Holidays once they’re no longer using a cot

[Rrrrrres]

DC climbed out of her cot recently so moved straight to a toddler bed. Once we’ve put her to bed, she will usually do a bit of climbing in and out of her cot and often end up going to sleep on the floor but that’s fine as she’s in a safe toddler-proof space and settles eventually.

What do we do with holidays now?! We went away last week and stupidly thought we could use her travel cot but nope, straight out of it then she scratched her arm climbing into the wardrobe. Eventually settled her on a blanket on the floor but took hours as she is use to self settling to sleep, without me there, but the room had lots of ornaments, sharps bits etc so felt I couldn’t safely leave.

As a toddler, ours always slept in with us on holiday. Either we’d co-sleep (one of us in bed with them and one of us elsewhere) or we’d put them in a mattress on the floor (go get mattress from single bed and move to floor of our room). If it was somewhere we were driving to, we had a cot mattress at home specifically for floor sleeping on holiday or when visiting family, so would just whack that in the car. It would fit in most double bedrooms unless they were teeny. Put any glass ornaments or knives or whatever up out of reach.

Unfortunately, holidays with a toddler aren’t really for adult time and romance! We spent many holidays sleeping separately or with a toddler on the floor next to us, sometimes going to bed at 8pm when they did. Ultimately, I’d rather get sleep than anything, so didn’t really matter.

When are you next away? You might find she’s used to just going down to sleep by then. You could always try her in an inflatable toddler bed?

Thank you, that’s a good point - no upcoming holidays booked just yet.

will look into an inflatable toddler bed, wasn’t aware of these

I’ve always just put mine in a normal bed and made a barrier under the bedsheets with rolled up blankets to make a buffer to keep him from falling out. There are some great inflatable kids beds too.

Normal bed with rolled up towels / pool noodles under the sheet on each side to help stop them rolling out or an inflatable toddler Ready Bed.

Just normal bed. At that age either he slept in main bed with us in hotel or in hotel sofa bed so same room

It doesn't sound like it's the bed you are too worried about but the safety of the space?
You need to pick places that aren't full of ornaments, abd bill themselves as child friendly. It's a nuisance, but necessary for a couple of years.

Normal bed, but book somewhere child friendly.

Bed and the safe space! Her bedtime routine involves her wandering around her room for a bit before going to sleep.

Good shout with the child friendly bill, not considered this either so will look for suitable options

We just used a bed

We have some retractable bed guards that fold down and go in the car easily (I think you could possibly also lie on on the bottom of a large suitcase, but they aren’t the lightest for flying). They help DS (3) not fall out of normal sized beds (he’s in a toddler bed at home as that’s all that will fit in his room). Honestly, I scope out the accommodation before booking it to see what their bedrooms are like and if they look like he could sleep in there on his own. Also the layout of the property so we aren’t too far away from the room he’ll be in and we always take the baby monitor to keep an eye on him even though we don’t use it at home anymore. If it’s just ornaments in the room etc I take them out to keep them away from him. We use Air BnBs that say they’re child friendly. The last 3 we’ve used have had baby gates fitted on the stairs, furniture attached to walls (or just no furniture that needs to be attached, such as all TVs being wall mounted or units all built in). One even provided toys and potty seats for the toilet! You can always message the host as well if you have any questions. We also have a blow up toddler air bed which we’ve used once or twice on the floor of our bedroom with a bed guard on one side to stop him rolling onto the floor. This is a last resort or only for a night, as if he’s in our room we get no sleep and he’s constantly in and out our bed and he’s a wriggly sleeper.

And the prize for commenting on a thread without reading anything other than the thread title.... 🤦‍♀️

Quite a few hotels provided bed guards, or I put a pool noodle under the sheet.

I found in Tenerife I could hire all manner of baby equipment like bedguards and that worked really well.

I read the op 3 times then went back after your extremley eloquent response and read it again i dont see what I am missing, we just used a bed i dont see what I have missed