A Little Ingenuity Goes A Long Way
Thursday night, my not-quite-two-year-old-daughter figured out that the space between the end of the banister on our stairs and the first spindle in our banister is just a wee bit bigger than all the others, and houdini-ed herself between them and up the stairs, bypassing our gate. The entire purpose of the gate is to keep her off the stairs by herself, so this wasn’t a welcome discovery. At least, from my perspective.
My first thought was to move the gate up a few stairs, but upon inspection there isn’ta good place to attach the gate we currently have. This made me think I was headed out to Walmart or some such place in the middle of the night to find a new gate. But then my spouse and I got creative. His first thought was to rummage through the plywood in our garage, and he did find an appropriately-sized piece. But the edges were very rough, so we temporarily abandoned that idea. I started poking around in our closets looking for some sort of temporary solution. I figured if I could make something work for now, I could buy something the next day to fix it for good.
And I came across our travel-sized ironing board. It was the perfect size, soft on the edges for when my daughter grabs it and tries to rip it out,and even had a useful tie on one end I could securely fasten to our banister rail. Another tie for the bottom, and we were done. It can’t be pushed out because of the ties, the stair keeps it from being moved back and fort, and no one can fit through the extra space. I looked for a temporary solution, but I found one that will work for as long as we need it to.
My daughter is not amused. Actually, neither are the cats. But I solved our problem and didn’t even spend any money. It might not be pretty, but it works and shall stay there until my daughter can safely use the stairs on her own. And I found a use for a long-forgotten travel ironing board, to boot.
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August 9th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
That is great! We have some very steep stairs at our house and I am afraid that little Ms. nosey britches is going to fall down them one day! DH left the door open one day and was at the top of the stairs waiting to see what she would do…..lo and behold she went head first…right into my DH’s arms because he was right there to catch her!! We have a door that we keep closed and I have to stay onto the boys to keep it shut. I am going to have to get a gate to keep her on one side of the house so she doesn’t get to that door. She is 9 months and crawls very very fast so this is an item I need to pick up very quickly.
I love the idea you came up with. I would have never thought of that. Great job!
Hugs,
Angie
August 9th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Might not be pretty? My image of it it makes it look pretty hoodish!
August 9th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Do you ever feel like you are always making sure your children are safe and then you see others never use gates, locks, etc? We were always the cautious, nervous parents, and always wondered how others got away without baby-proofing. Congrats on the no-money solution. My husband is very much the same!
I wish I could go back to baby gates. My oldest is 13 and her freedom is becoming very important. Very scary for me!
August 10th, 2008 at 5:42 am
When we had our first child, we did the same…a gate for the stairs.
My wife’s grandmother came to visit and said that the child should fit the house…and not the other way around.
We removed the gate for the few hours grandma was at home, then promptly put it back when she left.
August 10th, 2008 at 10:44 am
What a great image! Reminds me of all the jury-rigged inventions I dreamed up to keep the cats our of certain parts of the house.
I always felt the same way as fathersez: the kid lives with you & so he adjusts to how you live. On the other hand, we didn’t have stairs. I would have been very nervous about stairs, just as I was about cleaning chemicals and meds. On the other hand, we did NOT move our stereo system to high, out-of-reach shelves — we taught our son not to mess with it, and he didn’t. We did not replace all our glasses and dishes with plastic junk — and my son never broke a glass or a dish in his entire life.
LOL! One of his little classmates in preschool was an accomplished climber. I mean, this kid was an acrobat!
His parents, who were affluent, installed a swimming pool in the historic minimansion where they dwelt. Suzie was very concerned that Roger not be able to get into the pool unsupervised, and so of course they installed an extra-high (expensive!!!!) wrought-iron fence around it. The day the men finished building the fence, she looked out the kitchen window to see them wrapping up the job…and Roger perched on top of the fence!
Not long after that, our preschool had one of those parents’ (fund-raising) evening events, to which the kiddies were invited. Everyone was standing around chatting and jingling the glass in their drinks when suddenly a great silence fell over the gathered hundreds. Everyone looked up in the sky.
Roger had shinnied up the 30-foot-high flagpole — all the way to the top — where he was perched and giggling with joy. George, his father, was standing at the bottom with a baffled look on his face and his hands stretched out, as though he expected he could catch the kid if he fell. Pretty quick Roger climbed back down, and the party went on.
I’ve often wondered where that kid is now….
August 10th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Necessity is the mother of invention, as they say!
Don’t you just luv it when you come up with a no-cost solution
YES!
August 11th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
I love a free solution! I took some cup hooks and garden net and created a barrier to keep my cats from jumping behind my washing and dryer. It doesn’t look great–kind of like a 6″ wide safety net for tiny trapeze artists! They once torn the dryer vent off rendering the dryer unsafe to use. Ha! Never again. I’ll take ugly and functional any day of the week.
August 11th, 2008 at 7:24 pm
Very clever! I’m glad nothing bad happened from HER ingenuity.
August 12th, 2008 at 9:14 am
It’s amazing how far a little creativity can go. Too many times we resort to running to the home depots and walmarts of the world trying to find a solution where often one is lying forgotten in a spare closet.
I’ll have to remember this for when my little one starts to walk.