How To Effectively Toddler & Baby Proof Your Home

This article will give you tips on how to baby proof your house in the UK.

As a parent, it’s important that you make sure that your home is a safe space for your little one, not just on an emotional level, but physically as well. While your home may be set up well for adults, children lack our abilities and life skills, meaning that there is hidden danger in your home.

So, to avoid these hidden dangers, it is important that you child proof your home for them. This involves mitigating risks and dangers around your home, to stop them from hurting themselves.

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Find out how to baby proof your house in the UK with these simple steps…

Child-Proof Locks

The first thing you should look into when baby proofing your home is securing anything they could get in to with child proof cupboard locks. Cabinets, drawers and other storage areas with dangerous objects, like cleaning chemicals, medications and sharp cutlery.

The best way to go about this is to either move the objects somewhere they can’t be reached by a child such as higher storage units or on tables, or to install child proof locks to the doors of these storage areas, so that they can’t break into them.

Also, don’t forget to use child proof window locks on any windows they might be able to reach, open, or even fall out of.

This also applies to anywhere your baby, or child might be able to get out of the house. Using a child proof gate latch on any outside entry/exits could help stop them from escaping out on to roads.

Block Access To Dangerous Areas

Next up, you should look at blocking off dangerous areas in your home with child proof door locks. Just incase your little one does try to wander into a dangerous zone unsupervised.

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By using baby gates, you should look at blocking access to: stairways, where they could fall. The kitchen, where they could get close to the oven. Utility rooms, where they could get into washing machines. Swimming pools, where they could fall in, and bathrooms, where they could get their hands on hygiene products. Using a baby gate means that you still have easy access, but your child can not enter the area without adult supervision. 

Plug sockets should also be made impossible to reach, or stick fingers in to by using child proof socket covers. This will ensure they can’t stick their fingers, or anything else into your plug sockets!

Baby Proof Corners

Hard corners are another area that should be a priority for your home’s child-proofing. Young children aren’t best known for their coordination or balance, which means that you can expect them to fall over and bump walls quite a bit.

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While a falling down is inevitable, if your little one falls and hit’s their head on a sharp corner, that’ll be a trip to the emergency room. By using something like soft foam covers for corners in your home, you can make those bumps and falls less dangerous. 

Eliminate Choking Hazards

In your home, there may be a few choking hazards that could pose a danger to your child as they adventure around your home. It’s important to remove these choking hazards, or take steps to reduce their threat.

Even the cords of your blinds could be a threat. So make sure you have child safe roller blinds with secured cords. Just look around your home for anything your little one may get their head trapped in and either remove it, or secure it.

“Babyproofing your entire home can be overwhelming, so it’s better to babyproof one room at a time.” — Osmara Aryal, Founder of Motherhood Community. Rather than attempting to secure your entire home at once, which can be quite overwhelming, consider tackling the babyproofing process one room at a time. This approach helps you focus your efforts and ensure that each room is thoroughly and properly secured before moving on to the next.

Secure Climbable Furniture To Walls

Once your child starts learning how to crawl and later walk, they’ll likely also start learning how to climb things. Or hold onto objects to help them stand up. This means that any freestanding items in your home could pose a danger if not secured.

Things like bookshelves and cupboards which your child may be tempted to climb on or use for a support, could topple over if not properly secured. So, make sure any freestanding units in your home are secured to the wall so they can’t fall onto your child.

Keep On Top Of Floor Level Clutter

While most parents don’t think of this as child-proofing, it’s incredibly important to make sure that your floors are free from clutter or objects that may hurt your child. As babies crawl around, play with random items and worst of all, put things they find in their mouth.

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It’s important to keep your floors clean and free of clutter. Or remove objects that may harm them, like plastic bags, electronics wires, hair clips, etc. Regularly hoovering and cleaning floors should do the trick. Just make sure to check every now and then for potentially harmful objects on the floor.

For example, baby proof the litter box if you have pets. The last thing you want is for your child to start eating their poo, or playing with the litter tray!

Remove Dangerous Plants From Your Garden

If you’re lucky enough to have a garden, it’s likely that your little one will be spending a fair amount of time playing and exploring it. This is great for introducing your child to nature and outside play. However, as toddlers have a knack for putting things in their mouth, you should check the plants and berries in your garden to make sure they aren’t deadly poisonous. Then remove any plants that could pose a threat to your little one!

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Getting your home ready for the newest member of your family is certainly a large project. However, it’s also one that can be done over time as their movement and independence improves. Once you’ve baby-proofed everything in your home, you’ll be a lot more relaxed. You’ll have peace of mind knowing that your baby or toddler can safely roam around.

Hopefully you now have some good ideas on how to baby proof your house in the UK.

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FAQ’s

What Age To Stop Child Proofing?

By the time it comes to thinking about whether or not you can stop child proofing your home, you will know your child well enough to know what they need. This could be very different from child to child.