Ever since I brought my little screaming ball of fury beautiful, love-of-my life daughter home from the hospital, I knew it wouldn’t do to have her sleeping across the room. Waking up every two hours and leaving the comfort of my bed just to feed her? I might as well be mixing formula! What’s the good of nursing if you have to get up to do it?
So we brought her to bed with us. I loved it. She loved it. My husband… put up with it. He knew it gave me more sleep, so he never complained. But there were subtle little nuances.
“Should we try putting her in the crib tonight? See how she does? Maybe she’ll sleep through the night.” (Which she refused to do, by the way, until she was a year old.)
So I looked into co-sleeper products that would give my husband back our bed. However, we already had a crib and a pack-n-play. We didn’t have the room or the budget for another bed for our baby!
Thankfully, my husband resident engineer walked past the computer while I was researching co-sleepers and said, “Hey, I could make one of those.”
This is what he did:
He took the sliding side of the crib off, tested the stability, and deemed it sturdy. He then proceeded to push it up to the side of our bed.
Yes, that’s a door at the head of the crib. No, it’s not attached to anything. I got sick of it falling off the cheap-apartment-closet-door-guide-thingies. So I removed it.
While admiring his accomplishment, I noticed there was now a three-inch gap between the crib mattress and our own. I pushed the crib mattress flush against ours, took four rolled up towels, and filled in the gap between the crib mattress and the crib railing.
Voila. Instant co-sleeper.
All the benefits of co-sleeping. No extra money. Nothing extra to store. And (Bonus!) it got her used to the crib, so that when it was time for her to move to her own room, she got to take the familiarity of her bed with her.
(Works for Benjamin, too!)
what a great idea! Good for you!!! so smart! Jodi
I wish I would have had the brains to think of this before purchasing our Arm’s Reach Co-Sleeper! Though, in my defense, the co-sleeper was purchased on the day Peapod came home from the hospital as the stinker just had to come five weeks early! The early arrival messed up quite a few of our early November plans. haha. My daughter slept in the co-sleeper for one night before she was brought into our bed and the co-sleeper became a glorified stuffed animal holder. ;o)
I co-slept with both of mine. This would have been a blessing. Wish I would have thought of it. Great idea!
I could basically write the same thing as Mrs. Brigham! We have the Arm’s Reach… have had it for the last 3 of our kids and they have probably all logged a combined 10 nights sleeping in it…
This is a great idea.
Blessings,
Karla
A fine tip to file away for the future!
Love it! I wish I would have thought of it, but I will pass on the idea to my sister in law. Who by the way had her first daughter (now 7)in her bed with her until she was 4. YES FOUR!!! And this girl was NOT easy to sleep with. Trust me, she slept in my bed a time or 12. This is such a great idea. Go Josh!
It always helps to have an engineer around, doesn’t it?
Yep, we’re co-sleeping junkies too. My hubby loves having the babies in the bed with us as do I. I SO agree with what is the point of nursing if you have to get UP to do it.
Our Arms Reach Co-sleeper is currently against the wall, storing copious amounts of baby wipes and cloth diapers and what ever else tickles my fancy to stick inside of it. Best $140 storage unit I’ve ever purchased. 🙂
I so need to try this ~ My 7 month old won’t sleep in his bed. I just have to figure out how to fit the crib in the bedroom. Thanks for the great tip!
http://tonsofsons.wordpress.com/
What a fantastic idea! This sounds like a real winner. Thank you for sharing this one. Not only do you not have to get up and have more room, but the baby gets used to the crib too.
We did the same, but went to the shop and had a flat wooden bedbottom made wich was wider than the babybed and fitted under my matress too.
And got a wider babymatress into the babybed.
It works great!
We did this exact same thing with our second! (I wish I had been smart enough to co-sleep with #1.) In worked great but eventually we even went a step further and created a mega-bed of sorts. I posted a picture here.
http://thissimplelife.net/blog/2007/02/24/photo-hunt-theme-soft/
Oh, how I wish I would have thought of this years ago! We had the same struggle you were having.
It’s a great tip, and I will be passing it along to one of my younger siblings who is awaiting stork arrival!
I picked up an Arm’s Reach off Ebay for our 2nd son. It’s about to re-appear for my 3d.
Wish I’d thought of the crib trick though! Oh well, between myself and my sisters-in-law, that co-sleeper was well worth the $75! It’s slept several families’ babies.
What a clever idea! I think when baby number 3 arrives, I may try this. Thanks for the insight.
Thanks for the idea! When we have #3 I wanted a cosleeper but not at the price they are. This will be great and save us lots of money.
Hello.
I’m from portugal and I found your site during my research on co-sleeping. I’ve had imagined what you just showed me. What a great idea!! But I’ve a question if you could answer it woulb be great. When the baby starts to roll and move during his sleep did he fall? How did you prevent it. My English is not very good (sorry).
Thank you very much!!!
Sílvia