Baby Safety

While this isn't the blog post I'm sure you all have been on pins and needles waiting for, I wanted to show off our mad skillz at baby proofing the house - which includes a little bit of parent proofing as well.

We installed this great gate at the top of our stairs that has a handle on it to easily lock and unlock, with a nice loud "click." However since we go up and down this set of stairs a lot, we decided we wanted to take it one step further and incorporate some visualization into parent-proofing the baby gate. This is what we have!

We put red tape across the top in a line, and then wrote 'SAFE' with the letters on different parts of the handle. This way I can easily look at the handle and see that the line is straight AND it says "SAFE" to me - confirming that it is safe to let the baby roam! The line also continues on the back so you can see it there as well.

Now below is what it looks like when the gate is open! One, the bright yellow catches your eye to let you know something is amiss. And in case you can't figure it out, it says what is amiss: the gate is "OPEN." In retrospect I think I should have written "DANGER" here instead, but this does clearly convey what the situation is.

And also, since we both enjoy order*, having both a line that is broken and a word that is broken invokes all our OCD tendencies to straighten the line and form the word - thereby closing the gate!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE this new system. I love being able to scan the room and visually see and read that my baby is safe. At least when it comes to getting through this gate!

So I'm curious - any interesting tricks you've had to baby-proofing your house?

*We "enjoy" order, however implementing it is very hard - our house is usually in a state of chaos. But when we have order, we enjoy it :)