Buying a baby cot

Our cosy bed is where we spend the most time in. This is even more so for babies. Young babies on average sleep for 16 hours a day. Therefore choosing the right bedding for your little bundle of joy is of extreme importance. Here are some tips on choosing the basic beddings such as cot, cot mattress, and cot bumpers for your precious ones.

Cot

• Look for Cer­tification to make sure standards have been met
• A cot usually has one or both sides that can drop so that you can put down and pick up your baby more easily.
• Decide on whether you need one or two hands to operate the mechanism that drops the side; go for one handed designs if you can, because you will need the other arm to carry your baby.
• Cots are designed with wooden bars, make sure the bars are no more than 6 cm (2 inches) apart
• Make sure that there are no splinters or cracks in the wood.
• Buy one where you can adjust the base height of the mattress. There are usually two or three adjustable levels.
• Buy those with plastic covering on teething rails. Check that the plastic covering are tightly secured and unbroken
• Choose those with casters for mobility. Also make sure they are lockable.
• Avoid cots which have knobs that protrude.
• Avoid cot with decorative playbeads set into the cot ends. These will make the cot more attractive but not essential as you can easily attach toys to the cot.
• There are cots that can be transformed into a bed when the kids grow older, choose those if desired

Cot mattress

• Look for firmness in the mattress
• Prefer those with pocketed ­coil innerspring
• If there is a family history of allergy, select a dense foam (or put an airtight cover over an innerspring)
• Make sure the mattress is a snug fit in cot (with no more than two adult­finger widths between cot and mattress).
• Cot bumpers
• Cot bumper is a piece of padded fabric which attaches to the inside of the cot
• Look for snug not floppy fit around entire perimeter of cot, due to the danger of suffocation or strangulation if the bumper is loosen and the baby’s head comes into contact with them
• There should be at least 6 ties or sets of snaps for fastening to cot rails

For all the above items, always look out for:

• lead­free paint, if painted
• sturdy non­tip construction
• smooth edges and rounded corners

Avoid:

• rough edges
• sharp points
• small parts that might break loose
• exposed hinges or springs
• attached strings, cords, or ribbons

Source: Myshopping.sg, 3 May 2007