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Simple No-Sew Bunk Bed Tent

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Try this easy no-sew bunk bed tent trick next time your little one wants to use all your sheets and blankets to build a fort out of their bed.The no-sew secret to building the perfect bunk bed tent!

One of my daughters is a burrower. Do you know a kid like this? She likes to pile up all her stuffed animals on her bed and sleep right in the middle of them. If you’re ever looking for her, you can bet she’s hiding somewhere under a sheet tent in the den or behind a chair reading a book with about 3 or 4 of her animals.

She’s also an engineer-in-the-making. If you’re on Instagram with me, you may have seen the picture I posted recently of her invention that allows her to turn her light off and on from her bed. (When you’re cuddled up with all your stuffies, the last thing you want to do is crawl out of bed, turn off the light, and then race the monsters back across the room to the bed!)

So I wasn’t surprised when I came in the other morning to find this.My 10-year-old's version of a bunk bed tent

It may be a little hard to tell from the picture, but she raided the linen closet, draped sheets and sleeping bags from the top bunk, anchored them with rolls of yarn, and made herself a colorful little bunk bed tent.

Now, I respect a girl’s right to the perfect little reading hideaway, but I just couldn’t deal with a bed that looked like the villain from a luxury bedding horror movie. I mean, it looks like the swamp thing, with sheets instead of watery goo! Plus, we have no more spare sheets now. I couldn’t bear to tell her to take it down, so I had to come up with a more mommy-approved version of the tent. After a few failed attempts, I hit on an amazingly simple trick.

The secret to creating a bunk bed tent

 

In trying to solve this dilemma, I sacrificed a couple of hours and a perfectly good bedsheet before I realized that all I would need is:

  • A twin-size flat sheet
  • 4-ply Jute string
  • Command “Fridge” ClipsThe Perfect clip for building a bunk bed fort

I picked up two packages of the fridge clips from my local Hobby Lobby, otherwise known as “My Happy Place”, and applied them upside down at about 12 inch intervals around the upper bed frame.Hang clips upside down on top bunk frame

Then I simply cut the jute string to a little more than the length of the bed and tied a knot in each end. I folded the bedsheet in half lengthwise, and inserted the string along the fold.Knotted string along folded edge of sheet.

Then I gently pushed the sheet and string into the clips.Slide the sheet and string into the command strips

In case you’re wondering about the string, I found that the sheet alone was too thin to be securely held by the clip. But once you put the string in the fold, it fills up that little loop at the top of the clip and is much harder to pull out. Plus, tying a knot at the end keeps it from slipping out of each corner. You can probably use any kind of string that you have on hand, as long as it’s small enough to fit in that loop, but not too small to pull through.Knot-holds-sheet-in-place

For the end of the bed, I used part of the other sheet that gave its life for an earlier, failed, prototype. You could probably use a pillowcase too, if that’s handier.

The beauty of this method is that it can all be removed, with no trace! So if she ever outgrows her bunk bed tent, I can just take down the sheet. I can leave the clips up because they’re almost invisible, but once we’re really done with them, they’ll pull right off cleanly, with no mess to clean up and no damage to the furniture.

I also relocated her lamp cord, just to clean things up a little bit. Doesn’t it look pretty with her light on inside?

A bunk bed tent makes the perfect hideaway

 

I’m sure she won’t mind if I make myself at home with a good book while she’s at school! I’m off to play Goldilocks…

Comments

  2. Brilliant! I absolutely love it! I wish you’d been my mom 🙂 I used to get in trouble for raiding the linen closets and making tents…and she never offered me an alternative like this! Suppose it could work on a card table??? I used to tent the card table regularly:)

    Reply

    • Yes, I think the card table idea is a great one! We don’t have one of those, but I bet my kids would love that too.

      Reply

  6. I have a grand-daughter who sounds just like your daughter. Her favourite quiet place is amongst her stuffed animals underneath her bed where the bed skirt gives her a cozy den. I’m going to pass this on to my daughter-in-law. So creative.

    Reply

    • I used to love hanging out under my bed as a kid, and I’d forgotten all about that until you mentioned it. 🙂

      Reply

  8. You had me at “no sew”. Then you had me again at “command hooks”. You sweet talker, you! Great tutorial, Meredith! Thanks!

    Reply

  9. That is so clever and really cute! I don’t have children, but my dog is a burrower and will push the blanks and sheets all together to make a tent in the middle of the bed and then tuck herself under it all. Maybe I can use your inspiration to create something for her using her doggie bed (the one she never sleeps in!). 🙂

    Reply

    • Thanks Marquita! I always think it’s funny how much we spend on those adorable plush dog beds that never get used! 🙂

      Reply

  12. Oh how fun and your version is so much tidier! I used to make forts under the dining table a lot and another favorite of mine was to drape a blanket over the armrests of the love seat and sofa on either side of the door to my bedroom. I would spend hours in my blanket hideout.

    Reply

  13. Wow, I’m sure all little kids would want an awesome mom like you. I love your version of the bed tent. Very creative and very pretty!

    Reply

  15. Very cute once again. For me though it would not have worked but then again I was a boy. Boxes, tree houses, and finding a happy spot under the house was what I looked forward to.

    Reply

    • Yeah, I know it’s kinda girly. 🙂 I have a friend with a little boy who’s perfectly happy whenever she brings home a new cardboard box. It doesn’t get much better than that!

      Reply

    • Thanks a great idea! I’d love it if you made something a little more useful and manly out of my girly bunk bed idea. 🙂

      Reply

  17. I wish I knew how to make a bunk bed tent when I lived in the dorm as a college freshman. I would have loved the privacy. A voiceover colleague of mine used his son’s bottom bunk to record his audition, he said it was just like being in a recording booth. But he put a blanket over his head. I’msending this link to my VO pals who have kids with bunk beds as a voiceover recording tip.

    Reply

    • I know, me too! I was always on the bottom bunk because I didn’t like the feeling of being up in the air. I would have loved this myself in college. That’s a cool idea using it for a VO booth. I’m amazed at people’s creativity!

      Reply

  20. Love it. Reminds me of my days as the “bottom bunker” when I was young. There are times that I wish my kids ages/genders were closer together so they could experience the joys and pains of bunk beds.

    Reply

  21. I simply love this trick. My daughter also pile up all animals cushions etc and sleep with them. I have to look for this clip to help her make a tent next time. Thank you for a great and easy share.

    Reply

    • This one actually doesn’t slide on the string. The rope is in there just to give the hooks something to grab onto. She doesn’t open it by sliding it, but just by lifting the flap.

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. […] This falls under the category of “Don’t compare your outtakes to someone else’s highlight reel.” (I don’t know who said that, but I think it really applies to the world of blogging, where we put our best projects on display, and don’t tell you about how we snapped at our kids while we were trying to finish that project, or how we had to try it 3 different ways before getting it right, as I did with my last project, the No-Sew Bunk Bed Tent. […]

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