You may be wondering how to make your home safe for your soon to be crawling baby! Baby-proofing your home before your baby begins to crawl will ensure your baby can safely explore your house in the months ahead. To do so, it is important to put away, lock up, or discard, anything that could be harmful to your baby.
Here are some important spots to baby proof in your home // source: TODAY
At this age, your baby’s mouth is their primary tool for exploring new objects. As a result, it is important to check your rooms, and particularly the floors where your baby can easily find things, for small objects like key fobs, batteries, or buttons, which are choking hazards. It is also important to remove or store away poisonous substances like bleach, detergent, and aspirin. You can look through each room to remove any potentially harmful substances you no longer need like old prescription medicine, or paint, and store the rest in locked cabinets or containers. When going through your home, remember to consider materials in your basement or garage such as antifreeze, paint thinner, and insecticides, all of which should be placed out of reach.
Child proof latches can be used to keep both poisonous substances, and sharp objects, out of a child’s reach behind cabinet doors or drawers. Placing child proof latches on cabinets throughout your house gives you control over which materials your baby can access, whether that be playing with toys in the bathtub, or pots and pans in the kitchen. Installing gates at the top of the stairs, fencing off rooms, and taping soft padding over sharp corners, are other ways to maintain a safe living and playing environment. Placing plastic covers over electrical outlets will stop your baby from placing their small fingers into the holes. Taking these safety steps now will allow your baby to explore your home without fear of injury when he or she begins to crawl, and ultimately, takes their first steps just a few months from now.
Supplementary Material
For additional information and resources, take a look at the following.
1. As you start to baby proof your home, here is a helpful checklist from the American Academy of Pediatrics. Remember that every home is different and will require different safety measures to keep your baby out of harm’s way.
2. We mentioned many ways in which you can baby proof your home. Here are a few more from WebMD.
3. Check out this helpful article from the American Academy of Pediatrics for tips and reminders when baby proofing your home.
References
Mayes, L. C. & Cohen, D. J. (2002). The Yale Child Study Center Guide to Understanding Your Child: Healthy Development from Birth to Adolescence. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company.