Best choice for growing kids

Mattress Talk General Mattresses Questions
1

Hello,

I am looking to purchase mattresses for my husband/myself and our three children: 2, 3, and 5-years-old. I plan to purchase all-natural latex with comfort layers that can be changed out. My thinking is, I could change the top layer as it becomes worn or to meet the changing needs of the kids, and extend the life of the core layer (Please correct me if I’m wrong).

Also, could anyone give me an idea at what age (or weight and height) kids start to prefer a larger mattress (full or twin XL). Since I am thinking long-term, I would prefer to spend more today rather than make another large investment later.

Just to make things more complicated, I would like a natural fire retardant, like wool, instead of the polyurethane covers that many companies use. I am in Tampa, so my first call was to Fox Mattresses (the sales person was patient and knowledgeable), as I would like to stay local. However, their mattress covers are not made from natural materials and only queens and kings have removable comfort layers. I have looked at Cozy Pure and may end up buying from them. However, they don’t have the interchangeable comfort layer. I would have to buy a 6" mattress with a topper.

Oh, yeah, and I want the best deal out there. I’m sure that’s not asking a lot.

Thanks for any suggestions.

2

Hi rgraham,

You’re certainly not wrong. Your thinking makes perfect sense to me and is one of the advantages of a component design.

This really depends on the kids themselves and their size and of course their comfort and sleeping style. In most cases twin or twin XL provides them with enough width until they either sleep with someone else (a twin XL has the same room for one person as each half of a king size) or they begin to feel cramped because of their size or sleeping style (such as a sprawler that prefers more room). Ideally a mattress should be a minimum of about 6" - 8" longer than their height (8" would be more ideal) and should be about 16" wider than their shoulder width. The design should be firmer when they are younger and still growing to help with good spinal alignment and when they begin to develop more and go through puberty then is the time that they may need a little more thickness in the comfort layers to help with their changing and more developed body shape (they will normally tell you if you ask about the comfort of their mattress or there would be some signs that they are not sleeping as well as they used to). A regular twin mattress is 38" or 39" x 75" and is generally wide enough for most kids or adults (38" - 39" is generally fine for a shoulder width up to about 22" or so) and it wouldn’t need to be any longer until they are taller than 5’ 7" - 5" 9" or so. If you expect them to grow taller than this then it may make sense to start with a twin XL. Wider than a twin would depend on your best judgement and would be a “luxury” in most cases but wouldn’t normally be necessary.

The best place to start your research is post #1 here which has the basic information, steps, and guidelines that you will find helpful and also includes links to a list of the members here that sell online. Several of these sell component latex mattresses that have great quality and value if there are no suitable options or good quality/value options available locally.

The better options and possibilities I’m aware of in the Tampa area are in post #143 here.

Phoenix

3

Some suggestions:

o Twin XL is a good size for a single. It can be used for a kid at any age and for adult guests. Also, the bedding can go to college where dorms commonly use Twin XL.

o Your kids will likely move out before you ever replace any of the Latex. Any then you may not be so interested in maintaining so many single beds.

o The typical 100% Latex/foam mattress will be soft around the edge. A soft edge can interfere with a parent snuggling their child in bed, reading a book, sharing their day. And it’s not the best seating surface, which a kid might prefer for himself and friends. A traditional (and less expensive) innerspring could be a better fit.

zzz

4

Thanks so much for the feedback. We chose to go with three queen size latex mattress from Sleep EZ. They were having a great sale. I was hoping to review after sleeping one them for a few nights.

However, I have a problem. My 4-year-old, who hasn’t wet the bed in months, just did. On her brand new mattress. First night. Her puddle pad gets here Tuesday. That means there was no protective layer. Sooooo, any suggestions on how to clean it? Good thing she loves her bed because we can’t return it now. I guess she was sleeping so soundly she didn’t wake herself up. I also guess I will be running to a mattress store tomorrow to get a pad for the other two beds we bought.

5

One more question. I understand that memory foam has an initial off-gassing and that latex should not. The latex mattresses we bought has a distinct oder. I think it smells like a tire. Is this normal?

6

I would ask the vendor about cleaning the cover. Maybe it will survive dry cleaning. Maybe it will survive a minimal cold water wash with something mild like Woolite. Maybe it won’t shrink. Air dry it.

Your only option on the Latex is to rinse it out and air dry it. Maybe a dash of HE detergent that rinses out well would be ok… I don’t know. Rinse it out the way it came in… slow and gentle. Air dry it thoroughly. Do not expose it to sunlight… it will degrade.

New Latex can smell rubbery, but this should pass.

zzz

7

Hi rgraham,

Ditto to Sleeping’'s suggestion. They will know better than anyone how to clean their cover.

The latex underneath will probably be fine (if the cover absorbed the accident) but there are some suggestions for cleaning latex here and a little more information in this thread if this is necessary.

All materials including latex will have some degree of offgassing (some of which can be smelled and some that can’t) but the important part is whether any offgassing is harmful. Even food has offgassing that can be smelled. In the case of latex the smell isn’t harmful. Talalay latex tends to have a sweeter smell and Dunlop tends to have a more rubbery smell but neither are harmful and both have been tested to Oeko-Tex standard 100 class 1 (safe for babies) standards. Both will dissipate to levels below normal detection but the rubbery smell can last longer than the sweeter smell.

Most of all … congratulations on your new mattresses. You certainly made great choices :slight_smile:

I hope you have the chance to let us know what Shawn or Jeremy at SleepEz say about cleaning your cover.

Phoenix

8

I talked to Shawn at Sleep EZ this morning once the west coast woke up. He recommended spot cleaning the cover and latex mattress with water. He said the same thing as you did in the “cleaning latex here” post (paraphrased): solvents will damage the latex, but I could try a mild dish soap. The cover is wool woven inside 100% cotton, so washing it, even on gentle will cause the cotton to shrink and the wool to bunch, but I could spot clean or try the dry cleaner.

I took my steam cleaner to the cover, because it also has a hot water infusion/extraction feature, but there is still a faint odor. I googled urine in a wool comforter and they suggest this method: Non-washable Fabrics - How to Remove Urine Stains: Tips and Guidelines | HowStuffWorks. If that doesn’t work, I am headed to the dry cleaner.

As far as the mattress, it seems like the pee went completely through the layers. I mean, in one side, out the other. I put towels between the layers last night (where the latex was wet), but this morning (about 3 hours later) it felt completely dry. I can not tell where it was wet to treat the latex, unless I put the cover on. I’m not sure if I’m going to dump water in a large area and let it run through the mattress just in case or assume the latex is porous and everything just went through.

Can I also say that we all love our mattresses! I got a great price with the sale on latex at Sleep EZ. The queen 8" 100% natural latex mattresses are $1250 through the end of the month. We got queens for everyone thinking that they could take them when they moved out in 20ish years. My oldest daughter (the one who peed the bed) has problems sleeping and she was asking to go to sleep last night because she loved her new mattress so much. The shredded latex pillows we were given are like clouds. Not like real clouds because that would be cold and wet. :wink: I was able to get almost everything I wanted: 3 layers that can be changed at anytime, 100% natural latex, GREAT price, quick delivery, excellent service, split layers on our queen bed, happy kids. The one thing I did without is the organic cover. I couldn’t spend $400 more a mattress for a cover. Because of the sale, that is the price difference right now.

I had great conversations with knowledgeable people from Fox Mattress here in Florida, Brooklyn Bedding, Arizona Mattress, and especially Hans from Cozy Pure. I really wanted to buy from Cozy Pure because of their partnership with renewable energy and pure mattresses, but I didn’t have the extra money to spend since we were buying three mattresses. :dry: In all, it was a very easy process. Now, to protect the mattresses from the kids. Wish me luck.

@ sleeping: we do a lot of cuddling, so it is a great point about the edges. I’m hoping because we were able to go with the queen size, that problem should be minimized. Thanks so much for your help.

@ Phoenix: I am so thankful I found this site. I read the instructional post on how to go about choosing a mattress. I saved time, I saved a huge amount of money, and have a product I am extremely happy with. Thank you and keep going! There is this huge web of misinformation and just plain lies. And yes, when I went into stores, I knew a few things the sales people did not. I knew what questions to ask and what I wanted and that saved a tremendous amount of effort.

Thanks!

9

Hi rgraham,

I hope you have a chance to let us know how the cover cleaning works out. If you follow the instructions on the link that you posted make sure you noticed not to use ammonia on the wool.

There is another set of wool cleaning cleaning instructions here that I would use (using woolite) and hand washing is the only remaining choice before replacing the cover. The key with wool is to be very careful to avoid agitating the wool which causes the wool to felt.

If all else fails you can also talk to SleepEz and replace the cover but of course this would be the last option.

Thanks for all the great feedback and you certainly did well in spite of Murphy’s Law taking over for a bit :slight_smile:

Phoenix

10

Well, all seemed to turn out well. I spot cleaned it with just water and my steamer that day and let it dry for two days. Once it was dry there was no oder or stain. I guess the wool did “self-clean” as the was mentioned in the link you posted. Crisis averted.

11

Hi rgraham,

That’s great news :slight_smile:

Thanks for letting us know.

Phoenix