Christmas Ornaments

How To Decorate Your Home And Still Have It Safe For Baby

Christmas with babies and infants is a wonderful time, but it can also be a worrying time. All children put things in their mouths, its normal. However, at Christmas, there is so much more for them to grab and stick in their mouths, so how do you make your home safe at Christmas?

There are two areas you need to look at. The first is the decorations you are going to put up. The second is how you put these up.

We all want a pretty Christmas tree and an attractive and festive home for the holidays, but when you have kids you have to change how you achieve this.

Small baubles are the first danger to consider. You can still use these, but they must be at the top of the tree, well out of reach. In fact, the top of the tree is for all the really shiny and sparkling things. Think of your tree decorations as being in two sections; one which works down from the top and one which works up from the bottom. The top is for the more adult (aka ‘dangerous to baby’ Christmas ornaments) while the bottom half of the tree is all about color and texture.

I think that every tree should have some paperchains. These are a great way to define the lower branches of the tree. Be sure to use lots of short ones rather than one long one, as you toddler is likely to try to pull these off, and you don’t want them to end up pulling the tree down; so lots of short paperchains of a foot or so each is ideal.

I only use paper ornaments on the lower half of the tree. I get lots of colored paper stars in different sizes. I have a high density of them at the bottom of the try and these sort of petter out as you go up the tree. I also use larger stars at the bottom and smaller ones at the top. This stops the tree looking like it has been cut in half! The other way to create a great effect is to have bright colors which your baby will like at the bottom such as purples, blues, pinks, greens, and then as you progress up the tree start to reduce these colors and increase the orange, yellow, gold and silver stars.

It is important that you keep an eye out for dribble or teeth marks on your paper ornaments as this is a good way to constantly remind baby that they should not put the stuff in their mouth. Of course, putting paper in their mouth will not hurt them, but they will start to learn important lessons while being completely safe.

A safe Christmas with your baby or toddler does not mean that you have to give things up, but it does mean that you have to adapt and adjust for new and different concerns.

Finally make sure that you tree is placed near a plug socket so that you don’t have any trailing wires for your lights which your baby or toddler could access.