Creative ideas for infant sleep space in hotel?

[RedSuedeShoes]

I'm asking this for a friend of a friend who is traveling with her 5-month-old soon. They are flying cross-country (Florida to the Pacific NW), then driving to Las Vegas. They don't want to bring a pack and play along for that whole trip and are thinking of trying to buy a used one here in the PNW, taking it to LV and leaving it at the hotel when they're done. I thought there's probably a cheaper, more lightweight option, though.

The baby's not super-active yet, so not rolling around alot, etc. Could technically sleep on the hotel bed, but the mom is too freaked about germs for that to be a good option. Couldn't he sleep in anything with sides...a laundry basket?! Maybe with a shearling or something in the bottom? I don't know, but it seems like there should be something besides a disposable P&P.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

[YouAreTheFocus]

The hotels she's staying at don't have cribs? We stayed in a hotel when our son was a year old, and he slept and napped just fine in the hotel crib. If it's the germ issue, well honestly I think the crib would be easier to sanitize than a used pnp.

[Jelly Bean]

Not sure if by "creative" you mean something other than a portable crib, but I'll suggest it anyway...the Baby Bjorn travel crib!

Not sure how much money she wants to spend, but you can always get them for 20% with coupons at Buy Buy Baby or Albee's. Mom and Pop shops tend to honor competitor coupons too. I have used mine a ton and flown with it tons (I've been able to check it for free). It's been worth every penny.

Best part: it comes in a little suitcase, weighs 11 lbs and sets up in 5 seconds.

For the record: The idea of a laundry basket scares me! They can topple over. I would never put a sleeping child in one.

[hoodlims]

I would just get a hotel crib and put my own sheets down. And maybe put the kid in the bathroom, but only because my own daughter doesn't sleep very well when she is in the same room as us.

[candaceb]

For that long of a trip, and since it sounds like she'll have a bunch of different hotels to deal with, I would buy the cheapest pack-and-play and just drag it along (also get a couple of pack and play sheets). I have had a variety of experiences with cribs in hotels, and none of them have been perfect - even at the $500/night Andaz in NYC where they had a fancy crib and baby toiletries, but no crib sheet so they had a full size sheet bunched up under the mattress and it wouldn't lie flat.

We have found that it works really well to request a handicap accessible room because the bathrooms are larger, and then we put the pack-and-play in the bathroom so we don't have to sit in the dark and quiet starting at 6:30 when DS goes to bed.

[Naranjadia]

My mom once pulled out a bureau drawer for my sister to sleep in, but that was the 70's. :rotflmao: