childproofing your home: safety tips and childproofing checklist

Childproofing Your Home: Safety Tips Around The House

Childproofing your home may seem like a chore, but it sure beats sitting in the emergency room with an injured child, both in monetary terms and emotional hastle. It will cost about a few hundred dollars and maybe a weekend’s work to childproof your home, or around $1000 to $1200 to have a professional childproofer do it for you. The childproofing checklist below will help you eliminate the common hazards in the home.

General Childproofing Tips

·	Get down on your hands and knees and crawl around your house, noticing things from your child’s vantage point. It may help tip you off to potential hazards that you might not have otherwise noted.

·	Install childproof doorknob covers for any room of the house that you would like restricted from your kids, particularly closets with liquor or cleaning supplies, as well as the bathroom, which is a drowning hazard for toddlers.

·	Remember that when it comes to childproofing a home, more is better. Keeping dangerous things up high is good, but keeping dangerous things up high inside a closet with a childproof knob is better.

·	When people visit, or when you visit other people, keep purses and handbags, which often have potentially deadly items inside, safely out of the reach of a curious child.

·	Install emergency phone numbers, such as police, fire, poison control, etc., at every phone around the house.

·	Keep all cords to lamps or other appliances tied or effectively clamped down to avoid children from pulling them over onto themselves.

·	Install finger guard pinches on doors around the house.

·	Install one piece door stops or remove the rubber tips from door stops, as the tip makes a perfect accessible choking hazard to young children.

·	Keep your child away from a baby walker in any area of the house that has steps up or down, as it could cause a fall directly onto the child’s head.

·	Check over all toys a baby could choke on, and try ridding your house of these items. If you have older children, emphasize the need to them of never letting the baby play with any of their toys, and the importance of keeping them out of the reach of their younger sibling.

·	Get at least one reliable, cordless phone to use around your house. Bring it with you wherever you go so that you can answer the phone without leaving your little ones side.

·	Try to keep household plants out of baby’s reach, as many are poisonous, as is the fertilizer put into them, both of which will make its way to a baby’s mouth, as everything else around them does.

·	Make sure that your home’s water heater is strapped to studs in the wall.

Child Electrical Safety

·	Install outlet plugs or special childproof outlet covers throughout your house. They have specially designed outlet covers that swivel to cover the plugs. We recommend these because you won’t have to mess with plug covers when you need to use the outlet.

·	It is a good idea to set your water thermostat at temperatures below 120 degrees, to avoid accidental scalding.

·	Use cord holders to fasten all longer cords safely against the wall.

·	Keep a VCR or other similar devices locked away to ensure your child can’t stick their hand inside them.

Furniture Safety

·	Bolt large shelves to the wall using wall brackets to prevent them from tipping over on the child if they were to climb or pull on them.

·	Use protective corners around all tables, fireplace hearths, and other sharp furniture, which is a leading cause of stitches in young children. A fall into one of these corners will likely be brutal. You can use foam weather stripping to cushion these hard edges.

·	Position all stereo equipment and television sets safely against the wall. Check their stability to ensure they can’t be pulled over.

·	Place non-skid backing on all carpets or area rugs, as this is a common form of tripping or slipping for both adults and children.