Dishwasher Safety Latches

Oh have I been there! And I never really found a solution except to repeat no over and over and picking them up and moving them to some where else. 3 of our 4 played with the dishwasher, we didn't have one with the first or he would have played with it too, I'm sure. Now that it has been several years since it's been a problem and I can think more clearly about it,you can go to WalMart and buy velcro and if you have a cabinet or other sturdy fixture on both sides you could stretch the velcro from one side to the other. Just a thought. Not sure it will be tough enough up against a determined toddler but it's cheap and worth a try.

We have the same problem with our son. We had tried looking for a latch first, but had not found any that would work for our dishwasher. As for the lock button, ours has that too. Unfortunately, he has figured it out. Our solution has just been to give him three warnings to leave the dishwasher alone. The last one in which we tell him he will have to sit in his time-out chair if he does it again. If he continues playing with the dishwasher, he gets a time-out. It can be very trying at first, but he is doing much better at leaving it alone. We usually only have to tell him once now and he will stop playing with it.

my friend used the latches for refrigerators & toilets. she used the toilet one at the top & the fridge one near the middle. they're pretty cheap & you can get them almost anywhere.

I haven't been able to find a dish washer latch, but my washer has a button you can push to lock the key pad (so they can't turn it on). But I feel for you with the latch opening thing. My 14 month old daughter likes to flip the latch on ours back & forth while a wash cycle is running. That makes it turn on & off. More than once I've come in to find a dish cycle half run & all the dishes still dirty because she flipped the latch.

We have a Wide Spaces baby gate by Evenflow across our kitchen. The door space is about 8 feet wide, so it's mounted to the wall & has a swing door. Since you don't have a second wall, you might want to look into a flexi gate. WE ordered ours from a pet catalogue. You might want to consider this: http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=...

Good luck!!

Hello,

Something like this might work...

http://www.epinions.com/reviews/Safety_1st_Multi_Purpose_...

Good luck!

I'm not sure i've ever seen anything specifically for dishwashers BUT they do make gaurds that are for tvs to cover the bottom portion where the buttons normally are, they are just a piece of plastic, part slides under the tv and part extends up, you might be able to use it for the dishwasher or if your knob is big enough you might be able to use one of the covers that they make for stove knobs. other than that a quick fix untill you can come up with something better if you happen to have cabinets on both sides you could just hook a bungy cord from cabinet A to B, won't look pretty but would work till something better came along.

I did find a product - I think safety 1st makes it. I found it at K-Mart. It works great - I think it is designed to work with several appliances, you can use it on a fridge or an oven too probably. It's more of a safety strap - it works best if your dishwasher is at the end of your counter - not sure if it would work otherwise. Here is a link to something that is along the same lines. As far as him turning it on - do you have a switch that runs the power to it - a lot of houses have this - I just always turned the switch off, then it can't turn on - he may mess up your settings if it's an older push button style machine, but otherwise it will keep him from doing something dangerous with it.

http://www.safebeginnings.com/WebComponents/Catalog/Publi...

I don't know the set up of your house, but I just put a gate at the doorway to the kitchen and then I don't have to worry about him getting in to anything in there.

Onestepahead.com has great safety latches for very reasonable prices. All I can say is welcome to the world of boys! LOL! =) They are their own breed for sure! Good luck!

~S.~
Mom to 4 boys: ages 11, 9, 9, and almost 2

I just used one of the generic latches from Target, strategically placed! It is the type that has a "strip" that latches into the other part (real technical terms here LOL). Sort of like a car seat latch. I put it on the right side of the lock bar so that if the bar is in the unlock position, the child can't move it to lock (our dishwasher buttons don't work if the bar is in the unlock postion) and if it is in the lock position, there is a lock button so if the child pushes the buttons, they don't do anything. I hope you understood some of this. Good luck!

C

He sounds very smart. Call the manufacturer of the dishwasher. Hot wiring is a good solution for turning ir on. I wonder if there is a way to remove the door and remove the racks. It may be a big bother to do everytime. I am a big believer in time out or taking toys away. Maybe if he does it do both and do it anough that he soon understands. I mess with it and I lose things and have to sit out. When our grand son throws a fit we turn George off. He loves curious george and we have iton all the time for him. I also refuse to read his favorite books which he is 2.5 and gets upset but he learned in very short time. Tick grandma off and I don't get my books read or watch George.