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Hey and welcome/croeso to camping!

I haven't camped with babies as my babies are 7-15!! But friends wo take similar aged babies as yours use alot of layering both on and blankets. 1 heater in our tent doesn't really do much so heaters may vary in effectiveness. My friends go regualry so can't be a problem.

Sorry I can't be much of a help but here's to many wonderful family camping memories.........all good

A tent carpet! - essential for floor play now and for years to come! Also keeps it a little warmer.

A normal travel cot with broadish feet (so don't damage the groundsheet) should be fine for now with appropriate bedding. We went for the baby growbags plus extra clothes so that our son didn't wriggle out of the bedding. Use extra blankets and the usual advice on tucking them in. Take good layers for yourselves for those night-time sessions.

Comfortable chairs to breast or bottle feed. May need to try them out before buying.

You may want to take a baby bath and a good change mat - otherwise it will be baths in a small shared sink. If the little one gets cold, a warm bath can help loads. Although improving, changing facilities are a bit limited in campsites, so you may have just a shelf, a slatted bench or the washroom or tent floor for nappy changes.

Must admit we chickened out for anything more than a few days until our son was 2 1/2 - too much stuff to lug along with the camping gear and we only had a small ridge tent at the time.

Good luck!

Helen

We camped last year when DD was 6 months old and again when she was 7 months old.

We just use a standard legged travel cot which you can get for about £20 or so. In this I put a flannelette bottom sheet. DD wears a long sleeved vest and babygro and a 2.5tog sleeping bag. I then put a double folded fleece blanket on her when DH and I go to bed.

Our heater is a cheapy fan heater from argos and it cost £15 or so. I also took one of those gel room thermometer things so that I could see what the air temperature was. We only had the heater the second time and it was more for keeping me warm when I was up in teh middle of the night feeding because I couldn't totally layer up because I breastfed. 

I have a umbrella folding camp chair without arms which is smaller in size for the 'bedroom' for when I was doing night feeds, but if your baby is bottle fed then I think any old camp chair would be OK.

Our highchair is an Ikea 'antilop' which costs about £15 and the legs come off it so it is easy to pack away.

I bought a plastic coated flat changing mat form poundland for nappy changes etc. It can be folded up, but is still full size unlike the ones you get in change bags.

The one tip I can tell you is ring the campsite before you go and ask what baby facilities they have. We camped at CCC sites with parent and baby rooms. The scarborough site had a proper baby bath and Thetford Forest had a big belfast sink. I took a small travel bottle of dettol cleaner stuff so that I could wash the bath or sink out before putting DD in it. Also, I ended up buying a tesco value bath mat and cutting it down to fit the belfast sink so that DD didn't slip because she was sitting up quite well by the time with went to Thetford forest.

We have an electric coolbox so that I could keep DD food properly cool, but I did stock up on jars/pouches. If you bottle feed, my advice would be purchase a small plastic tub to cold water sterilise 2 bottles at time and a flask for keeping hot water in, which would save you boiling the kettle on a camping stove for the bottles. Or, you can buy pre-sterilised bottles, but I'm not sure how much these are and how many bottles a 6mth old takes.

In poundland you can also get plastic smock bibs and so to save on washing I put DD in a sleeved cloth bib (she's a mucky devil!) then, the plastic smock bib which is wipe clean. This saved me having loads of bibs to wash and I only used 1 a day or even less, depending on how much food DD got on the sleeves.

Also, even if it is warm weather, you will know what time your baby normally wakes, so ensure you have a blanket/cosytoes for the pushchair because I often had to take DD for a walk at 6am just for something to do.

Also, if you are camping with a 6 month old you will probably need to take your hand blender if you are making your own food.

I hope that helps.

We took our son when he was 6 weeks............and he's now 23!!

Do they still do 'cosy toes' sleeping bags type things because of all the stuff we had to take that was the one that stood out as useful, multi purpose and importantly kept him warm.  In fact the first night he slept straight through the night inside it...........it was made of pure sheepskin so maybe we boiled him to sleep  but it worked and I didn't worry constantly about him being cold.

They were made to go inside a pushchair, which I did during the day, and then whenever he slept,he slept inside it, in a travel cot at night.

Sorry, this may be not much use to you if they don't exist anymore but I just remember this as being the one 'thing' I would always take.

The tent carpets tend to have a waterproofish base layer, foam interior and soft fabric top and pack relatively small and dry quickly. I wouldn't use a domestic carpet if that is what you have in your loft. Try and find one from another make of tent and either sew together or cut down to size and re-hem.

Helen

If you can't get a tent carpet to fit try arranging picnic rugs to cover your floor.

If you want to make it really cosy the old fashioned foam mats that we used to use as beds years ago are great as an insulating layer underneath.  Especially if baby is crawling around.