Beds for babies

Beds for babies

Most babies start off life sleeping in a crib or Moses basket. Those names are very historical: a cribb was an Old English word for a manger (the thing that horses and cattle eat out of), while the Moses basket was named after the basket that the Old Testament prophet, Moses, was placed in by his mother to keep him safe from Pharaoh. Recently we’ve made lots of little mattresses for Moses baskets and cribs, and some people have sent us lovely pictures of their baby sleeping soundly in one.

Making a mattress for a baby is completely different to making one for an adult. Grown ups like to sleep on something that gives under their weight, while it’s really important that babies and young children have a perfectly flat surface to lie on. A baby cannot lift its own head for the first few weeks, and if the mattress is too soft his or her head will create a hollow in it. This can be dangerous if the baby is sick as the vomit could be re-inhaled.

The mattresses we make for babies are made from layers of strongly needled organic wool. This gives a warm and cosy mattress which is also properly flat. Size or shape isn’t an issue so if you have an heirloom moses basket or crib it’s well worth dusting it off so that the next generation of your family can make full use of it. It’s easy to make a template for us so that we can make the mattress to exactly the right size; simply put the basket on to a large sheet of paper (newspaper will do), then draw around the base of the basket with a felt pen or something similar. Cut the shape out and fit it into the basket. At this point it may well need a bit of trimming so that there’s room for it to sit neatly in the basket, remembering that you will need a little bit of space to tuck a sheet in.

An organic mattress is what every baby ought to sleep on, so get your scissors out and within a few days of sending us the template you’ll receive a hand made mattress that will give your baby the very best start in life.