Christmas tree + crawling child = disaster?

[Jennyrosity]

DD will be one in January, so this will be her first Christmas. She's crawling and is in to everything, and so I'm wondering whether a tree is even possible this year. I just can't imagine her not finding all the lights and shiny baubles irresistible, so am having visions of her at best breaking all the baubles on the bottom half of the tree, and at worst pulling the whole thing down on top of herself.

So who else has been in this situation? How did you manage? Is my only option just not to have a tree till she's a bit older?

[EnglishGirlApproximately]

Marking place. Ds got on his knees and rocked yesterday so we'll be in your situation soon. I foresee baby and Christmas tree disasters ahead. I was considering getting some if those table top trees to dot around the place.

[DoodleAlley]

Hi we have a now four year old Prolific climber and been fine with real Christmas trees.

We get a biggie so it's hard to pull over and the bonus is they are quite spikey which acts as a deterrent.

When he was little we did keep baubles slightly higher up and made sure nothing that could break was within reach.

So it took a bit of effort but was worth it.

It was other decorations which were more of a challenge!! Though still wouldn't risk putting presents under the tree before the day itself! Too much temptation!

[PebblePots]

Watching with interest!

[xMinerva]

I let mine decorate the tree with me then re-did it once they were in bed, it gave them chance to explore and have their little play under supervision.

Put all the cheaper/harder to break/kids decs around the bottom so if they did play, they weren't grabbing the more expensive decorations but try and distract them if they did go near the tree.

Distractions included:

Small blow up paddling pool filled with tinsel or cheap shredded wrapping paper, hide a little present in their for them to find (pack of stickers or something)
Singing, dancing tacky Santa thing.
Their own mini fibre optic christmas tree with small decorations that they could take off/play/redecorate as they wished.

All this meant they pretty much left the big tree alone unless say in front of it to watch the flashing lights.

[Sillybillypoopoomummy]

we found that if it was a forbidden thing, then they would be drawn to it. If we took them to see it, showed it to them and said it was the christmas tree etc then they weren't bothered and left it alone!

[BoysBoysBoysAndMe]

Put it in a play pen

[xMinerva]

In there*

[Theas18]

We had a paper Xmas tree stuck on the patio doors one year when I couldn't face the stress of a 1yr old and 3yr old mucking with it! THey loved helping to make it/decorate etc

[LoveInAColdClimate]

I am going to put ours on top of a chest so DS can't reach it - this may backfire if he gets better at pulling himself up, though!

[BoysBoysBoysAndMe]

Seriously though-I've found if I'm really blasé about the tree the novelty wears off after a couple of days.

Just don't put any naice decorations near the bottom.

Also one year when ds1 was 14 months he pulled the tree on him. Frightened him to decking death and didn't go near it again (shouldn't laugh)

[naughtymummy]

We put ours in a playpen. Worked a treat

[procrastinor]

Hung cheap non-breakable decorations at the bottom and encouraged DS to go touch it and explore. Got bored pretty quick and pretty much ignored it apart from being obsessed with a red bauble. The cat however was a different story.

[harryhausen]

We always had a tree even when my two were very young.

Like another poster said, the novelty of touching etc does wear off. I actually found it a source of huge entertainment - decorating it, choosing favourite ornaments etc. It used to keep them quiet for ages!

We used to make sure the tree was well sturdy. Lights were never at the bottom of the tree. Most of the decs were wooden or fabric. Show them the ones they can touch etc. Honestly, I never found it a huge problem.