What level of baby-proofing did you do?

[WhoahThere]

DD (pfb!) Has just started crawling so I need to start making sure the house is safe. Don't want to go over the top though so I'm wondering what people think are the essentials and what is over-egging it? I've already read up on socket covers so don't think we'll be getting those, but would welcome all tips and advice.

Thanks

Safety gates, move things to higher shelves/put away til she's left home , fireguards.

depends a bit on the layout of your house etc but to be honest i made our living room pretty much as safe as it could be so that I could leave DS unattended for a few minutes if necessary. There will always be the odd sharp corner or hard floor or whatever but socket covers, (why not?) safety gates and moving stuff to ever higher shelves about covered it. Now he is 2 we are starting to rely more on teaching him not to do things but DD will start crawling soon so we'll e back to the start!

socket covers are a no no they are worse than leaving open see numerous previous threads as uk sockets (not in europe or USA) have athing inside which only opens when plug inserted

you can not baby proof it is a myth make things relatively safe but they will always find something to hurt themselves with, DD never hurt herself with the stairs sockets or anything but created huge bruise by eye by picking up large plastic top then lying down and sort of dropping it on her own face, she recovered just fine my DD is now 21 months we live in listed building so some things can not be fitted like stairgates so i relied on very quickly teaching her to go up and down safely, i have made 1 room child friendly and removed stuff , I put a fireguard around hard drive as she thought the cd thing was for sitting on forcing toys through and had habit of switching router off when mummy was extremely busy with important stuff mumsnetting

but i would go for less rather than more and start teaching no and removing them as soon as possible, she now knows not to touch my books as I have way too many to move out of reach

Probably similar to many people - looked round rooms when ds looked about to crawl, tried moving stuff to higher shelves, repeat daily, run out of high shelves, buy new tall furniture...
We had a stairgate early on to fence off the loft as we had DIY going on up there, and got one for the top of the stairs, mainly so I could be in the shower and ds could play on that floor and not get into trouble (until he learnt to open doorhandles, see first para).
We shoved furniture in front of cables and stuff and put remotes in drawers, and trained him very early about HOT! and Mummy's tea is HOT, do not touch (on pain of death...)

Luckily ds was a fairly sedate child who didn't get into things very quickly - unlike dn who is here every week...

The kitchen cleaning stuff that used to be under the sink is now in a crate above the oven, which is a bit inconvenient but dn mastered door latches very early on, so we never bothered with any.

I think it depends on the child. I didn't do anything with my DD except fit stairgate to the top of the stairs.

I had a fireguard but that has already gone (ds is 22 months now) a stair gate at the bottom of the stairs (which can probably come off now tbh, and a stairgate on his bedroom door now he is in a bed as one wont fit to the top of the stairs

Babyproofed first time round, even though we all hated the fireguard. Second time, we hardly bothered. DS1 kept swinging/tripping over the staircases (he was 4), so they came off. We've always had vases etc around, but neither child touched them. We currently have a White leather sofa and, so far, it's still in one piece.

Hard to say as it depends so much on your baby/your household and your lifestyle - I didn't really do anything - no stairgates, fireguard (had a log burner not open fire - if that makes a difference )/no cupboard locks - a few plug sockets although I see they are not necessary ........... but don't take my advice - although, touch wood, no accidents and DS is age 10 now !!

My DD was pretty placid and risk averse, so didn't actually do much baby proofing. I think stairgates were about all we did - she wasn't interested in opening cupboards or posting stuff in the CD players.

Did nothing except a fire guard for the open fire (not for the woodburner), as I'd rather teach the dangers and then keep an eye (although sometimes from a fair distance!). No stairgates, but as soon as they showed an interest in climbing we helped them learn to go up and down safely. We also have a large garden and yard, where the boys often play outside loosely supervised so things like nettles and duck poo got pointed out as things to avoid as soon possible, but obviously can't be removed entirely. Common sense and teaching dangers IMO works far better than trying to make an area safe, as you can only do that in a small area and not rely on other people doing the same in other locations. I understand that everyone does things differently though, but I tend to have a fairly laissez-faire attitude to these things and it's worked well for us.

DD was an oddly unadventurous baby and we had a pretty compact house with very little to babyproof anyway!

I blocked cupboards we didn't use often by putting open toy boxes in front of them and had a gate at the bottom of the stairs and going into the kitchen (it was a very small kitchen with no high units so I decided it was easier to just keep her out until she was older) You might want one at the top of your stairs too but we were barely ever up there so it wasn't necessary.

I put anything I didn't want her to touch (TV, games consoles etc) up out of her reach.

We didn't get a fire guard but we had a very deep fireplace so I just taught her to stay away and didn't leave her alone in the front room if we were using it.

Oh yes, the reason I had stairgates on the stairs as that they were reeeeallly steep. Ridiculously so. In fact DD only managed to learn to go up and down them recently at 2 as her little legs just weren't big enough.

I have baby proofed, and then toddler proofed, as a previous poster says you have to keep up with their developement.

Once they get past 2yo you can start to teach them to stay away from things but before that any attempts will be frustrating for both of you. You also want to be confident leaving her alone for 5mins.

Make sure tall furniture is secured to the wall otherwise climbing toddlers can pull them over, cover sockets that have things plugged in etc

stairgates, and cupboard locks - and moving stuff up higher
btw if you have room its lovely to leave a cupboard the DC can empty -put non breakable stuff in it - both mind LOVED this - and did it every day for months

and they had their own shelf for baby books which they both enjoyed as well - and think helped them not empty the other book shelves

like stormwater risk management we have large garden bordering woodland would be virtuely impossible to fence properly,

advantages of old house steps are quite shallow and wide (23 rather than the 12-14 in most houses) so easier but she is into everything and will climb to reach stuff
when DH was window cleaning she was trying to climb ladder so i stood right there behind her and let her try she managed 4 steps up just like a rockclimber trying different holds making sure she could get foot back down, was quite impressed with her carefulness but when she comes down stairs alone she walks carefully two feet on each step holding rail but if i am there she will jump and dangle from my hand and just be silly as she is so sure i'll catch her stop her falling.

I think too much baby proofing is actually disadvanteous to them in learning about the world

For DS1 we moved everything out of reach, got 2 stairgates, soft plastic covers for the corners of the coffee table, those things that stop the cupboard doors being opened for the kitchen.

For DS2 we just kept an eye on him a bit more.

For DS3 the most we've done is tell the other two to try not to step on him too much....!

Not much, I have limited dexterity (through disability) so most baby proofing gadgets effectively make things mummy proof.
We moved overtly dangerous stuff out of reach. Fitted a lockable medicine cupboard and a lockable cash box for my day to day drugs in bedside table.
We've then focused on teaching that things are hot, sharp, dangerous rather than preventing access. He learnt stairs really quickly and touch wood we now have a very robust, rambunctious and undamaged (apart from the odd bruise) 3 yr old.