's been playing on my mind a bit.

You could attach a string of bells to the door zips. You get them in hippy type shops.

I've always heard everything going on outside the tent, they don't soundproof them very well! You could always leave a carrier bag (weighed down) outside just by the zip so you'll hear it rustling, but I think you'll hear the zip being opened anyway.

You'll hear every zip on every tent on the whole campsite at night so don't worry.

Hi WW! That's kinda what I thought but as a bit of a worrier by nature I have been going over worse case senarios! We only picked up on the sleepwalking thing recently when we all had to share a room and I woke to find dd wandering around - suspected for a while as we sometimes wake up to her crying as she's wandered out of bed and got disorientated. We're all fine here, and facing the prospect of being on the move again - this time 7 months or so in Brighton, so going to be big changes come Aug. Hope all well with you guys!

Dragonbutter, good idea but I wander if we might end up being really unpopular with our neighbours if it's windy .

Thanks all esp for being polite enough not to tell me I'm daft .

Split up and one parent sleep with each child. ex dh and I did that when ours were small. Also easier to deal with waking children if you have one each. We'd take a spare nappy and drink appropriate for our designated 'dolly' for the night and it worked brilliantly. We took them camping at remote sites, busy sites and music festivals and always felt very sure our children were safe

Zips to sleeping compartments are double zips which go all the way round. Zip both zips up to the top of the opening, out of reach of your child, rather than to the bottom, to stop her sleepwalking out or unzipping herslf out.

put the bells on the inside

Aaah the best ones are always simple! Great ideas re:zips! Ds often in with us anyway as still feeding at night and we could change zips about once dd asleep - suspect that for peace of mind we're all end up in together. That's been really helpful - thanks!

There is no way you'll sleep through one of the dcs opening the zip to escape. And actually, they will be so incredibly tired they'll sleep like logs all night without stirring, so you don't have to worry about sleepwalking, And no one is going to come in. I guarantee it.

Have fun!

Sorry to hijack, but on a similar theme DH is keen to go camping soon, I'm a lot less keen as DD1 (2.6) is a "bolter".
Not bothered about the nights, but worried she'll run off during the day if our attention lapses for 5 seconds. Am I right in thinking you can get alarms that you attach to your child that go off if she strays over a certain distance? I'm really not normally this neurotic, but think this would be the only way we could relax at all, and ensure DD1 isn't found trotting down the nearest motorway happily singing the theme from Dora the Explorer.

Hijack away! Yes you can get these alarms, not sure where would stock but am betting if you google it'll turn something up.

One of the things I like about camping is that the children can be a bit "free range". There are usually lots of children in campsites, and lots of grown ups to keep an eye on them. Just make sure that you choose "family" campsites and you'll be fine.