Cot bed or stick with cot?

[anothercoldcupoftea]

Hi - am about to buy a new mattress for DD1's cot, she is 2.1yrs, but got me thinking, should I be getting a cot bed at the same time, and a bigger mattress, as the mattresses are about half the cost of the overall thing? Planning to keep her in a cot for as long as possible, but she's quite tall... Is a cot bed really that much bigger? Or is there any kind of amazing extending cot bed type thing that would do her through until she is 5 or 6 or whatever? Have had a look online but there are so many different makes am a bit confused! Any help appreciated!

Had similar thoughts over the last few weeks (DD 2 yrs 2 months at the mo) and have decided to ditch the cot and go straight to full sized single bed (found a very low one though) and deal with the crashes onto the floor and us being freaked out by DD appearing at our bedside in the middle of the night ... having written that I'm now going off the whole idea again!

why are you bothering with a new mattress?

dd (2.2) has just gone into a single bed

Our DD was tall too, she went into cotbed at about 1 and we put the cot up in DD2s room when DD was just under 2 and she started climbing in and out of it very easily. So I don't think your cot will hold her much longer and cotbed will buy you more time if you want not to put her in normal bed for a while.

DD went into normal bed at 2.1 and she is pretty good at staying in it. We got a bunny clock on a friends advice and that seems to be working, amazingly

I'd just go straight to a single if you can. You can get the side rails so they wont fall out.
We've got a cotbed which is great - but its purely because DS is in the box room and there is just not enough room for a single bed (unless its a cabin bed and he's nowhere near ready for that!)
He actually doesnt get out of it once he's in - just shouts for me instead!

Its not really the climbing out of the cot that I'm worried about, as she doesn't try that - just that she loves her cot and sleeps so well at the moment (and have a 4 month old who doesn't!), don't want to risk doing anything that might encourage her to sleep less well, so sticking with what she's happy with for as long as possible!

Thanks all for the responses - I think a cot bed might be the way to go then. DD2 could then have the cot (she's currently in a mini cot type thing, but is a giant baby so will need something else for her within about 6 months).

Mrs Badger - getting a new mattress as she seems to be developing asthma on top of other allergies, so want to get a new hypoallergenic one (and her old one is pretty grim now, bleurgh, although realise that potty training in few months time will trash the new mattress as well)