Those cleaning agents under your sink? That bathtub? Buckets? Get rid of them. They’re much more deadly to a child by a long shot.

Oh, and empty the pool, fill it in with dirt, and maybe put a soft, rubber mat down where it used to be.

Do you have a link so that others of us may read and send our thoughts?

What is with people today and ‘childproofing’?
When I was young my parents taught me to leave things the hell alone.
What is the use of wasting money raising a child if you leave them deluded into believing the world is a safe warm cuddly place? They won’t survive once they are out of the house. Man up, throw out the outlet covers, cabinet locks, etc. roll up a newspaper and teach the kid to behave.

Somehow, I think the girl-child is going to learn how to index her trigger finger before she learns how to walk.

Oh, by the way my much younger self found out that 12 volt light bulbs DO NOT like 120 volt outlets.

Also, my fathers 1920’s vintage motor with a pole switch would send a tingle up my arms if I went around barefoot while using it. Finally threw that damn thing away when he passed. \

Good luck!

When my wife and I had our first child, I’ll admit, we were rather protective and did our best to “child proof” the home. By the time we had #4 we had long since realized that you can’t “child proof” barring living in a padded cell and having Scotty beam the food into your body and beam the wastes out.

Our kids have nearly electrocuted themselves, nearly drowned, fallen down the stairs, smacked each other and themselves with garden tools, ran out behind a car, used knives to play the drums on pots, and any number of things that should have got them killed. They know how to unlock the doors, take the caps off of medicine bottles, use scissors, and have their own rake and shovel to help out in the garden. Strangely, I never taught them how to do any of these things. Interestingly enough all of the “dangerous” stuff – like guns and cleaning chemicals – we taught them about and didn’t make it mysterious, and they have never had an accident with them. Yes, I even let my 3 year hold the firearms when I am cleaning them (imagine that two super dangerous things at one time chemicals and guns!). I am sure that out in public when my kids are about to pull the shopping cart over onto themselves, others at the store think I am negligent. One person had a horrified look when I said, “Yeah, they might do that, and hopefully they will learn their lesson.” I was dead serious, and the only thing that stopped them was I found what I was looking for on the shelf and moved the cart to the next aisle.

Kids are going to eat dirt, get sick, injure themselves, injure others, and generally cause you to have a heart attack at least once a month. No amount of child proofing is ever going to change that. All it will do is shelter them enough so that they really get in trouble when they are teenagers. To say that kids and guns don’t mix well is ludicrous. My kids have been making their own “shooter guns” out of everything they own (the best was when I was switching stocks on a rifle and let my kids have the old stock, no imagination needed there). Kids want what you don’t let them have. So show them your guns and teach them all about them. When they are old enough show them that the proper use can be really fun (especially with water jugs and large vegetables).

For what it’s worth, when I was but a small child, my parents gave me a lecture about the dangers of firearms and how I was not to handle them without an adult present. As a test, they left me in a room alone with an unloaded 1911. The very first thing I did was head over to examine it. So, this leads me to a few conclusions. First, I’m not good at following directions. Two, I was destined to be a pistolero from birth. Lastly, children tend to be most interested in the things that are kept a mystery. The best thing my parents ever did was let me handle guns as much as I wanted, as long as they were around. This lasted until I had demonstrated enough responsibility to be given my own guns. The natural progression of my growing comfort level and responsibility was evident the time (around age 12) my mother asked what I would do if someone broke in and they weren’t there. I promptly responded “load the .308 and take care of the problem”. Dad laughed and asked if I might consider a smaller caliber as he didn’t want to repair our house and the neighbor’s. From then on, I simply carried his cocked and locked LW Colt Commander around instead. I’m still here, they must have done something right…

As long as your kid isn’t eating lead paint chips off the wall, most of the modern child-proofing nonsense is just that… nonsense. Keep jugs of bleach where the kid won’t pop the cap and start chugging it. Keep knives out of reach. Turn pot handles on the stove away from the edge. Its all common sense. With guns, just make sure they can’t get their hands on ‘em until they are old enough to do so safely. I don’t get why people have such a hard time with that.

My dad kept an unloaded rifle in the hallway by his bedroom. The ammo for it was on a shelf next to it. By the time I would have been capable of loading and operating it, I knew damn well that I wasn’t allowed to touch it without permission. That’s good parenting, not reliance on locks, bubble wrap, and hiding places to keep your kids safe.

She will bonk her head on the faucet, if you have a normal bathtub. I’ve done that myself, while cleaning, and it hurts. It’s in the dumbest place, and has an unseemly number of corners.

Guns, luckily, don’t need to be in a dumb place.