Too many stair gates?

[Strawberrycheesecake101]

We have a lo who has started walking. We have three stair gates in the house.

One on the bottom of the stairs - to stop the baby from climbing upstairs when our backs are turned

One on the top of the stairs - to stop the baby going down the stairs. This means baby can safely toddle around if I’m upstairs brushing my teeth or making beds or anything else.

One on the kitchen door - this is because my eldest crawled in once when I was cooking and burnt his hand on the oven door. The baby hates sitting in the high chair so when I’m cooking I can safely put him in the hallway with toys and I can keep an eye on him, but not have to worry about him toddling around the kitchen getting into everything.

It works well for us, but mil and fil keep making comments about it being like a prison. They proudly state how they never needed stair gates and how they are ugly things.

We did the same with the stairs, but the kitchen one seems a good idea, especially when you are on your own in the house.
It may have worked for them and did for my parents too, but there's a lot of tools out there to make life easier so why not make use of it 🤣 less accidents is only a good thing

You definitely need one for the top and bottom of the stairs imho, so ignore MIL and FIL there.

I never used one in the kitchen, but I had a hob guard attached to prevent them grabbing pot handles. You can also buy oven protectors to prevent the type of accident you describe. It can be fun to do cooking or baking with even quite small children (eg age 2) so hard to keep them out of the kitchen forever. You do need to be very careful with the cooker, kettle position etc.

But ultimately use whatever is working for you. You’re the boss here. If you find a gate useful at the moment then use it.

I had exactly the same number of gates and in the same places when I had my dogs and looked after my small grandchildren - wanted to keep little ones safe from stairs and to be able to keep separate from dogs. Small, friendly dogs who were good with the kids but if baby was asleep and I wanted to pop to the loo I'd be able to easily separate them. It's your home, your kids. Just roll your eyes and ignore the in laws.

We have this, and another between our living room and dining room to keep the dog and baby separate, and we also fitted gates at each set of stairs in our multi-level garden. No harm in being cautious in my opinion

Sounds perfect. It’s not some kind of achievement not to have stair gates, what a strange way of thinking about it!

Editting to say.. I bet they had a play pen that their kids spent a lot of their time in.. ask them that 😜

Better safe than sorry.

I remember a very stressful visit to a holiday cottage which had a gate to the open plan kitchen. It didn't fit well and we had to wedge it tight with the Sunday papers and all the colour supplements. It was such a faff we ended up using a stepladder to get over rather than undoing it all. DD diverted to trying to drown herself in the bathroom instead. I mean I'm laughing NOW...

Indeed it’s not!

we didn’t have any but only because we were living at mils when dc1 was born and she lived in a split level house with 6 half flights of stairs in 😂 that was too many stair gates so we went with zero and just watched dc1 if she was crawling out of the room we were currently in. It did work okay. By the time dc2 came along we moved into a flat with no stairs.
And dc3 was born when we lived in our house and we figured we’d managed without that far so we didn’t bother and again just watched him. Would have been easier with gates but felt like an unnecessary spend by that point!

Oh yes, playpens! We had two (one at our place and one at my mum's). Both of 70s vintage.

DH called them "the baby prisons".

I have the exact same, my kitchen and living room are open plan so have a gate separating them.

I really don’t care what anyone else thinks about it!

If it works for you then it’s fine. I didn’t because of the house design and eye level oven

You’re keeping your children safe. If your in-laws keep commenting after you’ve told them why they’re needed, I’d tell them to be quiet or they can not bother coming to somewhere they feel is like a prison. 🙄

We had 6 gates when our children were young due to how our house is laid out. 3 of them were those extra wide ones so our house may have looked ‘prison like’. The only thing that mattered was that our children were safe.

We still have some gates now, taller pet gates to stop the dogs getting out onto the drive.

Ignore them.

If they do'nt like the set up then never mind, no need to visit. "We'll see you" not very often.

I had them in top and bottom of stairs plus bottom of top stairs (3 storey townhouse), plus on the living room which was totally baby proofed (toddler plus crawling twins to keep alive).

The only thing I would mention is stairgates at the top of stairs can be more dangerous.

if the child attempts to climb it they’re falling from the height of the stair gate down the stairs.

in my day, admittedly a while ago, we were advised not to use them anywhere they increase the height of a fall.

other than that, put them where you want.

We had kitchen door, bottom of stairs, top of stairs and toddlers own bedroom door - I would say to your in-laws “yep prisons are safe places”

I didn’t think you were supposed to use them at the top of the stairs because a) the type with the bar at the bottom are a trip hazard to everyone even adults and b) if DC climbs it (and there probably will be a time where they attempt to climb a gate or a cot) falling over a stairgate and then down the stairs from a height is far more dangerous than open stairs. If I was changing a bed upstairs or whatever pop them in their cot with some toys or have them in the room with me but shut the door. But otherwise you do you! Whatever makes life easy and keeps them safe!

Sounds a fire hazard

I'm a granny, and have stairgates top and bottom (will remove the top one when baby looks like she might climb, but she's not as agile as her older brother. Kitchen we don't as she's not walking yet but I would if I felt necessary. I did the same when my kids were little so it's hardly a new thing!

Safety beats aesthetics!!

My pils didn’t believe in stair gates, travel seats or fire guards. They were also perplexed why we didn’t leave the dc with them.

My eldest is 22 and we lived in an area where a new children's centre was being built when he was born and they came and assessed.the home and gave free safety equipment, included in that were 3 stair gates as standard. The fitter was able to fit to top and bottom of stairs then one other (I also chose the kitchen).
It seemed sensible to me.

Seems completely fine to me. We had the same arrangement on the stairs. Nothing on the kitchen, but it was an open plan kitchen / diner at the time so I’m not really sure how that would’ve worked.

Your MIL is spouting nonsense.