Sleep Tight: Keeping Kids Beds Safe

It's a bed, not a cliff

Take comfort: you are not the only one whose children are lunatics. While you probably can't pad an entire rubber room, there are plenty of reasonable steps you can take to make bedrooms safer for rambunctious kids.

The high dive

Like the chimps they are, kids love to climb. The first thing they do when they see a loft bed or bunk bed is say, "Wow! Cool!" and climb up. Then their audience says, "Wow! Cool!" as they fall off. Manufacturers of kids loft beds have become very clever at minimizing the fall. Safety rails look stylish while keeping squirmy sleepers in bounds. Cleverly designed ladders, desks and drawers also make it hard to fall very far. Look for certification labels from the Consumer Products Safety Commission or the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association. We offer beds only from quality manufacturers, including American Woodcrafters, Liberty, Young America and Stanley, that are built to be solid, safe and secure.

For kids bunk beds and loft beds, go with safety rails. The mattress should be at least five inches below the top rail, and rail spacing should be smaller than your kid's head. (Yes, he'll test it. It's genetic.) Sturdy, angled ladders are a must. Even future ballerinas stumble when they're sleepy.

Bed placement helps too. If you have two sets of loft or bunk beds, move them close enough together so jumping monkeys can't miss, or far enough that kids won't bother to try. Keep upper bunks away from windows that could be kicked during a nightmare or a treehouse wrestling match.

It's tempting to hang lots of dangly decorations from a canopy bed. Just say no to anything that could snag clothing or that doesn't break away easily with a little weight on it. Clear the battlefield Look out below! A fall may be inevitable, but a rough landing isn't. Periodically scan the area around your kid's bunk bed. Pillows and bean bags, good. Action figures with gleaming swords, a globe with a spiky axis, bad. Make kids pick up sharp toys before bed to protect tender bare feet in the middle of the night (theirs and yours). It gives you one more chance to say, "It's for your own good!" Their future spouses will thank you.