Newborn in a travel cot

[BroccoliSpears]

The plan is for the new baby to sleep in a travel cot in our room. I am planning to buy a proper mattress for the travel cot. On the leaflet that came with the travel cot it says to ONLY EVER use the mattress supplied with the travel cot and NEVER use a different mattress.

Why?

The 'mattress' supplied with the travel cot isn't even a mattress. it's a foldy thin padded board.

Is there a safety issue that I'm missing?

The mattress for a cotbed or cot would not fit and your baby could roll over and down the gap and suffocate. That would be why.

But they don't need acres of sprung mattress either.

You could get a cot free from freecycle if you asked for one I'm sure or v cheap on ebay (I got a M&P cotbed for £10 and then spent £120 on the mattress).

You may also find a travel cot a PITA in terms of access because they are so low, you will wake the baby picking him up/putting him down and probably knackered your back.

probably in case it's a slightly different size and baby could get trapped or something.

why not use a moses basket or something?

ds would not settle in his travel cot on the few times we used it. However when we got a new mattress for his cot bed i cut down the old mattress (it was foam) to fit the travel cot. It was done very carefully and was a perfect fit. DS settled much better in it. Can you not do this? Although agree i wouldnt avise it long term - ds hated being in his tbh probably only used it 5 or 6 times.

I was planning on getting a made-to-measure mattress!

And the travel cot has a high shelf so the baby will be on a level with my bed.

I'm quite happy with using the travel cot, just couldn't think why they would advise against putting in a proper mattress. You have both answered my question: they obviously can't assume people wouldn't go and buy one that's the wrong size.

Um, don't you get travel cots in Britain with a decent mattress? The ones we get here can be fitted with a thicker mattress.

I'm not sure Kinder. It would make sense as a lot of people use travel cots for more than just the occasional night away.

broccoli, we had a travel cot with a higher 'shelf' like bit in it so that ds was higher up. Dont mean to sound patonising, but check it isn't too loose. When ever ds moved (even as little as a cough) the entire shelf wobbled and woke him up! We had to take it out the first time he ever used it because he was waking up all the time.

i got a mattress made for ds's travel cot as the one it came with had less bounce that a digestive biscuit. I cant remember off hand the company, but i think i just googled travel cot mattress and it came up. Anyway, they basically make mattresses to any spec, all you have to do is give them make and model, it arrived next day and is perfect. Removable cover, breatheable and about 10cm thick. Couldnt recommend them enough. It actually fits better than the original.

Will bear that in mind REID.

It would be helpful if babies sent advance notice of where they would like to sleep, how good a sleeper they are planning to be and what they would like to sleep on / in. We had a beautiful white rocking crib for dd; she hated it and I don't think she ever slept a night in it. Loved her pram though and spent the first few months sleeping happily in that before she moved into a cot .

Hauck do the kind of thing that I mean. This one here has two levels, although I do not know how steady the second level would be.

They don't have the mattresses on their UK site. Here is the German one.

thats the type of shelf mine had. I think it was this one

kiddicare used to do travelcot sized mattresses.

We had the load of a v v old graco style travel cot with DTDs. It have a v v v spongy mattress as an extra.

Why are you using a travel cot in your room? DO you realise that many travel cots are actually larger than a standard cot (althouhg obv not a cotbed)?

here

Yes, similar sort of thing Reid.
Am giving up on the internet and going tomorrow to see the nice man who runs an independant baby shop near me.

Thank you for the link misdee.

SMS - why do I want a travel cot in my room? Thank you, yes, I do realise that many travel cots are actually larger than a standard cot . I will be using a travel cot in my room because
(a) I don't want to turf dd out of her cot before she's ready.
(b) Soon enough she will be ready and then I will put the new baby into the cot we already have.
(c) I don't want two wooden cots in our small house.
(d) We have recently been given a free, brand new, top of the range travel cot.
(e) The baby will probably end up in our bed most nights anyway.
(f) The travel cot we have is smaller than a standard cot so I will have the luxury of being able to open my wardrobe while the baby sleeps in our room.
(g) (Bonus) When we go away, the baby will be sleeping in a bed he or she is used to.
(h) It just seems like a workable plan.
(i) As a solution, it just sort of presented itself (the travel cot being free 'n'all) so we thought we'd give it a go, bearing in mind that you never really know what's going to work and what isn't until the baby gets here.

Is that okay?

Of course it is OK. I only mentioned it in case you were assuming that it would be smaller than a cot to realise at a later date that it wasn't and that your solution to lack of space wasn't a solution IYSWIM....

Obviously you have more motivation than that annd many reasons to use a travel cot...

here is the mattress shop that I used

Thank you GeordieMinx.

Appologies SMS - that was really snippy of me. I shouldn't mumsnet past my bedtime when I'm grumpy and hormonal. Sorry.

Don't see any reason why not if you are going to get the matress made.

No worrys....Just don't do it agiain [spanks BS]