It’s mid-morning on a warm summer day. Your family has decided to brave the great outdoors in nothing but a tent. Good, old-fashioned camping – none of this “glamping” stuff people rave about now. The sky is partly cloudy and the temperatures are in the high 80’s. The humidity also hovers in the high 80’s. You’re sitting in the shade with a cool bottle of water you pulled out of your ice chest and you can feel a bead of sweat run down your back. Your 1-year-old has begun to fuss and you know nap time is here.
You step inside the tent and have to look around to make sure the tent door wasn’t a secret passage way to the sauna at your favorite health spa… nope, it’s still just a tent. Sweat beads up in your hair line and you realize pretty quickly that your little babe will not be sleeping in this heat and humidity. What’s a momma to do?
If you saw my post about why you might want to consider taking your crib bedding with you next time you vacation with baby, you may have come across some ways to use a fitted crib sheet that you may not have previously thought of. In fact, since putting that post together, I’ve come up with some more ways to use it and have decided that it’s worth carrying one around in our diaper bag as an everyday item.
But folding a fitted sheet every day is not my idea of fun. I’ve decided to fold my fitted sheet into a roll for carrying around in the diaper bag. It saves a little room, stays folded much better and isn’t any harder to fold than folding it flat.
Reach deep down into your note writing days from junior high and high school, because this is a modified version of one of those basic origami-folded notes you used to pass around with your friends. After you do it a couple times, you’ll be a fitted sheet origami whiz and it will take about a minute to fold this roll.
Pinch the corners at the top of the sheet. Lay it down on the ground and, as best you can, fold the sheet in at the corners to create a rectangle shape. The more you do this, the easier it will become. I don’t need to lay the sheet out on the ground anymore.
Fold the top down to the bottom of the sheet, so the sheet is folded in half.
Rotate the sheet, so the folded edge is to your right. Fold the bottom up to create a point.
Fold the short edge of the sheet over to the long edge.
Here’s the tricky part… flip the whole thing over. Don’t let the folds come out or your roll won’t hold together as well. This gets easier the more you do it. You’ll want the point on top now.
Start from the bottom and begin rolling the sheet. The tighter you pull it, the smaller your roll will be. You don’t want to roll it too tight, or you won’t have anywhere to tuck the end of your sheet into.
Roll the sheet until it comes to a small point. The point should overlap the slanted edge of the sheet.
Tuck the point into the slanted edge. You can tuck it all the way into the sheet or you can leave a little point sticking out to pull for a quick unroll.
Ta-da!! That’s it. It’s really not difficult. Promise. And I have used our sheet so many times in the past week and a half. There’s no changing table in the bathroom? Left the baby’s blanket at home? And it works awesome with the pack and play… check out that post for more ideas on that!
