Common crib comforts can become culprits of tragedy, as one mom from Washington painfully found out last month.

The worst kind of tragedy

Jordan DeRosier's son was just a day shy of 7 months old when she put him to bed in his crib.

She laid him on his back with a blanket made by his great-great grandmother and another grey blanket he'd had since birth.

The next morning, she discovered him blue and ice-cold. The cause was immediately obvious: one of his blankets wrapped around his head and face.

DeRosier and her husband called 911 and tried to resuscitate him with CPR, but the emergency responders arrived and knew there was no chance of bringing him back.

"Our baby was gone," DeRosier said. "Those had been the last moments we would ever hold him again."

De Rosier hopes other parents will read her story and save their own children from the same fate.

"That's really the only thing giving us comfort right now," she said. "We've gotten thousands of messages from parents saying that after reading about our story, they took blankets out of cribs."

Unexpected instruments of death

DeRosier's story is unquestionably tragic, and unfortunately, similar stories happen all the time.

Emily Silver, a Family Nurse Practitioner and co-owner of Boston NAPS, told FamilyShare she is passionate about spreading safe infant sleep practices because she lost her sister to SIDS (Sudden Infant Deaths Syndrome) in her childhood.

"To keep the crib and bassinet area safe, we teach parents that the mattress should be firm with a fitted sheet only," Silver says. There should be no bumpers, loose blankets, or stuffed animals within the crib, that could increase the risk of SIDS or suffocation."

It seems natural to put a baby to sleep with a blanket, toy or stuffed animal. But seemingly harmless objects such as these can easily become choking and suffocating objects.

"Practice the ABCs of safe sleep," said Tyler Killette, who works for an awareness campaign called Prevent Needless Deaths. "The safest way for infants to sleep is Alone on their Backs in a Crib. This minimizes the risk of the infant suffocating, especially if they have not yet developed neck muscle control."

Co-sleeping

Caitlin Hoff, a health investigator from Consumer Safety, told FamilyShare that she always recommends parents never share beds with their infants.

"While it is recommended to keep your infant's crib in your bedroom with you, sleeping in the same bed as your infant or napping with your baby on a couch or chair are extremely dangerous actions," Hoff says. "A sleeping parent can easily smother the infant by accident simply by rolling over in his or her sleep."

She also suggests mothers try to avoid breastfeeding when they're very tired, because they're at risk for falling asleep while holding their infant.

"As a general rule of thumb, always return your sleeping infant to its crib." Hoff said.

By being more mindful of safe sleeping practices for our little ones, parents can better protect their children from the tragedy that could ensue from something as seemingly innocent as a blanket.