The living room: edges, outlets and tip-overs

The room where everyone lives is the room with the most corners, cords and climbable furniture. Most of the fixes take one evening.

Corners and edges at head height

A cruising baby falls at coffee-table height, and coffee tables have corners. Corner cushions and edge guards pad the impact points on tables, hearths and TV units. Fit them on everything at the height between knee and hip; that band is where new walkers land.

Clean the surface before sticking, press for the full count in the instructions, and expect to re-stick the ones the child studies most.

Outlets and the cords that feed them

Outlet covers close the slots that sit at exact crawling height. The plug-in caps are cheapest; sliding plate covers are better in outlets you use daily, because there is no loose cap to misplace or mouth.

Cords get shortened, clipped to walls or routed behind furniture. A cord at floor level is both an electrical question and a pulling question, since whatever is on the other end comes down with it.

Furniture that can tip

Every drawer is a ladder to a toddler. Bookcases, dressers and TV units get strapped to the wall with anti-tip anchors, into studs or proper wall plugs, not into plasterboard alone. The TV itself gets its own strap.

This is the one job on this page we would not skip in any house. Furniture tip-overs are rare and terrible, and the anchor that prevents them costs less than a pizza.

Doors and fingers

Door stoppers and finger guards keep slamming doors from meeting small fingers, hinge side included, which is the side everyone forgets. Foam C-shapes clip on in a second and move between doors.

While you are at the doors: door knob covers turn any room you cannot childproof, like the office full of cables, into a room that simply does not open.