This house of straw: update

Remember my complaints recently about our upstairs stairgate coming away from the wall, and leaving a big hole in its place? Well the hole is still there, but we’ve finally managed to rehang the stairgate! Hubbie had to attach a couple of blocks of wood to the banister of the stairs and hang the gate from that so that its hinge is on the banister instead of on the wall. The locks for the gate are now on the door frame at the top of the stairs instead of in the wall. We don’t trust that part of the wall to support anything!

And I’m happy to report that this solution is working really well. Turns out the banister is the most stable thing in the house.

It’s not the prettiest of solutions, but it’ll keep Little Man safe for now. He is flying around the place, and I’ve been afraid to put him down upstairs in case I can’t stop him on time before he gets to the top of the stairs. And he’s been getting really frustrated with me for constantly closing the upstairs doors on him. When I close the door to stop him getting out, he walks over to it, slaps it with both hands, and then leans his head against the door with a big sigh. As if to say, “She’s done it again. I’ll never get out…”

So now we have to research long term solutions. I spotted this rollerblind-style stairgate on mothercare.ie today – but it’s €116, which is a lot of money to spend without researching it first. I think I’ll keep looking for a while before deciding.