I Created a Hazard

Yesterday I spent a lot of time looking at pictures of stairs. To have carpet or not to have carpet? That is the question. Our stairs have a very dirty runner and even dirtier carpet on the landing between the two staircases. Heidi encouraged us to simply get rid of all the carpet because it's such a high-traffic area and it's difficult to keep clean. We have a dumpster here right now for our office remodel and so I finally decided to take advantage of that and rip out the carpet on the landing and the lower three stairs (to see what it would look like). The landing is beautiful hardwood like the rest of the house. The lower three stairs are not so nice since they go into the "basement". Peter cleaned the landing last night with furniture polish which made is super slippery. This morning Taylor woke up early and came downstairs. Before she got to the landing I explained to her that it would be slippery and warned her to be careful. Her solution: to jump over the landing. Which of course she couldn't do and she ended up on her butt, fortunately unhurt. I was in the half bath, just off of the landing, when Peter came down stairs. I heard him say, "Be careful not to slip-" which was followed by a loud crash, like a 6'5" man just fell down the stairs. I opened the door to find him on his back. Again, fortunately not hurt. I'm glad I didn't take the carpet off the real staircase. With no hand rail it would be like a bumpy toboggan run. My conclusion: I'm glad I took the carpet off the landing because the floor is nice, but I would like to get a stay-in-place, padded area rug. Our stairs however are too steep and narrow to be safe without carpet.