Baby Gates

[Anonymous]

We are entering the baby gate stage and have a few questions. Thoughts on gates that have be installed into the wall versus use a tension system? (If the latter is sufficiently secure, we would prefer not to have to screw them into the drywall.) Additionally, our stairwells are fairly wide, so I would love recommendations on baby gates that work for wider spaces. Finally, I'd appreciate any feedback on how long you used yours. I've seen recommendations for 6 months through about 2 years and curious if that matches with experience.

[Anonymous]

We are in the baby gate stage for kid number 3.

We use a tension gate in a weirdly narrow staircase that leads to basement.

Teach your kid NOW how to go down stairs. Gates are a pain and only create a false sense of security. You child may slip on the stairs. It’s ok, they are learning. We normally are done with gates by 15 months.

[Anonymous]

It’s not just for your own child. Your child will make friends and have playdates with other kids. Their parents will bring their two year old to play with your two year old, but also bring their nine month old crawler. You don’t want that kid falling down the stairs. We kept the gate up until our youngest was four.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s not just for your own child. Your child will make friends and have playdates with other kids. Their parents will bring their two year old to play with your two year old, but also bring their nine month old crawler. You don’t want that kid falling down the stairs. We kept the gate up until our youngest was four.

Using that logic you never take down the gates. My kids are 6-10 and we have close friends with babies and my kids’ friends still have young siblings. Not your responsibility to baby proof for others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s not just for your own child. Your child will make friends and have playdates with other kids. Their parents will bring their two year old to play with your two year old, but also bring their nine month old crawler. You don’t want that kid falling down the stairs. We kept the gate up until our youngest was four.

This is fine but not our approach. We taught our kids early how to handle stairs. We also made sure the stairs had proper covering on them to reduce slips or falls. We didn't use baby gates past about 18 months. Once our kids were steady walkers, we started letting them play on the stairs with supervision until we felt comfortable enough just taking the gates down.

If people with babies come over, we deal with it the same way we would before we had kids at all -- keep an eye on the kids, or if we want to give them more freedom, go to an area of the house not near the stairs (or outside). I don't believe in eliminating risk though. I'm not going to let a 9 mo play on a stair landing unsupervised, but I'm also not going to keep baby gates up for 10 years just in case a 9 mo comes over and might be attracted to the stairs.

[Anonymous]

Interesting. I have 3 kids, 3 level house and never used baby gates. Only one kid fell down the steps but a baby gate would not have prevented that fall at all. Literally just slipped while walking down the steps at age 3. Anyways, I was never away from my kid long enough that I couldn’t catch them before going down the steps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are entering the baby gate stage and have a few questions. Thoughts on gates that have be installed into the wall versus use a tension system? (If the latter is sufficiently secure, we would prefer not to have to screw them into the drywall.) Additionally, our stairwells are fairly wide, so I would love recommendations on baby gates that work for wider spaces. Finally, I'd appreciate any feedback on how long you used yours. I've seen recommendations for 6 months through about 2 years and curious if that matches with experience.

There was a good website that showed different scenarios and had gate recommendations for each but I can’t seem to find it. Basic advice was top of stairs require something drilled or attached to the wall. A pressure gate could be pushed out of place. Bottom of stairs pressure gate is ok. We have a split level and the up step is adjacent to the front door. We opted for a play yard that came with maybe 6 panels so you could decide the size. We installed it a few feet away from the steps to close off our entire main level. It did mean the upper and lower levels had access to the stairs. We honestly never got around to putting a gate at the top because by the time we got it he was really good at going down the stairs.

We put it up after we moved and baby was 5 months because he was already crawling and took it down around 20 months because one day we realized we didn’t need it anymore. We probably could have taken it down much earlier but got used to it and it helped contain the dog.

[Anonymous]

Screw in for steps, tension is fine everywhere else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Screw in for steps, tension is fine everywhere else.

this exactly. I remember reading this somewhere when DD was a baby. For life/death situations like the top of stairs you want that kind that screws in that closes shut properly every time. To just keep the baby away from certain rooms you can do the tension kind. We actually one did the one at the top of the stairs, never had a gate anywhere else.

[Anonymous]

Not OP, but when do people put gates up? I assumed we needed to worry about this when he could walk and perhaps climb out of his crib, but this seems to be about crawling? I have a one year old (not walking) and still didn't put any up yet. He spends most of his time on the main floor, where there are no stairs to fall down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not OP, but when do people put gates up? I assumed we needed to worry about this when he could walk and perhaps climb out of his crib, but this seems to be about crawling? I have a one year old (not walking) and still didn't put any up yet. He spends most of his time on the main floor, where there are no stairs to fall down.

It really depends, we never put up any baby gates for our first DC, he stayed close to us and didn’t wonder off to far or too quick.
We have DC2 now and NOW we are finally baby proofing and putting up all gates, so it really depends on your kids’ personality and not so much their age

[Anonymous]

when my baby was about 11 months, if you put her down on the ground she would basically hit turbomode and speed-crawl to the stairs. Every.Single.Time.

we also have an old dog that is too dumb to realize that he hurts himself every time he attempts the stairs, so the gates will probably stay up for as long as he is around.

we got the mesh-on-a-reel type gates. we allow her to crawl up and down the stairs, but only supervised.