Baby proofing essentials

[Wonderflonium]

I live in Denmark and they can be a bit laissez-faire about baby proofing. The philosophy is that children discover their limits by having accidents. You might see a stairgate occasionally and they do tend to put child locks on kitchen cupboards.

One childcare worker put it like this: it is every child's RIGHT to break a limb when they are little. If they don't, how will they know what they can and can't do?

All very well but my 7 month old precious first born is crawling and starting to learn how to to cruise, and I've lost my nerve.

What are the absolute essentials and what measures aren't necessary?

So far what I have been doing is: keeping my eye on her at all times and putting her in the jumperoo/high chair briefly when that's not possible. I get everything done when she naps.

I have a dog, so a lot of my day consists of keeping them separated.

Remove breakables/dangerous items from your baby's reach. We also turned down radiators and put foam around the bottom pipe which is below the temperature control in the rooms that she crawled in. A few baby gates at the bottom of stairs and on a couple of rooms that you want to leave your baby in unattended.

Does the dog have an escape route/ his own quiet place? My toddler (15 month sleep) was trying to put a nappy on the cat the other day so I know how difficult animals and babies can be.

We have a stair gate at the top and bottom of the stairs, and clips on the cupboard under the sink and drawers where we keep knives, scissors, matches, etc. Also going to have to fix a couple of shelving units to the wall as I found him trying to climb on one like a ladder the other day...

Those little covers for the corners of tables.
They're not really essential but I do remember feeling like a terrible parent when my pfb was toddling and whacked his face off the corner of a table.

We have stair gates and furniture in kids rooms is attached to the walls.

I also push back stuff like candles so dd can't reach them.

Other than that I just tell her no and move her away if she is touching things she shouldn't.

I guess I have a danish attitude. We never had stair gates or cupboard locks (my DD is 3 now). I would just say no and she wouldn't do it.
However I'm pregnant again and if the next baby is more of a daredevil then I think I would get the cupboard locks but that's about it

I take the view that babies should be able to explore their environment and develop their motor skills and, when they're older, learn how to move around safely (e.g. Going down stairs backwards). So rather than sticking our children in a playpen (which they both would have hated) I have made the rooms we spend most time in safe for them to be in without me watching them every second.

We're in Germany so the plug sockets are secured (you should do the same in Denmark I expect). We have stair gates - DD2 could climb stairs at 7 months. Because of the design of our house we also have lots of sharp edges - e.g. Floor level stone window sills - which are liable to cause a head injury to a falling child so we have put rubber strips over those. Amazon is good for these things, you can buy various colours so they blend in to the decor and don't look hideous. We also have locks on cupboards with medicine and cleaning products on. And anything dangerous or breakable we moved out of reach, easy enough as I hate clutter.

I found that we had to review what needed doing every few months depending on what trouble DD1 tried to get herself into!

DD2 currently has a bump on her head from falling on the wooden floor whilst cruising . Yes I feel bad about it but I can't tie her down nor can I be next to her every second of the day. I figure bumps and bruises come with the territory.

Our son is 19 months. We have a stair gate and a gate at the kitchen - he tends to come in when I am in there tbh though.

We also moved a side table from one end of the sofa to the other as it allowed us to put drinks out of his reach.

That is it though.

My view is of teaching to limit risks.

So once baby is crawling, at a time many parents are putting up stairgates, we are playing in the stairs. I would quite deliberately teach baby how to climb the stairs and (more importantly) how to descend the stairs safely.

Likewise I teach climbing on and off the sofa early. And on and off a high bed (by reverse crawlling).

That said, I do still have staircases around. Our kitchen door gate is as much as for zoning off my dog as the toddler. The main purpose of our bottom of the stairs gate is to pen baby in downstairs, when I'm not directly watching. Not so necessary with your first because you are more likely to be able to hover. But once you have a few children, it can become necessary to mitigate against not having eyes in the back of your head.

Meant to add... The the bottom of the stairs gate went as soon as I was confident of baby's ability going up and down stairs. It was about 18m.

I am also paranoid about wardrobes and book cases being pulled over by climbing toddlers. All of mine are fastened to the wall with L-brackets.

We out a stairgate across the kitchen, top and bottom of stairs. Removed any cleaning stuff/beauty products our of reach in the bathrooms, got door slammers (I have twins so slamming doors on each other was a favourite pastime) and jack locks on upstairs windows. Also obviously removed any dangerous/harmful objects around the house.

These are all great top tips. Thanks guys. I have baby proofed one room now... unfortunately there's no door to block it off from another door. But still, baby steps and all that.

You're right: I need to find my dog a place to escape too. What we've been doing is letting her out in the garden when the baby is too annoying. It's not a perfect solution and will not work forever. I feel like I only just moved everything back down after puppy-proofing! Back up it goes. (At least the dog could already walk when we got her. )

Today's lunchtime solution was to put her on my back in the sling while I cooked and now she's fallen asleep so win-win!

I've done the following- blind cords secured (I know a woman whose child died because she suffocated herself with a blind cord :(, all shelves secured to wall, all medicinals in high cupboards, no clutter/fragile items around home, stair grips on wooden stairs

Still to do: clips on bathroom and laundry cupboard, stair gate, buying a stove guard once baby is walking and reaching- I saw this at our hardware store today and thought it was great!

I would recommend all supervising adults do a FirstAid course or at the very least read through the book. The knowledge gained could literally save your child's life.

I distinguished between life-changing risks (dangerous chemicals and medicines, falling furniture, button batteries), which I ensured were not going to happen, and bumps/breaks/bruises or damage to property where I was willing to let him learn the hard way. I made sure that the downstairs area was an area where pretty much anything that he could do wasn't going to harm him, which gave him more freedom and allowed me to relax!

One tip I found helpful was that if you always lift them down from dangerous places they learn to climb up but not climb down, so it's worth teaching them to go down feet first and slowly.