Category Archives: Home Organizing

Cleaners and Chemicals

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By Alan Zahniser

Babies and small children put almost everything they can into their mouth.  Upon first learning to crawl, my baby first went to his bottom dresser drawer knob, grabbed it, and then put his mouth on it.  He then did the same to his brass closet door hinge.  These are two items he could see from his crib.  He probably studied them from afar for awhile and was curious to check them out as soon as he was able.  When he could, he did.

In these early days of mobility, there is no reasoning with your baby.  They do not understand words like “no” yet.  They are excited about the opportunity to explore.  They are driven only by their curiosity and ability.  They have no fear.  They do not know about danger yet.  There is no pausing to consider possible consequences of their actions.  They live only in the present moment.  If they have opportunity to get into something of interest, they will go for it.  It is up to the parents and caregivers to assure these little ones have a safe environment and are guided only into safe situations.

Cleaners and chemicals are very dangerous to children.  Like anything else in this very oral stage, if your baby can access something of interest, even if we know it to be a dangerous chemical, they will try to consume it.  Their action can be fatal or cause serious or permanent injury to  your precious little one. The risk of such a tragedy can be easily avoided because the problem is very easy to fix.

For your baby’s safety, remove all cleaners and chemicals from your home that are 4 feet from the floor.  I call this the “Four Feet From Floor” rule, abbreviated FFFF.  Go through every room carefully.  Get on your hands and knees and see things as the baby will.  Check floors, closets, drawers, cupboards, closets, everywhere.  For example, until now it may have been convenient to keep drano behind the toilet.  Now you must remove the drano to an entirely different part of the home that will be inaccessible to your baby, such as the basement or garage.

While we teach you how to use fences, doors, latches, and other techniques to provide barriers to certain parts of your home, no safety method is foolproof.  You may be getting something out of a bathroom and your quick little one will slip in behind you and get into something bad in just seconds.  You may have a guest visit who doesn’t quite latch an important door, and the baby gets into that room and accesses something bad before you realize it.  If a cleaner or chemical is around, at some point your little one can possibly get into it. Therefore, please take a few minutes to implement FFFF.  You do not want to one day sadly say “if only …” because the FFFF step was not taken.  Remove these items far out of the reach of your little one now.  Implementing FFFF is one of the most important and urgent steps you can take to protect your child.

While removing the chemicals and cleaners, also remove any other items you do not want in your baby’s mouth.  For example, while removing the drano, you will also want to remove the toilet brush and plunger.  For every item you see, ask yourself, “Is it OK for this to be in the baby’s mouth?”  If the answer is no, remove it.

Move these dangerous items to a centralized safe area, such as the garage or basement.  I used this project as an opportunity to better organize these items, putting some items in upper cupboards in the laundry room, and others in a cabinet in the garage.  A minor exception was the toilet plunger which we latched safely in the cabinet below the bathroom sink.  For this item, we had to weigh out our need for quick access compared to the baby’s small chance of accessing it.  We also organized shoe polish items into a plastic box, kept high out of reach.  You may also need to reason out where to put certain removed items in your particular space.

For my new centralized cleaning supplies, I tried to organize them into logical groupings.  I then used 3″ x 5″ cards and a marker to label each of the cupboard and cabinet shelves.  A nice benefit is I can now find cleaners or chemicals easily when I need them.  Putting them in one central location is actually convenient.  It is an easy habit to remember to return items as soon as I am finished using them in the house.  I also found so many duplicate items in my gathering effort that I do not need to buy certain cleaning products again for several years!  You may find similar surprises.

For me, the greatest benefit of this project is the peace of mind of knowing my baby cannot get into cleaners, chemicals, and other bad things they should not put in their mouth.  I hope you find the same peace of mind when you finish your FFFF project!

Happy Hunting!!!  🙂

Electrical Outlets

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By Alan Zahniser

Electrical outlets pose a serious danger to little children.  Children have a natural curiousity and always seem to find things to put into little holes.  The immediate jolt of electricity from such a connection can severely shock and injure a person, possibly stopping their heart and resulting in tragic death.  CPR may be needed to resuscitate, if it is even possible.  TIP: LEARN INFANT AND CHILD CPR.  It is very important to always prevent children from accessing electrical outlets.

Alternative 1: Safety cover plugs.  An easy inexpensive solution is to purchase safety cover plugs for every outlet within reach of a child, typically within 4 feet of the floor.  When you need to use one of these outlets by an appliance, you must first pry the safety cover plug out of the outlet.  A prying technique to remove these plugs is to use one of the flat posts of the appliance plug and pry behind the face of the safety cover plug then twist the appliance plug so you can then remove the safety cover plug with your fingers.  Then you can plug in your appliance.  When finished using the appliance, get into the habit of immediately unplugging it and replacing the safety cover plug.

Alternative 2:  Safety cover plugs with tabs.  Some safety cover plugs have tabs that can help you remove them when needed.  Less prying is involved.  However, be careful to test any safety cover plug you consider to be sure your child will not be able to remove it.  Like Alternative 1, you must always remember to replace the safety cover plug when finished using the appliance.

Alternative 3: Safety outlet face plates.  The face plate of an outlet is the rectangular cover on the wall that contains the outlets.  Standard outlet face plates can be removed and replaced by safety outlet face plates.  Safety outlet face plates have a surface panel for each outlet that normally blocks the outlet but can be rotated or slid over to let you plug in your device.  Upon removing the device plug from the outlet, the face plate surface panel should rotate or slide back over to block the outlet holes from little hands.  Safety outlet face plates will cost a little more than safety cover plugs and require a minor one-time effort to install them.  However, future access to the outlets will be easier and the spring back panels that block the outlet holes when unplugging your device will more consistenly protect the outlet without relying on someone’s memory to put back the safety cover plug.

Alternative 4:  Safety Outlets.  If you plan to build a new home, remodel an area of your home, or if you are able to replace outlets, consider installing safety outlets.  Safety outlets look similar to normal outlets and actually cost about the same as normal outlets.  However safety outlets have a barrier just inside each outlet hole that prevents objects from being pushed into the hole.  The only way to get through these barriers is to apply firm pressure to both outlet holes at the same time, such as what you do when you plug in an electrical device.  These devices should prove to be among the most difficult safety devices for your little one to overcome.  Like many good safety devices, your little one will likely become frustrated and move on to something else to do.

Assessment: Safety cover plugs of Alternative 1 and 2 are inexpensive and easy to immediately protect your children from electrical outlets.  I am on my second set of children and they worked great for both.  The biggest problem is for the adults or older children who use the outlets on occasion to have the focus and discipline to remember to put the safety plug back in the outlet after unplugging their device.  Despite my safety focus, even I sometimes forget to immediately replace a safety cover plug.  Visitors or others in the home are also likely to forget to replace safety cover plugs.  Once an electrical device is unplugged, that outlet is completely unprotected and a serious danger to your little one.  For some reason, outlets are very attractive to little ones.  Perhaps they see the holes in the wall and believe something must go in it.  All it takes is one bobby pin or paper clip.  As I follow my curious busy baby around, if he sees an unprotected outlet – he goes for it!  At that point, I pick him up to remove him from the danger and scramble to find and replace the missing plug or grab one from my drawer of extras.  Because even I am not perfectly consistent in replacing outlet cover plugs, I am compelled to believe safety outlet face plates or safety outlets are a safer and more reliable long term protection.  Once installed, safety outlet face plates and safety outlets are also easier to use by adults and any visitors needing to use outlets.

Recommendation: 4-step solution.  (1) Immediately protect your home by putting safety cover plugs in every outlet in your house, in every room where your child may possibly obtain access.  Keep extra safety cover plugs in some nearby central drawer so you can replace a safety cover plug that might wander off temporarily, only because you or someone else forgot to replace it!  When an unprotected outlet is discovered, it is more important to plug it with a new plug than to hunt for the missing plug.  (2) Once you have every outlet protected with a safety cover plug, identify the few outlets per room you may actually need to use for vacuuming, a baby monitor, an https://buycbdproducts.com or phone charger, etc.  For these used or occasionally used outlets, install a safety outlet face plate or safety outlet.  Make this installation effort a high priority project.  However, if you get delayed from implementing safety outlet face plates or safety outlets, perhaps because you are an otherwise busy parent, at least the outlets will be protected by an outlet safety cover plug in the meantime.  (3) Strategically arrange furniture to block outlets as much as possible, so most outlets will not even be seen or reachable by your child.  See furniture section in this website for more related safety tips. (4) for any new construction or outlets needing to be replaced, install safety outlets.

Installation: Outlet safety cover plugs and outlet safety face plates can be obtained from department stores, home hardware stores, online, or wherever child safety devices are provided.  Try each item out to make sure they are of good quality and will do the job (or take them back for a refund).  Installing outlet safety cover plugs requires just a good thumb.  Simply push!  Installing an outlet safety face plate typically requires just a flat head screwdriver to remove the screw from the old face plate and install a new safety face plate in its place (lefty loosy, righty tighty).  Be careful not to overtighten the screw in the face plate as overtightening can easily crack the face plate.  Just make sure the face plate is snug to the wall and stop tightening.  Save the original face plates you remove because you may want to put them back some day if you decide to relocate or as the children get older.  Safety outlets should be installed only by a qualified person and their installation is no different than installing normal outlets.

Bonus Outlet Tip: Keep a box of outlet safety cover plugs in your car or diaper bag so when you take your child to a place that is not child-proofed, you can use your outlet safety cover plugs to quickly protect your child from those outlets while your child is there.  You can take the plugs out when you leave.