Attaching a 3 sided cot onto our bed

[KD0706]

I'm pregnant with DC2 and for various reasons, mainly an attempt to maximise my sleep, I want to attach a cot to our bed so we can part time co sleep.

I think I've read here previously that there's a cheap ikea cot which is good for this? Any tips on what is a good cot, how to attach it, what to look for gratefully received. I'm guessing that not all cots hold together with just three sides?

Thanks in advance for any hints and tips

We used a bednest, which isn't a cheap option but it is designed to go next to your bed so you know it will work.

I've done it with our cot - it's a cotbed so holds together fine without a side. Simply used bungee cords to attach it to our bed and is pretty solid! I pushed the mattress right up against ours and rolled up some sheets to fill the gap that created between the edge of the cot and the mattress. It works brilliantly and I'm so glad we did it.

whatever you do don't buy the Mothercare beside cot for this purpose. It's a good stand-alone cot, but there will always be a small gap. A real PITA!

This is the cot we have. It was really easy to do, too.

Well i used the ikea somnat cot and it kept falling apart. Pity as it was the exact height of our bed. In the end she slept with us till she was over a year. Them she went in her sisters cot.
She still spends most of her time with me

Just having had a look you want the ikea Gulliver, Leksvik or Mammut. None of the others are designed to have a side removed so they probably won't be sturdy enough. The Gulliver is £60. I used to say any ikea cot but then they changed their range.

If you're looking elsewhere then look for either a cotbed (which is designed to have one or two sides removed) or something with a dropside as the drop side will not usually be a supporting part.

If you need to drill extra holes so as to raise the mattress far enough, make sure that the cot you choose has ends which go straight up and don't taper. I cannot find an example of this now but this is what kind of cot we ended up with and meant XP just screwed some bits of wood into the sides instead, which spoiled the look of it a bit and meant you couldn't easily convert it back and forth.

Casper have you tried pushing the cot mattress over and plugging the gap on the far side with rolled up towels?

Just marking this thread, I'd like one of these too for baby due in June.

Bertie, the cot has a lip that would push one side of the mattress higher if you did that. Didn't matter in the end anyway as I had a baby who hated any form of co-sleeping and now have a very independent toddler! It's probably worth finding that out before spending the money on a special cot. We spent the first few weeks on a futon in a bid to cosleep and she was quickly much happier in a moses basket next to it.

Oh, that sounds like a rubbish design!

We've got the Mothercare 3 sided cot and it's fine, maybe we've got an older version? We use cable ties linked together to keep the cot attached to the mattress. There's a gap between the side of the cot and the cot mattress, which I've filled by duct taping together some foam pipe insulation (the round tubes) to the right size and covering it with a sheet.

Now DD's rolling, we've put the 4th side back on so that I can safely leave her in the cot before we go to bed etc, but the cot's still tied to our bed.

Sorry that should say we use cable ties to link the cot to the bedframe, not to the mattress.

We have the Gulliver. Has been great so far and DD is 6 months. Had to wedge 3 small bolster cushions (John Lewis do them) into the gap created by pushing the cot mattress flush with our mattress. Had to drill extra holes to adjust height of cot mattress but was v easy to do. Will def use for the next baby, has given us all peaceful nights.