Baby proofing fire place - imagination or product ideas please!

[DraggleTailedWench]

DD is so obsessed with crawling to the fire place I need ideas.

It is about 40 cm deep before brick surround with log burner in the middle. 140 cm total length. In front of the burner on the 140 x 40 cm slab front I have logs piled up/ logs in basket/ fire tool set. No where else to put all this stuff.

I'm looking at fire guards but can anyone come up with something other than a great big mesh catastrophe taking over my lounge?

The baby dan hearth gate over shoots the size of the space a fair bit and I'm not sure it'll fit as the room isn't huge so I'm looking for anything better.

Probably no help, but we just stopped using the log burner whilst DD was crawling and learning to walk. We only started using it once she was a bit older (2ish) and could keep away from it during the day when it was cold, and we used to light it at night once she was in bed.

All the fireguards seemed like a bit of a nightmare TBH, all huge and flimsy, so I just lazily found it easier just not to bother with the fire for one winter.

That's fair enough onlyaphase. TBH it's more the stuff I've got in front of the log burner. I put her anywhere and she's crawling at the logs or even worse the fire tools. It's exhausting diverting her - she's too young for 'no' (9mths).

If you made sure logs and fire tools couldn't fall over wouldn't that be safe.?

You might have already factored this in but you don't have to use all the sections on the BabyDan. We have one and it's great. From memory (we've taken it down for summer) we use a side bit on each side then the smaller gate section and one other across the front if that makes sense. I'm sure there are 2 sections we've never used.

We store our logs outside, is that an option? We have a domed fireguard for our log burner and are used to it after 6 years. I hardly notice it. If we took it away my 17m dd would be opening the damn thing and hiding lego in it.

We've got a huge bean bag, one of those massive outdoors ones, that I put in front of our TV during the day to stop our 15-month old pulling the TV on top of himself, trying to feed the Xbox pieces of Duplo or emptying out the DVD drawers 16 times a day. He's now getting to the stage where he can climb over the bean bag if he wants to, but he generally seems to forget the stuff is there when it's in front of it, so it works for now. It's big so might not be a solution in a smaller room though. We use it as an extra chair in the evenings.

at lego hiding in log burner!

Funnily enough a log store is on DP to do list - but it's getting quite long so I'm not expecting anything soon.

I'd have to just remove the logs and tools to make it safe really, but no idea where they'd go.

I imagine some kind of unobtrusive guard going around the whole thing, but nothing seems to be available.

I hung blankets over ours last summer when DD was 7-12 months. We'd already decided not to baby proof it so it was a short term solution for the few months before she learnt it was a no go area. Pain in the arse to do that each day but it worked.

Would a babygate cover the gap, or is the gap too small?

great thinking EMS23!

LegoAcupuncture - not sure what you mean. The area I'm worried about is completely open. 3 stone slabs in front of the fire that come out into the room, about 140 cm wide.

How big's the recess around the wood burner? We found a wire cage that fits inside the recess, and there is enough space either side of the wood burner inside the cage for the fire tools. We haven't fixed it to the wall, but use a wire coat hanger hooked round the flue pipe that hooks onto the cage. That works for us. It's a complete hassle when using the fire but the best we could think of.