How to Baby-Proof an Apartment After You Move in

When you have kids, you’ve got to pay more attention to safety and security measures in your apartment. Now you have a little person walking around and trying to pull everything down, touch everything and climb onto every chair and box.

Safety of your kids should be the number one priority when you move to the new place. Unfortunately, rental apartments limit your creativity, but you still have to find the ways how to make your kid’s home experience less dangerous.

How To Baby-Proof Your Kitchen

Kitchen by far is the most dangerous place in your apartment for a kid. You have knives, a gas stove, lots of glass dishes and cups that can be dropped and shattered in pieces.

First of all, make sure you lock all your knives, forks and other objects with sharp edges in the cabinets and never leave them laying on the table. Now when you have a baby, you’ve got to pay more attention to what you leave on the floor, on the table or on the window sill.

Lock all the cabinets and always keep your chairs far from the tables or other furniture elements that can let your kid step up and pull anything down.

Everyone washes dishes and it means that you’ve got cleaning supplies at your kitchen as well. Lock them up! The best place for them is in the cabinet under the sink.

If you think that just hiding things in the cabinets is enough, you’re wrong. Your main goal here is to install locks on every cabinet at the kitchen. Lock the windows and install the gates around your pets’ bowls. Also, hide all the wires from your microwave oven and anything else that can be pulled down.

Did you know that there are special stove covers, so your kid wouldn’t be able to open the gas? Use them.

Expert tip: While baby proofing apartment, look underneath every table, cabinet and explore the floor itself. It should be free from anything that can hurt your baby or any chokable object that your kid can put in his mouth.

How To Baby-Proof Your Bathroom

Keep your cosmetics and hazardous cleaning supplies locked in the cabinets. Make sure your toilet lid is closed, the garbage cans are always empty and the door is always closed, so your kid wouldn’t shut the door on his fingers.

When you have a pet and decide to place its litter in your bathroom, you automatically take responsibility for making it inaccessible for your kid.

The best way to do that will be using the gates. Pets usually can jump over them and your kid cannot.

How To Baby-Proof Your Living Room

Living rooms usually have lots of wires: your console, stereo system, a TV set and things that need to be charged. Hide all the wires and divide your living room into zones.

The best way will be to use baby gates as a border that will prevent your child from entering the most unsafe zone in your living room.

Lamps, shelves, and tall cabinets with drawers – keep them in the toddler-free zone (and still, lock everything up, just in case he finds a way in).

How To Baby-Proof Your Bedroom

Keep the doors closed, cause your kid may close the doors on his/her fingers. Also, hide all the jewelry and medications. Anything that can be put in the mouse is a potential danger to your child.

Leave all of your personal stuff along with a laptop somewhere in the drawer. Especially now when new MacBooks’ charging cannot be so easily switched off. If your kid pulls the wire, your MacBook will fall in a blink of an eye.

How To Baby-Proof Your Kid’s Room

This room should be a castle of safety. Never attach the baby monitor with a wire too close to the baby’s accessibility area.

Avoid using bookshelves and unnecessary cabinets with drawers that your baby can pull and drop on himself/herself.

Buy the sockets covers and keep all the wiring in the room covered. If you don’t have a chance to get the socket covers, you can just set the gates around them.

Baby-Proofing Your Apartment Balcony

Not every balcony is prepared enough for your baby to pay a visit. Personally, I would recommend you keep your baby away from the balcony like… always.

If your goal is to keep the baby away from the balcony, gates will definitely do the job. If you want him to stay safe in there, then you’ve got to work hard to make that place safe.

Install the window guards, use gates to keep your kid from the staff that you store on the balcony. Leave no chairs near the windows, so he/she wouldn’t be able to get closer to the windows.

Some of us love to leave plants on the balcony, make sure your kid doesn’t have access to them while baby proofing the apartment.

General Baby-Proofing Rules

Now you know how to baby-proof any kind of living unit on your own, but we want you to review our ultimate checklist of general baby proofing apartment rules. You can keep it as a cheat sheet if you want.

Prevent Access To Cabinets

By all means, keep all your cabinets closed. Sometimes we tend to think that if we do not store anything hazardous or dangerous there, we can keep it accessible for our kids. However, when we talk about toddlers, we should always remember that they’ll find the way to use the things you store in that cabinet in the most creative way.

After all, your kid can always pull your cabinet and drop something on himself/herself. This is more dangerous than you think since your baby will use anything he can reach to pull himself/herself up and he doesn’t care whether it can be dropped or not.

Prevent From Escaping Through The Front Door

Your front apartment door should always be closed, especially when you rent a house, not an apartment. There are too many dangers outside and your toddler is still not ready for that.

I know, sometimes you may decide to leave the door open for a delivery boy or just to get some fresh air, but in that cases, you’re obligated to set up high gates that will not give your kid any possible way to run away.

Prevent Falls From Windows

Always remember about windows, no matter what floor you live on. There are four different ways to baby proof your apartment windows in the rental:

1. Window Guards
2. Window Stops
3. Shard-Proof Window Films
4. Window Cord Retrofit Kits

Heaters And Radiators

There are special radiator covers that you can find anywhere to baby proof your heaters and radiators, so your kid wouldn’t get a burn or get access to the radiator valves.

Basically, your main goal here is to minimize the access for the kid and at the same time keep the radiator exposed enough to give away the heat properly.

Watch Your Closets

Keep jewelry, shoes and other wardrobe elements on the higher shelves. Even if you forget to close it one day, at least your kid will not be able to pull down the jewelry and try to put it in the mouth.

Also, all your cabinets, dressers and closets should be anchored to the walls. Of course, when you try to baby proof your rental apartment, you’ll need to approve this with your landlord. However, if you’re not allowed to screw them in, you should always remember that when you put a lot on the top shelves, it’s easier to drop them.

Pets

Always keep the litters and bowls behind the gates, so your kid won’t be able to touch them . There are too many bacterias there and, also, your kid as a proper explorer will definitely try to put something to his mouth to taste it.

Use Pressured Gates in Rentals

When you rent a place, you don’t really have a chance to screw in the gates and anchor them properly. In this cases you, should use the pressured gates that use the force of pressure to be attached between two walls. Gates is the best way to keep any place in your apartment childproof.

Try Seeing At Your Apartment As Your Baby Sees It

Baby proofing apartment is not easy. The best way to understand what kind of dangers are out there for your kid is to get down on your four and look around. Walk through every room and you’ll see how many things you’ve missed looking at your apartment from the grown up’s perspective.