Dear Mr. Dad: What should we do to childproof our house?

Armin answers: Once your baby realizes that he’s able to move around by himself, his mission in life will be to locate–and race you to–the most dangerous, life-threatening things in your home. So if you haven’t already begun the never-ending process of child-proofing your house, better start now. The first thing to do is get down on your hands and knees and check things out from your baby’s perspective. Taking care of those pesky wires and covering up your outlets is only the beginning, so start with the basics:

Anywhere and Everywhere:

• Move anything valuable out of the baby’s reach.
• Bolt to the wall bookshelves and other free-standing cabinets (this goes double if you live in earthquake country); pulling things down on top of themselves is a favorite baby suicide attempt.
• Don’t hang heavy things on the stroller–it can tip over.
• Get special guards for your radiators and move your space heaters and electric fans off the floor.
• Install a safety gate at the bottom and top of every stairway.
• Adjust your water heater temperature to 120 degrees. This will reduce the likelihood that your baby will scald himself.
• Get a fire extinguisher and put smoke alarms in every bedroom.

Especially in the kitchen:

• Install safety locks on all but one of your low cabinets and drawers. Most of these locks allow the door to be opened slightly–just enough to accommodate a baby’s fingers–so make sure the kind you get also keep the door from closing completely as well.
• Stock the one unlocked cabinet with unbreakable pots and pans and encourage your baby to jump right in.
• Keep baby’s high chairs away from the walls. His strong little legs can push off and knock the chair over.
• Watch out for irons and ironing boards. The cords are a hazard and the boards themselves are easy to knock over.
• Get an oven lock and covers for your oven and stove knobs.
• Use the back burners on the stove whenever possible and keep the handles turned toward the back of the stove.
• Never hold your baby while you’re cooking. Teaching him what steam is or how water boils may seem like a good idea, but bubbling spaghetti sauce or hot oil hurts when it splashes.
• Put mouse- and insect traps in places where your baby can’t get to them.
• Use plastic dishes and serving bowls whenever you can–glass breaks and, at least in my house, the shards seem to show up for weeks, no matter how well I sweep.
• Post the phone numbers of the nearest poison control agency and your pediatrician near your phone.

Especially in the living room:

• Put decals–at baby height–on any sliding glass doors.
• Get your plants off the floor: over 700 species can cause illness or death if eaten, including such common ones as lily of the valley, iris, and poinsettia.
• Pad the corners of low tables, chairs, fireplace hearths.
• Make sure your fireplace screen and tools can’t be pulled over.
• Keep furniture away from windows. Babies will climb up whatever they can and may fall through the glass.

Especially in the bedroom/nursery:

• No homemade or antique cribs. They probably don’t conform to today’s safety standards.
• Remove from the crib all mobiles and hanging toys. By 5 months, most kids can push themselves up on their hands and knees and can get tangled up (and even choke on) strings.
• Keep the crib at least two feet away from blinds, drapes, hanging cords, or wall decorations with ribbons
• Check toys for missing parts.
• Toy chest lids should stay up when opened (so they doesn’t slam down on tiny fingers).
• Don’t leave dresser drawers open. From the baby’s perspective, they look an awful lot like stairs.
• Keep crib items to a minimum: a sheet, a blanket, bumpers, and a few soft toys. Babies don’t need pillows at this age and large toys or stuffed animals can be climbed on and used to escape the crib.
• Don’t leave your baby unattended on the changing table even for a second.

Especially in the bathroom:

• If possible, use a gate to keep access restricted to the adults in the house.
• Install a toilet guard.
• Keep bath and shower doors closed
• Never leave water standing in the bath, a sink, or even a bucket. Drowning is the third most common cause of accidental deaths of young children, and babies can drown in practically no water at all.
• Keep medication and cosmetics high up.
• Make sure there’s nothing your baby can climb up on to raid the medicine cabinet.
• Keep shavers and hair dryers unplugged and out of reach.
• No electrical appliances near bathtub.
• Use a bath mat or stick-on safety strips to reduce the risk of slipping in the bathtub.

About the Author:
Armin Brott, hailed by Time as “the superdad’s superdad,” has written or co-written six critically acclaimed books on fatherhood, including the newly released second edition of Fathering Your Toddler: A Dad’s Guide to the Second and Third Years. His articles have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, American Baby, Parenting, Child, Men’s Health, The Washington Post among others. Armin is an experienced radio and TV guest, and has appeared on Today, CBS Overnight, Fox News, and Politically Incorrect. He’s the host of “Positive Parenting,” a weekly radio program in the San Francisco Bay Area. Visit Armin at www.mrdad.com.

If you are a new grandparent, you may be unsure as to which baby proofing steps you should take. If so, you may find the five following tips helpful. These are baby proofing steps that you should take to make your home a safer place.

1. Cover All Electrical Outlets
   The covering of electrical outlets is one of the most important baby proofing steps, but it is also one of the simplest. Outlet covers are ideal for reducing injury to curious children. Baby outlet covers are affordably priced. In fact, multiple packs of outlet covers can often be purchased for one or two dollars!
2. Cover All Electrical Cords
   Unfortunately, the covering of all electrical cords is a baby proofing step that many grandparents and even parents fail to take into consideration. Loose cords, such as those for phones and televisions, can pose choking hazards. Simply fastening all cords to the floor or the wall should be enough, but there are also cover boxes that can be purchased as well.
3. Remove All Reachable Glass
   If one thing is sure, it is that glass and children often do not mix. All reachable glass should be removed from homes with children present. This most often includes pictures frames, candleholders, and other works of art. Furniture should also be examined. Although glass coffee tables and end tables are beautiful, they are not ideal for young children, as they pose a serious risk of injury.
4. Purchase Baby Gates
   Baby gates are another important component of baby proofing. Baby gates are ideal for any home where children will be present, but they are must haves when a home has a potentially dangerous set of stairs. Baby gates can also be used to block off portions of a home that have yet to be baby proofed.
5. Use Furniture Pads
   Furniture pads are ideal for homes that may have many sharp corners on objects, such as coffee tables, end tables, or countertops. These padding blocks slip right on to a piece of furniture, namely the corners, and they come in a number of different colors. They are ideal for preventing head injuries, especially for infants learning to crawl or walk.

The above mentioned baby proofing steps are just a few of the many that grandparents, like you, should take. For your grandchild’s first visit, make sure that you have a pen and paper handy. As you see them in your home, you are likely to come up with more great ideas on how to keep your home baby proofed.

Safety first. That is the key rule when having a baby. Once they start crawling and walking, there are so many hazardous places that the little child can get into. Here are some helpful tips to focus on when baby proofing a house.

Babies are very curious and love to get into any place that they can. It is important to make sure cupboards are locked and unable for the child to get into. Not only are chemical containers with toxic materials a very important thing to be careful of, but there are many other everyday items that can provide serious injury to the child through choking or and suffocation. Such items could include small pieces of plastic, cloth, writing utensils, bags, and practically anything and everything.

Once the child becomes really active and starts climbing things, you will have to make sure higher places are not full of dangerous items too. Such places could be draws or racks with shop objects like in the kitchen, bookshelves and desks with heavy objects, and an assortment of places like this.

Electricity is another important thing to keep an eye on. You want to make sure the child can’t get to electric chords and sockets. It is also important to be aware of what buttons on certain devices a child may be able to reach. Some could be harmless like a TV, but a few devices might pose a serious risk to a child once turned on or put on certain settings.

Keep an eye on items that have strings and chords. Make sure they are not in reach of the child and make sure no toys have dangerous strings. They could be swallowed or get stuck in the throat, or even more dangerous of a possibility is getting wrapped around the child’s neck and strangling them.

Another key item is safety gates to prevent a child from accessing dangerous areas. These areas might be rooms that have too many hazards to the child and can’t be properly child proofed otherwise or stairways. Make sure they are installed correctly, firm, and don’t have large holes for the child to get stuck in.

Be careful of furniture placement. This is to prevent your child from getting stuck. Children are very curious. Don’t put it past your son or daughter to try to squeeze themselves between two pieces of furniture, or even stick their head into the gap to look for something. It doesn’t always have to be between two pieces of furniture. It can be between furniture and the wall, furniture and a radiator, furniture and any other large object.

Above all, it is important to keep an eye on the child. Even the best child proofed room can still hold many hazards that are just temporary. In other words, objects that are left behind by other people that can’t be child proofed but still dangerous to the young child. Children should be watched at all times. You can’t possibly know or remember every single way they can get hurt in each room. But keeping an eye on them not only assures that you will be there to prevent serious injury, but you will also be able to notice places that were overlooked and need childproofing.

Children are very curious and constantly on the go. They are a great responsibility but a joy to the world. Don’t overlook anything when it comes to child proofing a house. When it comes to a child’s safety, it is better to be too safe than sorry later on.

About the Author
Jake Rose is an artist and an author from Massachusetts. This article has been submitted in affiliation with http://www.BabyNameVote.Com which is a site for Baby Names.

There are many details to remember when it comes to baby proofing your home and many times there are things you may miss in the process. The first suggestion many will give you is to get down on your hands and knees so you can see the world from your babies point of view. There may be something that your baby can see, being down low, that you can’t. If you get down to your baby’s level you can catch all those little details.

Speaking of Little…
Remember to pick up any and all little items left on the floor. Anything your baby picks up will eventually find its way to his mouth. These little things can be easily swallowed by your baby causing him to choke. It is best to keep anything that can fit into a roll of toilet paper up out of your baby’s reach.

Electrical Items
You have to be very careful about electrical outlets and cords. Babies can take smaller items, and stick them in an outlet resulting in electrocution. They can also get tangled up in the electrical cords themselves, or possibly even start chewing on cords when they are teething. They have outlet covers that you can buy at your local store and cord covers which keep the cords away from your baby’s reach.

Drawers and Cabinets
It is important that you install cabinet and drawer locks on your cabinets and drawers. When your baby is crawling and walking he can get into things and places he shouldn’t be getting into. Often cabinets contain poisons and sharp objects and other things nut suitable for baby. Your baby can get into these items and hurt himself before you even realize he is in danger, so it is best to get the cabinets and drawers secured as early as possible.

Sharp Corners
An area you need to make sure is baby proofed that many people do not remember is the corners of your counters and furniture. Many times your couch or tables will have pointy sharp corners on them that your baby will eventually run into resulting in head injury. Luckily there is a solution for the sharp corners as well. You can actually buy corner protectors to put on your tables and counter that round them out so when your baby does run into them, they do not get hurt.

Glass Doors
If you have a big glass patio door, you can’t forget about it! When clean these are often completely see through, and to a baby just learning to walk or a toddler, they can be hurt by running into them. If you have a glass door stick some window appliqués on them at your child’s level so they see them when they are walking around and do not hit the glass full force.

Swimming Pools
Not only dangerous during the summer months, but year round as well, poola are VERY dangerous. If you have an above ground pool you should drain it if possible during the month’s it’s not in use. If you do not have an above ground pool make sure you have a locked gate surrounding your pool, and a cover that your baby can not fall through. Your baby can drown in as little as 2 inches of water, so it is best to not take chances.

Stairways
If you have stairs in your home it is simple to protect your baby from taking a dangerous fall. Invest in a couple of inexpensive baby gates to put at the top and the bottom of the stairs. This will keep your baby from crawling up, and from falling down the stairs possibly causing serious injuries.

Baby proofing your home is a very important detail that shouldn’t be overlooked. In the end it is the health and safety of your baby that is at stake, and making sure your baby is protected is worth all costs.