Quarantine started and our kids were a little bit hosed in the backyard department. We had always sent our kids over to Pipers to play. She had the tree house, trampoline and big swing and it was a lot of fun over there, PLUS we didn't have to have anything!! Quarantine started and the kids outdoor activities dropped drastically. So I told Jakob it was time to up our game. We tried to order a trampoline, but they are literally sold out within a 100 mile radius of us, unless we wanted to spend $1,200... um, no thank you. So a tree house was born. (April 18th, 2020)
Jakob had a plan, and I tried to offer suggestions and he would remind me that "He had a plan" so I left him to his own devices.
While Jakob worked the kids built their own tree house out of scraps. They were so creative!
So naturally I took 100 pictures!
At this point I'm not exactly sure what is going on, it kind of looks like an octopus, but I'm doing my womanly duty and making Jakob a sandwich ;).
The floor is built. What a beautiful platform.
Sprout was Daddy's little helper.
Jakob came in from working the day before and I was a bit upset. While I loved the fact that he worked really hard on the kids platform, I asked him if he planned on keeping all of the "x's" there and he said yes. I also looked at the ladder and in a not very nice way said "If you're going to take the time to build it, it better look nice." And gosh darn it, that man loves me. He didn't get mad, even though he had every right to. He simply ripped the braces down and re-did the base. He's kind of amazing.
Sprout is Daddy's shadow. He was a very good helper handing him all of the screws.
The kids now have a very pretty ladder to get up on top and all they want to do is eat lunch out on the platform. It's a bit nerve wrecking not having any walls. We are pretty sure someone will break an arm. (April 25th)
A naked sighting of Sprout. I have no idea what he is doing but I laughed so hard I peed.
Jakob started framing a wall after a few close encounters with tiny humans shoving.(April 30th)
The sides are up and the roof is framed. The kids used scrap pieces of wood to build a front wall. We talked about building one but decided againt it. We were worried about having too much weight on the back and it tipping. It is also rather narrow once you add a wall. (May 23rd)
Using more scraps the kids made their own little tables and desks. I love the creativity!
The children then decided that they needed a fun way to get down off of the tree house. The 2x4 slide was born.
How they slide down that thing and didn't end up with splinters up their booty's is beyond me.
Next came the roof. Jakob used the old fence posts as shingles and they looked GOOD!
They arn't leak proof but they lend some shade and that is huge! (May 25th)
Climbing wall time. (May 30th)
Sprout wants to badly to be Daddy's helper, but is scared of loud noises. Poor baby.
for the wall we used th old shelves from our storage room. They worked great!
Rock wall ☑
At this point we decided that the basement was more important than the tree house to we pushed pause.
One afternoon Jakob and I were outside and we noticed that the floor boards of the tree house were cracking, badly. I needed to paint and seal the boards A.S.A.P. which meant I needed to finish the house. I had had the Elders come over fro a few projects before (with Covid they were looking for all the outdoor service hours they could get.) So I enlisted their help to finish the house. I was so thankful for Elder Martin who understood what I was talking about, without me having to explain much. He also knew how to operate and handle a drill. I sawed the boards while he drilled and it was pretty quick work. (August 25th)
Elder Allen was a saint and sanded down all of the cracked boards for me. It was a very time consuming job.
By the end of the day we had the back wall up and the floor just about sanded.
Two days later Elder Martin was on exchanges so elder Allen came with a different companion to help trim out the window, finish sanding and stain! this Sweet Elder wasn't the best with tools so I framed it out while he painted.
We had a play date and I realized that we had fun ways to get up the club house, but we didn't have any fun ways to get down. So the hunt began for a slide. It was almost impossible. after a few weeks of searching I finally found a second hand one for $50. CVID has totally jacked the prices up on alllllll of the outdoor thing! I attached it and it was PERFECT!!!!!
I very quickly realized that finesse wasn't these boys strong suit when it came to painting but we got the job done and it's only a tree house.
AND IT'S DONE!!!!!!!!!!! We added a gorilla net and some handles and I cannot get over how much i LOVE IT!!!
It wasn't a small project but it was absolutely worth it! (August 29th)
