Charmingly Peony: May 2015

I have a love hate relationship with our stair case. We have been searching for a baby gate to fit our very wide stair case for over a month, with no luck. Our stair length varies on the bottom 48.5" and the top is 52" due to a railing. Our goal was to find or make a gate that was SAFE and Kid Friendly.

Lilah is 3 and needs to be able to go up and down the stairs freely while little Kaylie slightly uncoordinated and needs restriction. So Derrick & I have been discussing and pinning ideas on how to make the stairs safer, well we were a little too late. Yesterday morning Kaylie fell down the stairs. She has a black eye and bruised up nose. So I decided to follow my gut and create two gates one for the top and one for the bottom.

So in my panic after the fall we headed to lowes to pick up some wood! Lilah is proud for being a big Helper!
Total cost for this gate $33.16

What you will need~

Sanding block (sanding paper)

Heavy gate hinges (2)

Gate lock (1)

Wood stain ( Old Leather)

Paint brush

Screws ( 1 1/4 ") short You don't want these to pop threw the other side

Wood

(1) 1x4x8

(1) 1x6x8

(2) 1x3x8

1x6x8 was cut to (2) 47" pieces, The stair width is 48.5" so I chose to go an inch smaller for the hinge and latch spacing.

~ The height of the gate is 24 " which is perfect height on our first step. Cut the 1x4x8 into (4) 24" pieces. We used the two extra on the second gate.
Attach the 24" 1x4 to the 1x6 to create a rectangle.
Cut the 1x3x8 into 24" pieces, used only 6 of these boards. I attached them with screws at 3.5" spacing between each board.

Next stain the gate and let it dry for atleast 2 hours, Our stain had a seal mixed in it. Then attach the hinges.

Attach hinges to the gate first, then attach them to the wall make sure they are in a stud you don't want the gate to rip a hole in your wall. Make sure the knuckle to the hinge is out, so that it does't get caught up on the wall.