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Budget Baby-Proofing
Amy Storch of Amalah.com | December 1st, 2008 - 12:28 PM
So I was watching some home improvement show the other day — or maybe it was more of an informercial, or perhaps I dreamed the entire thing up — that had a little segment about these fancy baby-safe electrical outlets. Not the little plastic outlet covers we all know and use and despise and regularly snap our thumbnails off with, though. No, those are for parents who clearly DO NOT LOVE THEIR CHILDREN VERY MUCH, because now you can get your house wired with actual baby-safe outlets that somehow sense when fork prongs or knife blades are being stuck into them and slide shut, saving your curious child from electrocution. So hooray! You are now free to leave sharp metal objects lying around the house with confidence!
(This same show also had a bit about a table saw that can sense when your finger gets too close to the blade and shut itself off. The inventor was there demonstrating the mechanism by sticking a hotdog against the blade, and frankly, I was disappointed that he wouldn’t use his finger. Way to stand behind your product! Come on! I want some violence mixed in with my do-it-yourselfing.)
Anyway! The show reminded me of how seriously we took baby-proofing, and of how much money we’ve spent on fancy retractable gates and outlet covers and window-blind cord covers and drawer locks that snapped in two every time we forgot about them and opened the drawer with the tiniest bit of force. And obviously we DO NOT LOVE OUR CHILDREN VERY MUCH, because we never even bothered with the corner guards and door blockers and toilet locks and coating every vaguely hard surface with bubble wrap. Not that I didn’t stand in the baby-proofing aisle of the store fretting over each and every expensive plastic doohickey of safety. What if our baby DID fall into the toilet? What if he DID knock himself senseless on the corner of the dining room table? What if he DID somehow push a chair across the kitchen to the sink, climb onto the countertop, flip the garbage disposal switch and shove his hand down in there?
And yet, we’ve managed to bring one child through infancy and toddlerhood relatively unscathed, save for one tumble down the (carpeted) basement steps, but that was not for a lack of a working gate. That was more for the lack of me remembering to close the gate.
Unfortunately, I think we might be getting a little cocky now.
Last week we found our three-year-old on the far end of our upstairs landing — on the OTHER side of the railing. He’d shimmied down the ledge and was just gleefully hanging onto the banister, many many feet above the floor below. The leading candidates of Parents of the Year were both just a few feet away but completely oblivious, and we reacted to the situation in a calm and capable manner. Which is to say we shrieked at the top of our lungs and nearly started him into letting go and plummeting to a broken bone or two.
Luckily, we’ve since rectified the situation and devised a clever (and money-saving!!) solution to the landing problem:
Yep. A three-pack of tissue boxes. There’s no way he’s getting past THAT one, oh NO. Impenetrable! Inconceivable! (And yes, that is an old mount to a baby gate that we removed ages ago because it was annoying.)
To be fair, he has not attempted a repeat performance. Perhaps he’s waiting for cold season to get the best of us (we originally blocked it off with TWO three-packs), or perhaps he is capable of understanding the OH MY GOD DON’T EVER DO THAT AGAIN I MEAN IT OH GOD parenting guidance we offered him immediately after pulling him back over the railing.
That said, please tell me I’m not the only parent who occasionally takes an..ahem…creative and do-it-yourself-ish approach to child-proofing? Please?
Well…umm…maybe I shouldn’t admit this, but after not being able to figure out those blind cord thingys, I decided to just use clothespins to clip them to the upper part of the blind, waaaay beyond their reach. Way cheaper, too.
[...] Vote Budget Baby-Proofing [...]
Corner guards? Good heavens no. Bubblewrap elegantly cushioning the coffeetable? Yes. Toilet guard? No. Packing tape taping the lid down? Yes. The only thing I haven’t figured out how to make better/cheaper myself is the carseat. Oh, and the stair gates.
I’m on baby #3…here’s my babyproofing method…instruct your oldest child (mine is 5) to follow around the baby and make sure she doesn’t hurt/kill herself. Bribe the older child/babyproofer with M&Ms.
This method can backfire. When baby#3 was ~4 months old I left her on the couch and told my 3-yr old to “watch your sister for a minute”. I heard frantic screaming and came back and found her face down on the ceramic tile. I said to the 3-year old “I thought I told you to watch your sister?” and he said “I did…I watched her fall off the couch and hit her head.”
The problem with baby-proofing is that those thingies are hard to work…for adults, that is… my son has completely figured out the cabinet latches, while my husband and I scratch our heads and instead try to squeeze our hands into the cupboards with the darn things on to get the soap/pots/things that kill small children out…
Any Christmas tree bebe-proofing suggestions would be greatly welcomed – so far, the shatterproof bulbs and candy canes have let me down in their child-friendliness…
D
Christmas tree baby proofing…HA! For years our Christmas trees have simply had all paper decorations on the first 3 feet from the floor. After the cat knocked over the tree (pre-babes) we got a super duper anti-tip tree stand. Problem solved.
I use those big fat elastic bands that come on broccoli to lock together lower kitchen and bathroom cabinet doors with knobs. Easy to get off for me, not so much for the one year old. And free!
We haven’t baby proofed, yet … our son is only 8 months old. My best friend, however, found her son with a plastic bag OVER HIS HEAD showing her “how well it fit” and had to restrain herself from tearing it off him and scaring him to death. Kids! (the boy is fine, and, ahem, won’t be playing with plastic bags again anytime soon, thanks to the PLEASE DON’T EVER EVER EVER DO THAT AGAIN method of baby proofing.)
You are all models of babyproofness compared to me. I have a 16 month old and since we moved 2 months ago I haven’t gotten around to installing so much as a single cabinet latch or outlet cover. I DID put up one stair gate. In our old house we prevented the baby from climbing up the stairs (which were totally open on one side) by pushing her old Intellitainer in front of them. Unfortunately, this was too hard for the rest of us (including my 4 year old) to get around so we took to leaping off the stairs from mid way up to land on the couch below, fun yes, safe no. Perhaps my kids are doomed, but I prefer to think of it as preparing them for a dangerous world where things will not be wrapped in bubble paper for their protection.
Ugh. I’m not ready to think about babyproofing yet…..I’m still waiting for baby to get here. 3 more months to go. Sigh.
A friend of mine has her play room blocked off by a tension gate between the wall and an ottoman. Mom, Dad, and 2.5-year old can climb over the ottoman no sweat, while sweet baby 1-year old is stuck. I told her she was a genius!
HAHAH! Too funny
Perfect! Love Target even more now that I know that their brands do double duty.