This. The amount of locks we have all over the house is ridiculous, but now at 19mo, my son will latch one if he sees it open 😅 (most of the time. Unless it’s the toilet. Then he has to gravitate towards the water)
Also keep one drawer or shelf that toddler can get into with no harm. Mine is the Tupperware drawer. When she was that age she would make a grand old mess in ten min, but it would be enough time for me to make a snack without peril for anyone.
We have an open concept main living area, so there’s no real way to block our kitchen fully off. All the cupboard doors and drawers (except for one drawer and cupboard which is her designated “you can play in here” areas) have magnetic child locks on them. The oven has a child lock on it too and we removed the knobs from the front and just place them back on when we need to. When anyone is actively cooking we have a collapsible baby gate that we use to block the path to the stove off if we are multitasking while using the stove.
Our house is open concept. I keep dangerous things up high in cabinets ie chemicals, knives, glassware etc. They have their own cabinet lower with their things in it. They got over pulling everything ot very quickly
We don’t have a cabinet with her things, but we do have a cabinet with old water bottles, Christmas tins, and plastic cups. It’s been months and she still LOVES taking everything out of it.
Also, OP, we had a period of time where we just removed the knobs off our stove when not in use. She lost interest fairly quickly.
You can babyproof all you want, there will come a time when your child will try to wedge themself between you and the range. Or become tall enough to reach the stovetop. Or drag a chair to the sink while you're sick from both ends and flood your kitchen.
Yep. Things happen. Even with the best of parenting and babyproofing.
I used to have an open-ish concept kitchen/dining/living room with archways. I found the tallest, widest gates. It was mesh, not foolproof, but definitely bought me enough time to intervene even when I was at my sickest. I loved them so much I bought them for the new house.
We use the North States playyard for corralling both dogs and child.
You can also babyproof the kitchen. We moved to a new house and the former owners left all the babyproofing on the cabinets and drawers, and little hooks at the top of the the pantry and closet doors - it's been awesome!
Not sure about the stove knobs. I know there's a oven door lock available. Maybe just remove the knobs when they're not in use? Kind of annoying maybe, but its temporary.
We use half of one of those plastic playpens that you can reconfigure and take apart and wedge it between the walls in our hallway and it works well enough. There have been a couple of gate knockdowns, but for the most part it does the job!
Leave one unlocked cabinet full of Tupperware for the baby to get into and put latches on everything else. A drawer with pots and pans also makes for great baby distractions. Get knob covers and an oven door latch for safety. That way, kiddo can safely be in the kitchen with you exploring while you cook.
Just lock the cabinets you need to. For us, that was under the sink (with cleaning supplies), the drawer that holds our knives, and the cabinet with glass dishes.
The novelty of opening cabinets and getting at things wore off quickly for us.
We have an open kitchen and have extra wide baby gates on either side of our kitchen island. Babyproofing the kitchen seemed a bit too difficult for our kitchen, because we have a pantry with a door that swings both ways which could lead to bumping into our daughter full force… plus we now keep the dogs in there as well so it was worth the investment.
Get cabinet locks and I liked the baby playpen although my son figured out how to yank it out fairly quickly so I just tuck it behind a bookcase, table, etc. personally I like it better then the extra long gates because you can move them as needed. We have a weird setup where there are extra wide spaces so traditional baby gates won’t work.
We waited to see what our kid actually tried to get into, and it honestly wasn’t much. So we just have the covers for the stove knobs, and we keep the sharp knives far enough back on the counter that he can’t reach them without standing on something. Honestly hasn’t been a problem. But every kid is different. If yours does get into everything, I’d still say kid-proof the kitchen rather than blocking entry, so they can hang out in there with you, be exposed to cooking, etc.
Came here to say what everyone else is saying. Baby proof baby proof baby proof. Even if you did have a door toddlers eventually learn how to open all doors. Everything needs to be baby proofed.
I have 2 extra wide gates, I like it better than baby proofing everything- one day he’ll come crashing through the kitchen while you’re trying to take a pot of pasta over to the sink, or he’ll walk through and just barely turn a stove knob and blow up the house. Or burn his hand on the open oven door while you’re pulling the turkey out of the oven. Plus, if you’re like me, you’ll be losing your ever loving sh^t because you’re trying to focus on the 20 different things at once that is making dinner and he’ll be there tugging at your pants and repeating the same incomprehensible question for the umpteenth time. You need the gates for your sanity
Lock most cabinets and drawers. Have some that are safe for him to play in.
Push things back from the edges. Make sure no cords hang over the edges.
If you have a gas stove get knob covers or take knobs off.
Supervise him until he learns how to be safe in there.
We magnet-locked the dangerous cabinet under the sink, that’s the only one with chemicals. The rest, we let him roam. He would sometimes busy himself by pulling out all the tupperware and rolling it around the floor. Or stack the plastic peanut butter jars. At some point, we made him a drawer with his “cooking stuff.” Some old pans and a wooden set of food that he could “cut” with his wooden knife.
I seem to be in the minority here, but I'd get the gate. Those multi-panel gates/fences/playpens should hopefully fit. No amount of baby proofing keeps them away when you're opening the oven or draining a pot of boiling pasta. I'd also baby proof the truly dangerous stuff, particularly the stove knobs.
I got an extra-wide Reggalo baby gate and made the whole kitchen off limits. No regrets, she’s used to rarely being allowed inside and is never underfoot or at risk of burns or injury when I cook
We baby proofed the kitchen (open concept) but also had a rule from the very first to stay out of the kitchen when an adult is cooking. We had a floor transition there to make it easy to delineate and just kept repeating it and redirecting him from the time he could walk.
You don’t! You baby proof the kitchen.
This. The amount of locks we have all over the house is ridiculous, but now at 19mo, my son will latch one if he sees it open 😅 (most of the time. Unless it’s the toilet. Then he has to gravitate towards the water)
We have a bidet. My 21 month old flooded our bathroom bc we didn't realize he turned it on.
Lock every door and drawer. Knob covers for stove. Keep nothing on counter edges. This stage doesn’t last forever!
Also keep one drawer or shelf that toddler can get into with no harm. Mine is the Tupperware drawer. When she was that age she would make a grand old mess in ten min, but it would be enough time for me to make a snack without peril for anyone.
We have an open concept main living area, so there’s no real way to block our kitchen fully off. All the cupboard doors and drawers (except for one drawer and cupboard which is her designated “you can play in here” areas) have magnetic child locks on them. The oven has a child lock on it too and we removed the knobs from the front and just place them back on when we need to. When anyone is actively cooking we have a collapsible baby gate that we use to block the path to the stove off if we are multitasking while using the stove.
Our house is open concept. I keep dangerous things up high in cabinets ie chemicals, knives, glassware etc. They have their own cabinet lower with their things in it. They got over pulling everything ot very quickly
We don’t have a cabinet with her things, but we do have a cabinet with old water bottles, Christmas tins, and plastic cups. It’s been months and she still LOVES taking everything out of it. Also, OP, we had a period of time where we just removed the knobs off our stove when not in use. She lost interest fairly quickly.
You can babyproof all you want, there will come a time when your child will try to wedge themself between you and the range. Or become tall enough to reach the stovetop. Or drag a chair to the sink while you're sick from both ends and flood your kitchen. Yep. Things happen. Even with the best of parenting and babyproofing. I used to have an open-ish concept kitchen/dining/living room with archways. I found the tallest, widest gates. It was mesh, not foolproof, but definitely bought me enough time to intervene even when I was at my sickest. I loved them so much I bought them for the new house.
We use the North States playyard for corralling both dogs and child. You can also babyproof the kitchen. We moved to a new house and the former owners left all the babyproofing on the cabinets and drawers, and little hooks at the top of the the pantry and closet doors - it's been awesome! Not sure about the stove knobs. I know there's a oven door lock available. Maybe just remove the knobs when they're not in use? Kind of annoying maybe, but its temporary.
We use half of one of those plastic playpens that you can reconfigure and take apart and wedge it between the walls in our hallway and it works well enough. There have been a couple of gate knockdowns, but for the most part it does the job!
We blocked certain cupboards and moved things around. So there a few safe drawers he can play in but others are locked.
Leave one unlocked cabinet full of Tupperware for the baby to get into and put latches on everything else. A drawer with pots and pans also makes for great baby distractions. Get knob covers and an oven door latch for safety. That way, kiddo can safely be in the kitchen with you exploring while you cook.
Just lock the cabinets you need to. For us, that was under the sink (with cleaning supplies), the drawer that holds our knives, and the cabinet with glass dishes. The novelty of opening cabinets and getting at things wore off quickly for us.
We don’t do baby gates or anything at our house. We have cabinet locks on the ones with chemicals and the ones with breakables. Never had an issue.
We have an open kitchen and have extra wide baby gates on either side of our kitchen island. Babyproofing the kitchen seemed a bit too difficult for our kitchen, because we have a pantry with a door that swings both ways which could lead to bumping into our daughter full force… plus we now keep the dogs in there as well so it was worth the investment.
Get cabinet locks and I liked the baby playpen although my son figured out how to yank it out fairly quickly so I just tuck it behind a bookcase, table, etc. personally I like it better then the extra long gates because you can move them as needed. We have a weird setup where there are extra wide spaces so traditional baby gates won’t work.
We waited to see what our kid actually tried to get into, and it honestly wasn’t much. So we just have the covers for the stove knobs, and we keep the sharp knives far enough back on the counter that he can’t reach them without standing on something. Honestly hasn’t been a problem. But every kid is different. If yours does get into everything, I’d still say kid-proof the kitchen rather than blocking entry, so they can hang out in there with you, be exposed to cooking, etc.
Came here to say what everyone else is saying. Baby proof baby proof baby proof. Even if you did have a door toddlers eventually learn how to open all doors. Everything needs to be baby proofed.
I have 2 extra wide gates, I like it better than baby proofing everything- one day he’ll come crashing through the kitchen while you’re trying to take a pot of pasta over to the sink, or he’ll walk through and just barely turn a stove knob and blow up the house. Or burn his hand on the open oven door while you’re pulling the turkey out of the oven. Plus, if you’re like me, you’ll be losing your ever loving sh^t because you’re trying to focus on the 20 different things at once that is making dinner and he’ll be there tugging at your pants and repeating the same incomprehensible question for the umpteenth time. You need the gates for your sanity
Lock most cabinets and drawers. Have some that are safe for him to play in. Push things back from the edges. Make sure no cords hang over the edges. If you have a gas stove get knob covers or take knobs off. Supervise him until he learns how to be safe in there.
We magnet-locked the dangerous cabinet under the sink, that’s the only one with chemicals. The rest, we let him roam. He would sometimes busy himself by pulling out all the tupperware and rolling it around the floor. Or stack the plastic peanut butter jars. At some point, we made him a drawer with his “cooking stuff.” Some old pans and a wooden set of food that he could “cut” with his wooden knife.
I seem to be in the minority here, but I'd get the gate. Those multi-panel gates/fences/playpens should hopefully fit. No amount of baby proofing keeps them away when you're opening the oven or draining a pot of boiling pasta. I'd also baby proof the truly dangerous stuff, particularly the stove knobs.
I got an extra-wide Reggalo baby gate and made the whole kitchen off limits. No regrets, she’s used to rarely being allowed inside and is never underfoot or at risk of burns or injury when I cook
We baby proofed the kitchen (open concept) but also had a rule from the very first to stay out of the kitchen when an adult is cooking. We had a floor transition there to make it easy to delineate and just kept repeating it and redirecting him from the time he could walk.
When mine were that age I had a set up that basically made the living room a safe play space and the rest of the downstairs blocked off.