Guitars and Toddlers

[Ben Caracello]

Hey folks, since most of you have a lot of instruments around the house and many of you have kids, I figured I'd ask to see how you dealt with your guitars while your kids were toddlers. I have 4 guitars sitting out on stands around the house, and my kid is about to start crawling. I'm worried both about him and the guitars. How did you all deal with this? I suppose I could put some of them away in cases, but I really want to keep at least two of them handy. He likes to watch and listen to me play, and that is probably the biggest joy I have in my life. Let me know your thoughts. Thanks!

[Bob Gramann]

Would wall hangers solve your problem? With a crawling infant, the string bass and the instruments on the floor might have to be removed. Once they got past 18 months, my toddling grandchildren have respected the instruments.

[Mark Swanson]

Keep out only what you need to play. These winter months are bad for drying out of instruments, and keeping them in the cases really helps with that, while letting them sit out opens the door to drying out. Depends a lot on where you live of course!

[Bryan Bear]

For me, it was (and will be soon enough) no different than any of the other household dangers toddlers like to investigate. You remove the ones you can easily remove (or the most dangerous) and the rest just require vigilance. We used a lot of zone coverage. It doesn't take long for most toddlers to get a handle on what they are and are not allowed to touch; but don't turn your back too long. . . <G>

I remember my mom visiting one day, she freaked out that my toddler was strumming away on one of my instruments on a stand. She asked if I allowed her to to that. I told her yes, she seems to like the sound. She said something like "what are you going to do if she breaks it?" I said, "Make her a new one."

[Ben Caracello]

Thanks for the advice, guys. Wall hangers aren't really an option for me. I think I'll have to move them to an area of the house where we're planning on having a higher amount of vigilance. They're currently in the family room, where our intention is that he can play with a bit more freedom. I do want to keep them handy, though, because I want him to remain interested in them and hopefully learn to play someday.

[Bob Gramann]

Just don't use up your "No"'s too soon. You only get a finite number of "No"'s. If you use them up on the little stuff, they won't work when you're trying to stop the kid from doing something truly horrible. A toddler's environment needs to be such that most of the things he figures out he might want to do are okay to do. That's my parenting advice for the month.

[Michael Lewis]

Put out instruments you want your kids to play with. Instruments are interesting and they will play with them if given the chance. Keep your good instruments out of their reach until they understand how to handle them.

[Eric Baack]

yep, a cheap guitar laid out for them helps keep their interest away from your nicer one(s)

though they do tend to want to mess with whatever one you are playing at the time1

[Nathan Dodd]

My little boy is 2.5 and my guitars are in a stand in my man cave. He loves strumming them and can be a bit rough sometimes but i love watching him strum them and looking at me in awe saying "singing!!". I positively encourage contact from as early an age as possible!

The only downside is that we find photos and other similar sized things posted through the f holes of my jazz from time to time

[Adam Savage]

For what it is worth, my take on it is that unless you are only interested in the instrument as a financial investment, then they deserve to be seen and to be played. If they get a couple of knocks and scrapes, well that just adds a little character (the guitar in the photo has a few scratches where it was leaned against a stone wall at our wedding just before my wife's mum played a tune on it for us). For catastrophic damage, well there is always home insurance. You may feel that I am being a little glib with the idea, but however much they are cherished, I think that they are cherished less if they are not played/seen frequently.
Anyway, Sebastian (pictured) likes daddies guitars, especially posting the plectrums through the soundhole

Cheers,
Adam

[Eric Baack]

My little boy is 2.5 and my guitars are in a stand in my man cave. He loves strumming them and can be a bit rough sometimes but i love watching him strum them and looking at me in awe saying "singing!!". I positively encourage contact from as early an age as possible!

The only downside is that we find photos and other similar sized things posted through the f holes of my jazz from time to time

picks are found in my acoustic fairly often

[Nathan Dodd]

For what it is worth, my take on it is that unless you are only interested in the instrument as a financial investment, then they deserve to be seen and to be played. If they get a couple of knocks and scrapes, well that just adds a little character (the guitar in the photo has a few scratches where it was leaned against a stone wall at our wedding just before my wife's mum played a tune on it for us). For catastrophic damage, well there is always home insurance. You may feel that I am being a little glib with the idea, but however much they are cherished, I think that they are cherished less if they are not played/seen frequently.

Friend of mine has just purchased a Rickenbacker which is about 18 years old and he has sent it for some repair work. The guitar tech pointed out that there was a tiny bit of a twist in the neck (as is often the case with those things) which seems to have taken the shine off of it despite the fact that it doesn't effect the playability whatsoever. He also thinks it's likely to live in it's case under his bed. I've been trying to encourage him to wear the thing down to a toothpick! I'm sorry, but even if I had a 59 Les Paul in pristine condition it would be USED by the time I'm finished with it and my son would still be welcome to play it at any age!!

[Samuel Hartpence]

I have most of my guitars in cases at home, but there's something very refreshing and motivating about seeing a kid's enthusiasm while plucking strings. So the guitar that I always have out is one that I inherited when room mate didn't have enough room to move it across country with him, so he gave it to me in exchange for cleaning the apartment to get our deposit back. This is a cheap but reasonably playable and good-sounding Blueridge OM. I always keep it tuned to a chord (I tune it multiple times a day), and even give my kids slides to play around with. They don't have the attention span to actually start learning how to play (ages 4 and 18 months), but they are slowly learning how to gently strum and properly hold a guitar. The key is, they have their guitars (I also have a very small squire they play with), and my guitars are stored in locked cases unless I'm playing it.