Is your house child-friendly?
In the simplest form, a house is where we live. But a great house is not just about beauty. The most important thing about a house is its functionality. How well does it support our life?
A safe, comfortable family is an essential part of our lives. Safety is a very important consideration for a family, especially when children are involved. The truth is, a house that perfectly supports an adult may be very unsafe for a child. Therefore, it is imperative to consider how child-friendly your house is. A child-friendly house will have the following features:
Spacious
Kids are simply very active. They can hardly make do with small spaces. If your house is not spacious, the chance of your kids getting injured is higher. You have to choose accessories and arrangements that allow space in your house. And, if you have space, you can get playhouse DIY kit and create a playhouse for your kids that they will simply love.
Rounded furniture
Kids tend to fall a lot, regardless of the space in your house. You must ensure there are no sharp edges, as much as possible. Rounded chairs reduce the chance and severity of injuries sustained by children.
Fixed-cushion sofas
Kids are active and curious, always exploring. Everything they lay their hands on becomes a play-accessory. Sofa cushions suffer a lot from children. They love pulling them. To avoid a disorderly home and unfair harshness or strictness towards your kid, your sofa should have a fixed cushion. This way, you will worry less about your house being disorderly and your children will have more freedom to express themselves. A sofa with fixed cushions takes out the problem of ‘don’t fool around with furniture’. I wonder how some families do this. How on earth will kids not play with furniture?
Flooring
A floor that is perfect for an adult may be very hazardous for children. Some floors like tiles could be very slippery, especially when wet. Besides being not slippery, the flooring choice in your house must be able to withstand some rough treatment. Delicate floors are not child-friendly. Children will spill fluid and will not feel the need to dry it immediately. They will drag many things across your floor. Your house needs a formidable floor to withstand this, hence, you may want to consider the hybrid options. Hybrid Flooring is a mixture of the qualities of laminate flooring and vinyl flooring to give you a beautiful, waterproof, long-lasting and easy to install and to maintain product that is just as child-friendly as it can get. Hybrid floors can be easily installed, which means you do need the bare minimum tools to get them installed. One resource for options is Carpet To Go.
Semi-Gloss paint
Kids love to draw. Many parents give kids’ chalkboards to express themselves, but kids are kids. They often don’t want to write on those boards and they end up writing on the wall. This can deface your wall. By painting your walls, especially kids’ areas with semigloss paint, you are able to wash off all kinds of writings including markers.
Tiled walls
A child-friendly house must have its bathroom wall tiled. This will make it easy for you to clean stains e.g. toothpaste from the wall.
Closed storage
Kids throw their toys and other accessories all over the place — a house with closed storage for proper storing of these tools is more child-friendly. Kids counters, coat hooks, and area rugs are other important considerations for a child-friendly home.
Making your house as child-friendly as possible will not only keep your children safe, but it will also save you a lot of money that would have been spent on hospital bills if they slip and get injured in the process. The good thing is that some of the tweaks you need to make will not cost that much.
