When you have a baby, you will be told to remove everything from your floor or from a level children can reach. This does not change as your baby gets older. Hiding things from children and protecting your possessions becomes a mission every day.
Children can find candy and stuff you do not want them to have, the same way dogs can tell when you have opened the fridge but not when calling for them.
Hiding things and having many different storage units and drawers becomes almost like a hobby for parents. Even if all you want to do is hide your last chocolate bar from your child, who has suddenly decided that chocolate is their favorite treat.
Whether you want to go to Ikea and purchase a unit you can store many different things in or you are going to build in some storage, as a parent, you will want many places you can store your and your child’s things out of reach.
Living Room
Each room will require different types of storage. In your living room, you could benefit from a Kalax unit, which is a unit sold in Ikea, but different furniture stores will have their own kind of unit. This is a box unit, which you can use for storage with or without box drawers.
Using a unit with box drawers will take the temptation of seeing items away from your child but could make it easy for you to forget what is stored if you have poor object permanence.
However, this unit can be versatile as you can use it as a storage space with some things on show; being able to mix up how you use it can allow you to hide things that you do not want your child to focus on and use boxes for things that you want to keep away from them.
Another good storage space to keep things out of reach of small children would be to have shelves or shelving units in your home. Having shelves gives you the bonus of fixing them at a height that your child cannot reach.
A shelving unit can work the same way as shelves but has the disadvantage that, as a built unit, your child may try to climb it. When you want to have units or bookshelves around children, you should always affix these to the wall to reduce the risk of your child being hurt while exploring.
Kitchen
The kitchen is the only room in the home where you will already have storage space that your child cannot get to. In the kitchen, it is a good idea to use child safety devices such as locks to stop your child from getting into cupboards. This is for their safety as much as it is to keep your items out of their little hands.
Of course, if you are looking at storage solutions for your kitchen and not just child safety, getting storage and organizational boxes can help with the structure of your kitchen and help you sort and find things easier. Something that will be helpful when trying to cook in the kitchen with a child or children around.
You may want a Pinterest-ready fridge that is all organized and clean, or you just want to have boxes to put your prepared meals into and organize lunches to make life easier. You can find many different types of kitchen organization tools and boxes at most stores.
You can also get inserts you can put into the drawers and units in your kitchen to make your spices, tins, and everything else easier to see and more organized. If you have to reorganize for having a child, why not reorganize to help you in the long run?
Bedroom
Whether in your bedroom or theirs, having different types of bookcases, sideboard units, or storage units, all fixed to the wall for safety, can help store not just toys but clothes and books.
Bedroom storage will make your space look clean and organized while keeping the things you need out of your child’s reach safe. Use shelves in your child’s room to keep more delicate books or sentimental toys away from your child so they are not at risk of being broken.
In your room, you may benefit from having bedside tables with drawers, allowing you somewhere to keep things safe. You can also store the things you need for those late-night trips to your child’s room.
Whether spare pacifiers or a small light to help with those late-night feeds, having a space to store things for easy access and having a drawer to put your items is helpful. Drawers allow you to still have what you want by your bed without your child knowing about it.
It may also be a good idea to fix your wardrobe and drawers to the wall just in case your child decides to try and climb when your back is turned doing laundry. Not only this but if you do not want to risk little fingers touching your clothes or your partner’s clothes, using child safety locks can stop your child from getting into your storage options.
Bathroom
Similar to the kitchen, your bathroom is likely to have storage already. If it does not, some solutions involve an under-sink storage unit, which fits easily around your sink and gives you space to store items. With children, we would advise storing their bath toys and other non-dangerous items here.
When storing cleaning products in the bathroom, keep these locked away and out of sight of children so they cannot hurt themselves. A medicine cabinet is also a valuable storage space in the bathroom; a medicine cabinet is usually fixed to the wall over the sink because most medicine cabinets have a mirror.
In this unit, you can store razors and perfumes; this will keep them safe from children and easily accessible when needed.
Summary
Whether you have children or not, there are many different storage solutions you can implement in your home to help give you more space and allow you to have what you want where you want without people knowing.
When looking for storage solutions with children, it is worth weighing up the difference between storage and safety. Storage solutions do not have to be because you have children, and you can look for ways to add storage to your home with redecorating.