I know one day I’m going to regret this, but…
The drawers and low cabinets in our kitchen are child-proofed with locks that use magnets. They were more expensive than the traditional latch you have to push inside the drawer with your finger, but waaaay worth it. You just swipe a magnet over the lock to move the latch that catches on the hook on the other side of the cabinet. We keep two magnets in the kitchen so one is always somewhat close by. Sometime during Mac’s party, we lost one of the magnets. My feeling is that it ended up in the trash. It has never re-appeared since that day. You can use some of the fridge magnets, but they aren’t as convenient as the ones with the handle.
I’m the majority user of the kitchen. When I’m cooking, I’m the one most irritated when a magnet is missing and I have to search for it to open what I need. I made the executive decision to unlock most of the drawers. Really, some of them are locked not to protect the kids, but to not annoy the adults that do not want to constantly pick up towels or spoons. I have unlocked everything except one drawer that has skewers and big, sharp forks and the cabinet under the sink which has chemicals. I may end up having to re-lock the pantry with the dried fruit and crackers. Jay really likes to eat those. As soon as he finds out he can just open the door and get them, I’ll come in here and find that he’s eaten half the container. Really. I also kept my spice drawers locked because I have caught him dumping spices and, just, no. I don’t buy Penseys spices for them to be dumped on my floor. I’ll keep them unlocked while I’m cooking, but lock it back again when I’m done. If I remember.
I know that there will be a day when I come in my kitchen and regret what I have done, but cooking has eased quite a bit with this decision…as soon as I stop habitually looking for that magnet. I’ve been using it for four years.
