Babies bring property blues

CityLiving: A baby changes your relationship with your home, writes Edel Morgan.

Babies and property can be an incongruous mix. As a parent, it's hard to know if you spend more time protecting the baby from the property or the property from the baby - and it's rare that either emerges completely unscathed.

The arrival of a baby can have a three-prong effect on a property. Firstly, it can change your perception of your home - turning it from dream home to death trap overnight. Suddenly, everywhere there are lurking dangers. Your sleek coffee table becomes a jutting obstruction, your glass doors are still cutting-edge, but in a different way. One couple I know of spent years tweaking their penthouse apartment to their impeccable taste only to abandon it as soon as they had a baby because of the balcony.

The second effect a baby has on a property is to transform it from urban chic to Tellytubbyland. Once you have children you should immediately abandon any notions of being a sophisticate. A colleague who has two boys under the age of two and a half told me she has "finally given in" by covering her lovely sleek glass table "with a big fruity oilcloth" which she says is "great for learning colours and fruit as well as being a protective layer when painting, play-dohing, banging spoons, and sloshing food".

And speaking of banging spoons and sloshing food, the third effect a baby has on a property is its gradual destruction. This colleague says she is able to chart her boys' growth "as the mucky handprints advance" up the once pristine white kitchen walls. She once discovered hardened Weetabix on the underside of a chair which, for the uninitiated, is the consistency of cement.

I spent most of last weekend trying to clean congealed baby spew from between the floorboards while assessing the impact of my energetic baby son on my renovated house.

Baby vandalism happens in the blink of an eye. Once they're on the move, babies seem to be drawn to the danger zones of the house. My son's trademark impish grin tends to precede an attempt to squeeze himself down the side of the TV to get to the wires or to bash chunks out of the timber floors or the tiles with his jack-in-the-box.

Of course, it's not just the property that takes a bashing. According to Dr Peter Keenan of Children's University Hospital, Temple Street, around 7,000 toddlers and babies were attended to there last year following accidents - mostly in the home. Minor head injuries and scalds were among the most common incidents. "It's very important to fall-proof the stairs," says Dr Keenan, "and make sure there are no loose flexes or boiling pots that kids can get at. Fireplaces with sharp edges are another hazard."

Crawling babies don't get into as many scrapes as toddlers but can pull objects on top of themselves. "They can go from crawling to cruising without warning which can be an accident waiting to happen." Dr Keenan says he can be surprised by the lack of awareness of some parents, wo sit with a baby on their lap when pouring tea and coffee.

But is it possible to completely baby-proof your property without turning it into a padded cell? Probably not, most toddlers will suffer a few bumps and grazes along the way but there are ways of minimising danger, through the likes of cupboard and drawer locks,socket covers and soft-edge fireplace guards made of flame-resistant shock-absorbing foam. Adhesive protectors to cushion sharp corners on tables, fire guards and covers that encase wires at the back of a TV are all recommended. It's a good idea to bracket shelves to the wall in case of climbing accidents. If you want to be extra careful you can buy them a safety helmet (yes really) - available on ebay.

Some parents prefer to sit back and calmly watch their home disintegrate before their eyes. After all, it's difficult to convey to a child under two that the polished floor is not for bashing. In some cases the relaxed approach can be taken too far, particularly in other people's homes. I remember the trepidation of a single friend when her cousin asked her the dreaded question: "Can I bring the baby with me?" Her beautiful flat, her pride and joy, is still recovering from what she described as a whirlwind encounter with a mini-bulldozer. In the midst of this wanton destruction, her cousin sat back serenely, except for the occasional unconvincing "now, now, darling".

The other extreme is the parents who preside over an eerily ordered household. Like the couple whose architect designed a house for them that makes provision for an area for a single box "of primary coloured toys". This would be screened off so as not to upset the perfect order of the rest of the house.

You have to wonder if, ultimately, it's better to baby-proof the house, turn a blind eye to the mess, and hope the damage to your property is ultimately reversible. It might not help the value of the house but could help preserve the sanity of everyone involved.