This past Saturday, Matt cranked out a new DIY project. Now, it's not unusual for him to DIY something - he's pretty handy - but what made this project so totally awesome is that he came up with the idea all on his own and bought materials and carved out the time to make it - again, all on his own. Y'all - this wasn't my idea. I didn't have to beg. There was no nagging from me. No job supervision required. No unsolicited suggestions or tweaks. Just all Matt and his idea for something fun for the kids. Isn't he the best daddy?
Basically he emailed me last Thursday and said "I think I'm going to buy this kit and build a swingset this weekend." Umm...ok. I'm fine with that. No pushback here. :)
As he explained it, and I totally agree, we aren't ready to commit to a giant (read: expensive) play set (swings, monkey bars, fort, slide, etc.) just yet because we don't know exactly what we want to do with our backyard. We think we'd love to have a pool. But who knows when that would be. And we didn't want to splurge to have some gigantic monstrosity set up in our yard only to realize that it was in the way and needed to be moved later. Plus, with the kids still being little, this is the perfect time for something easy (read: cheap) and simple for them to play on.
Friday he bought the kit and also the wood required and drove it all home. And Saturday he built it! Yep, all in one day. Like, maybe three hours (spaced out between kid duties and errand-running). (Don't let the One-Hour Custom Play Set name confuse you, we'd already read all the reviews and knew it'd take longer than one hour.)
I stepped outside Saturday morning to snap my first pictures. I had planned on taking progress steps throughout the day. He was just laying out and marking his materials.
The next time I peeked outside it was practically done! Wyatt's job was very technical - lean on this frame and don't let it move.
The kit comes with two standard swings. It has an option to use a longer board across the top if you want to do three swings instead of two, and that's what Matt did. We already had the baby swing so we were able to get all three swings up right away and test it out!
Instant fun for the whole family!
Thomas seems to love swinging in his baby seat!
That is, until Katie Wynn kicks him out so she can use the baby swing.
The only pre-planning we did before Matt put it together was making sure it was set up in the afternoon shade from our one backyard tree. Hopefully that will help on hot summer evenings when we're outside after work!
We've already logged lots of time on the new swings! We ordered a bucket seat swing too and it arrived yesterday. Not sure if it will even get much use, though, since Katie Wynn has become so good at using the standard seats.
For now the plan is not to do any mulching underneath the set since they're feet don't even reach the ground yet. We'll see how it goes with our yard guys mowing and edging around it. We're just all excited to have something to do out in the backyard while Daddy's grilling dinner!
Thank you, Matt, for building this for the kids! Now if you could build me this to hang next to it, that'd be great! :)