You are at the kitchen table at two in the morning, and the rug in the hall is the thing you keep picturing. Dad's slipper catches on the edge, or a corner curls up under his foot, and nobody saw it happen. Mom would have known those rugs had to lie flat. She probably moved them herself every spring. Now they are where they have always been, and the house has changed around them.
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Rugs are one of the easiest things to fix and one of the easiest to get wrong. The fix is not to pull everything up or to buy the thickest pad you can find. It is to fit each rug to the floor it sits on and to the path he really takes, which is often not the path you would guess.
Walk his route once, slowly
Pick a time when he is up and moving, and walk behind him the way he would on an ordinary day. Notice where he slows, where he touches the wall, and where he looks down. Many people walk from the bedroom to the bathroom in the dark, from the recliner to the kitchen with a cup in hand, and from the back door to the car. Write down the rugs on that route, one line each: which room, roughly what size, and what is underneath.
Do not ask him to show you. Just watch. If he gets irritated at being watched, you can say you are checking the lights, which is true enough.
Measure what is there now
Take a tape measure to every rug he crosses. Measure its length and width, then measure the floor it lies on. A rug that fit the room when Mom was alive may now be too small, folded at the edge, or stacked on top of another rug. Two rugs layered together are a common problem. The top one slides on the one below, and the bottom one bunches up.
Check each edge for curl. Lift a corner and look at the back. Backing that has dried out, cracked, or gone smooth will not grip. Note whether the floor under each rug is hard wood, tile, or carpet, because the same rug behaves differently on each.
Compare the grip before you buy
When you look at non-slip pads, check these things before you compare options. Confirm the pad is cut to the size of the rug and not to a standard size you hope will fit. Ask whether the pad is made for hard floors, carpet, or both, since a pad that grips tile can slide on carpet. Look at the thickness. A thick pad can raise a rug high enough that its edge becomes the new trip. Check whether the rug has a binding that holds the corner flat, and ask the seller what to do if the pad stops gripping after a few months of use.
If a rug is worn, faded at the edge, or has a lip that will not lie flat even with a pad, it is simpler to remove it than to keep patching it. Bare floor is not a failure. Walk the route again without that rug and see whether he moves more steadily.
Keep the doorways clear
Check every threshold where one floor meets another. A metal strip that sits higher than the floor, or a rug that runs right up to a doorway, can catch a foot as easily as a loose corner. Use a low transition strip only where the height change is real, and check that it lies flat, is fixed firmly, and does not lift when stepped on.
Look at the cords too. A lamp cord that runs under a rug from the outlet to his chair is a second hazard hidden under the first. Move it along the wall, or move the lamp.
What to do tonight
Walk his usual route from the bedroom to the bathroom and back, and from his chair to the kitchen. Pull up any rug that slides, curls, or bunches along that route, and set it aside in a closet until you have checked it. Move loose cords out of the walkway. Turn on the lights along the route so you can see what is there. Then write down which rugs you removed, so you remember which ones need a pad before they go back down.
When to ask the doctor
Tell his doctor if he has tripped, caught himself on furniture, or seemed unsteady on his feet, even if he says it was nothing. Ask whether anything about his balance, his eyes, his feet, or the medicines he takes should be looked at before you change his floors. A rug is an easy fix, but a change in how steady he is on his feet is a question for the doctor to answer, not one for you to settle alone at the kitchen table.
A good week looks like this: he crosses the hall at night without reaching for the wall, and the rugs stay where you put them. If you are still working through the early weeks, the guide at Start Here: The First Hundred Days lays out the rest in order.