Wednesday, March 9, 2011

The last major purchase we need to make is a crib mattress. And I am completely confused.

We decided something organic is important, since he will be laying up against it and breathing it in for so many years. And a 2 in 1 is great, so that it can become his "toddler" bed in a few years.

BUT, since we don't know exactly what will happen with the co-sleeping, we have no idea how much he will or will not use the mattress. And, I just don't know the difference from one organic mattress to the next. For example the one on the left is only 200 (actually, marked down to 150.) The one on the right is twice as much at 300. Then there are even (according to the price) nicer ones.

So, you wealth of information, you. What do we take into consideration when buying our babies a mattress? What is important, what is not, what resources are available?

7 comments:

  1. I'm super interested to hear the answers on this one since we're trying to figure out the same thing now.

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  2. I went with the one on the left. For me, the most important thing was that the mattress is organic. Beyond that, I think you (well, I) can get a little overwhelmed with options.

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  3. we were all about getting the organic mattress, however, the reviews for the "cheaper" ones were not so great. we went with the Sealy Soybean Foamcore mattress, I think it was $108, and we got an organic mattress pad as well as organic sheets. I figure, the mattress if made of renewable and ecofriendly materials, had great reviews, doesn't smell of off-gassing AND we're using organic materials between him and the mattress that we're ok.

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  4. Oh my god, I researched this for HOURS. My understanding is that the term "organic" only means so much--it may refer only to the cover or just certain parts of it. Lots of mattresses don't disclose all their materials. For our bassinet pad, we went with Naturpedic. There is some plastic in it, but it's "food-grade polyethylene" and that seemed okay to me in this case; plus it's nice to have it waterproof. For the crib mattress, we did this one: http://thecleanbedroom.com/Organic_Nursery/Apollo-Organic-Crib-Toddler-Mattress.htm

    It's $300 to start, but free shipping, no tax, and we saved another 10% by liking them on Facebook. So it was $270 total. Organic cotton and wool, springs with no coating, no flame retardants (this is the big one for me), etc. Baby is still in my belly so I can't speak to long-term performance, but so far, I'm happy.

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  5. We're doing the sealy soybean foamcore, also. We can not afford over $200 on a mattress, so I read a ton of reviews on everything organic(ish) under that price point. A lot of people said that the double sided ones were too soft on the newborn side, the foamcore is lighter and easier to pull out to do sheet changes, I've been told it's the right size for my crib (babyletto mercer), and this review sounded good:

    http://www.amazon.com/Sealy-Soybean-Foam-Core-Crib-Mattress/dp/B001N4LE5M/ref=br_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=I9FGIIF5R0KI3&colid=3NRN2S1GCJBI

    We're getting a naturepedic mattress pad to put on top of it.

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  6. I work for an environment foundation so most of my coworkers study product life cycle and stuff like that. When I told them that I was pregnant they gave me all sorts of cool info about eco baby products.

    So yeah, organic stuff is nice and everything however in the US and in Canada greenwashing is pretty big so be careful. An organic mattress might not be as organic as you think. I'm such a party pooper!!!

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  7. I'm going to put in my two cents and say that I don't think it's worth the cash, especially if you aren't sure your kid will ever use it. Because we planned to co-sleep and we didn't have an organic mattress, it seemed silly to spend a ton. I opted for a standard Ikea crib mattress and made sure to let it off-gas outdoors for a month or so. Normally I just buy used furniture for this reason but for a crib mattress, used seemed a tad icky.

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