Baby-Proofing Your Home Room by Room

The kitchen has heat, sharp things, chemicals, and hard surfaces. It's a baby magnet.

Install cabinet locks on every lower cabinet, especially under the sink where cleaning products live. The CPSC recommends safety latches and locks to prevent children from accessing medicines, laundry pods, household cleaners, and sharp objects.

Turn pot handles toward the back of the stove. Use back burners when possible. If your oven door gets hot, consider an oven door lock.

Move all cleaning products, dish pods, and trash bags to a high cabinet or locked space. Laundry pods are a top poisoning risk for toddlers. They look like candy.

Keep a baby gate at the kitchen entrance if your layout allows it. If not, a playpen nearby gives your baby a safe spot while you cook.

This is where most falls happen.

Anchor all furniture and TVs to the wall. The CPSC is clear on this: furniture, TVs, and appliances can tip over and crush young children. Use anti-tip straps on dressers, bookshelves, and flat-screen TVs. This takes 10 minutes per item and it's not optional.

Cover all electrical outlets with outlet covers or plates. Get on the floor and look for small objects: coins, batteries (especially button batteries, which are a medical emergency if swallowed), pen caps, and anything that fits through a toilet paper roll.

Add corner guards to sharp coffee table and fireplace edges. Babies pull up on everything, and they fall constantly in the early standing phase. Soft corners won't prevent the fall but they'll prevent the gash.

Use cordless window coverings. Cords are a strangulation risk.

The bathroom door should be closed or gated at all times when your baby is mobile.

Never leave a baby unattended in or near water. Not for a second. Drowning can happen in as little as an inch of water, and it's silent. No splashing, no screaming.

Install a toilet lock. Babies are top-heavy and can fall headfirst into a toilet bowl. It sounds unlikely until it isn't.

Move all medications, including vitamins and supplements, to a high locked cabinet. Child-resistant packaging is not child-proof. It slows them down. It doesn't stop them.

Use a non-slip mat in the tub. Set your water heater to 120F or below to prevent scalding. Test bath water with your elbow before putting baby in.

The crib should follow AAP safe sleep guidelines: firm mattress, fitted sheet, nothing else. No bumpers, blankets, stuffed animals, or positioners.

Anchor the dresser to the wall. Dresser tip-overs are one of the most common and most preventable causes of serious injury in young children. A crawling baby who pulls open a drawer can bring the whole thing down.

Keep the crib away from windows, blinds, and cords. Once your baby can pull to stand (around 8-10 months), lower the mattress to its lowest setting.

Check for small objects that could have fallen behind furniture: buttons, coins, hair ties, pen caps. Do a sweep of the floor every day. Babies find everything.

If you're using a baby monitor, keep the cord well out of reach. Strangulation from monitor cords is a documented risk.

Install baby gates at the top and bottom of all staircases. Hardware-mounted gates (screwed into the wall) are required at the top of stairs. Pressure-mounted gates are only safe at the bottom.

Use door knob covers on rooms you want to keep off-limits: laundry room, garage, basement.

And here's the checklist most people forget:

• Save the Poison Control number in your phone: 1-800-222-1222
• Cover or remove floor-level pet food and water bowls (choking and drowning risk)
• Secure trash cans with lids or move them behind locked doors
• Check for recalled products at cpsc.gov/recalls
• Install smoke alarms on every level and test them monthly
• Keep a basic first-aid kit accessible to adults but out of baby's reach

The best baby-proofing hack: get on your hands and knees in every room. That's your baby's perspective. Every cord, every outlet, every small object you can see from down there is a hazard.