Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3

Original poster

Keeping guns in a baby's bedroom?!

65 replies

RoseGarden123 · 12/03/2013 19:13

I know i am probably being a bit silly but can others help me on this one. My husband is a farmer and as such we have three guns in the house. We live in a bungalow and due to how it is built we only have one main brick internal wall. For gun licences the gun case has to be attached to an internal solid wall and is currently in our spare room. We are due DC2 soon and the spare room will become baby's bedroom. The gun cabinet is absolutely secure and DH is so careful about keeping all the cartridges etc locked up elsewhere and not even I know how to access the cabinet. So safety wise no issue. However i feel really funny about our baby sleeping in a room with guns in it. I want DH to move it into the loft, only other option and he thinks I am being silly (in a nice way). He has said if I really want to he will but it is a real hassle, big job, paperwork and the fire arms officer has to come back out to approve etc!
Am I being silly?

OP posts:

flatpackhamster · 19/03/2013 11:54

Seems fine to me. Your husband is obeying all the rules on gun ownership. He's a responsible gun owner. Guns are a normal thing and an essential tool on a farm. The weapons are locked securely away and your children will learn about gun safety and when they're allowed to handle them and when they're not.

quoteunquote · 19/03/2013 12:04

In a static caravan the cabinet are required to be bolted to the frame,

have asked if you could have a floor cabinet, and bolt it to a concrete floor,

We build a lot into floors, so I know it can be done.

EmmelineGoulden · 19/03/2013 12:16

YABU, though I understand the incongruity between a gun room and a nursery. But if anything moving it now will possibly create a miniscule amount of danger for your child. Lofts aren't great locations for gun cabinets - getting them up there is less easy, the guns will have to be put down while the ladder is got out etc. and may they be left out ocassionally for convenience sake (even if you both swear blind now that that wouldn't happen).

The cabinet is safe where it is. You are both going to have plenty to do with a new child in the house without making other things less convenient. The only reason to move it is if your DH will need access when your child is sleeping and may disturb him/her.

Long term it keepingit in the child's room wouldn't be ideal because an older child will want a sense of their own space. But a toddler doesn't need that and if you're extending in a couple of years and a better location can be designed then you should just wait.

Purplemonster · 19/03/2013 12:20

We had this issue but are getting around it by swapping rooms and extending into the loft. That said, my reasons for not wanting the gun cabinet in the baby's room were to do with it being a big ugly metal cabinet and the potential in the future for a toddler to bang their head on it or something, not some notion about it being 'unsafe'. It's ok saying children are 'in to everything' but they can't get in to a locked steel gun safe when the key isn't even kept in the house so I don't see an issue with that but I do get the fact that it doesn't look very pretty in a nursery. If it's within another cupboard though I don't think I'd have a problem with it. The room the safe is in will now be DSS's room as he only visits every fortnight and at 13 isn't likely to crack his head open on it.

worldgonecrazy · 19/03/2013 12:25

Does it have to be an internal solid wall? My gun cabinet is attached to an external solid wall, i.e. the wall at the front of the house (I come under the West Midlands police force). Have you double-checked that you can't do this? I always read "internal" as just meaning inside the house, rather than no outside walls.

worldgonecrazy · 19/03/2013 12:29

Just found this:
?Gun cabinets must be fixed to a brick or concrete wall using a minimum of 4 x 10mm expanding masonry (rawl) bolts.
?They must be out of sight of casual visitors preferably in a room without direct access (i.e. door or window) to the exterior.

So not absolutely essential that it's an internal wall.

TobyLerone · 19/03/2013 12:34

Yes, you're being silly.

Viviennemary · 19/03/2013 12:56

There is no such thing as perfectly safe where guns are concerned. Personally, I certainly would not keep them in a child's room.

bedmonster · 19/03/2013 13:39

I can understand how you feel. DP has guns which are kept in our bedroom. When he went for his licence and said he would put them in a special cupboard in our bedroom I told him I would feel really odd about it. I can't explain it, but I knew I would be uncomfortable with it.
However, they are so secure that even I can't access them. They are kept under lock and key and also have 2 kinds of combination password things which I don't know the combinations for. The guns and the bullets are separated before being locked away. EVEN if a DC managed to get into the cupboard (impossible without the combination and the keys), they wouldn't be able to activate anything.
And we have had them in our room now for a couple of years and I had completely forgotten they were there! You will get used to it and you will still all be really safe.

maninawomansworld · 22/03/2013 00:08

There is no such thing as perfectly safe where guns are concerned.
I bet you've never even handled one.
A typical response from a townie who has no idea what they're going on about.

tigerdriverII · 22/03/2013 00:15

Absolutely no problem now but I would sort something out over the next couple of years as its not ideal when your child becomes cognisant of what is in their room. Maybe more than a couple of years actually but I know that DS11 would be very aware if guns were in his room and would probably be accessing them as he is v keen to learn to shoot ( we are v rural and have friends who are into clay shooting so this is a normal interest for him).

newbeliever · 22/03/2013 00:20

Rosegarden I felt the same as you when our 2nd ds was born as the gun cabinet was in a wardrobe in his bedroom. It bothered me for years and DH has finally moved it into the wardrobe in our bedroom. It's the external wall by the way. The only other option was to have it on the landing and build some sort of a cupboard round it to disguise it (my DHs preferred option) but I didn't want to spoil the look of our recently decorated hall/landing and newly acquired chair

nemno · 22/03/2013 00:23

I can't see a problem with it. Guns in lofts sounds much less ideal.

GrowSomeCress · 22/03/2013 07:28

There is no such thing as perfectly safe where guns are concerned.

There is no such thing as perfectly safe where anything in life is concerned.

OP I think it's fine.

SoupDreggon · 22/03/2013 07:35

Rationally, its absolutely fine. Certainly whilst the baby is a baby. I would probably want another solution for when the child is older.

I totally understand why you feel uncomfortable about it though.

Flip

1 2 3

Swipe left for the next trending thread