P1 and I had decided that getting a swing set for the kids was a great way to spend our tax return. That's not as simple as it sounds. First, we had to borrow a pick up truck from a friend to go pick it up. Paying for it was painful, these things don't come cheap!
I spent an entire evening unpacking the two large boxes and carefully sorting, measuring, and labeling all the parts. Of course, it never fails. Several parts were missing. I had to call the manufacturer to send replacement parts. The parts took a week to get here, but luckily they were necessary for some of the later steps of the construction, so I could get started anyway.
P1 is the nicest, and at least to me, the most exciting guy in the world, but anything more complicated than changing a light bulb is not for him, so the construction project rested solely on my shoulders. In addition he is so busy this semester, that I was not counting on his help holding parts up during assembly either.
So, gradually I started putting the pieces together. All the lumber was stacked up in neat piles on our back porch with the labels attached. I could only work on it on the evenings after the kids went to bed, and even then not for very long. One morning, about a week after the project started I went out to the porch, and found that F1-3 had carefully removed all the labels from the lumber, and placed them on the coffee table in a neat little pile. She ran to stand next to it and was obviously very proud of her handywork, and wanted to be praised for her hard work.
It took me a few days before I could muster up the energy to start re-labeling. And even then, I caught F1-3 on a few occasions, trying to sneak by to remove some of the labels. Finally, I finished both sides of the fort, and it was time to attach them to each other with the lumber for the front and the back. I could no longer go on by myself. F1-1 was spending the weekend with his biological father, P1 was too busy preparing lectures, what to do? Luckily, one of F1-1's friends stopped by looking for him, and got cornered into helping me out. It got dark shortly after he arrived, so I could only attach the front of the fort. The whole thing looked rather unstable, so I leaned it against the house, hoping that would provide enough support. And it did. At least, as long as it was just standing there.
A few days later, I decided to try and attach the back, hoping it would be more secure once I had done that. When I started, the whole structure came crashing down. I guess it wasn't that stable after all. Two pieces of lumber were damaged. I had to wait until it was Monday to call up the manufacturer again. They were very nice about it, and said they would sent the replacement right away. It took 5 days before that got here.
A week or so later, when F1-1 was with us for the weekend, I enlisted him and his friend to help out. This is not easy. Tell your pre-tween: hold it up straight, and pay attention. Keep holding it up straight. Yeah, right! Like that's going to happen. Oh well, eventually, I managed to get to the point where I could tell the guys they were off the hook. and from then on it was pretty steady going. And the end result is not bad......
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3 comments:
very nice. how do f1-2 and f1-3 like it?
Hi there,
Thank you. F1-2 was initially not overly impressed, but he spent quite some time on the swing and the glider this morning. F1-3 is pretty crazy about it, and can swing for hours on end. She also goes up the rock climbing wall and down the slide a good many times a day. Yesterday she brought some of her supplies (crayons and paper) to work at the desk underneath the fort. We've been out there for 3 hours now, and just getting ready to come inside for naps and such. You're welcome to come join us this afternoon with your offspring. How's the foot doing?
my foot's still tender, but improving. spending all morning yesterday standing in the kitchen probably didn't help. sagan's foot otoh, well, just check out my blog. *shakes head*
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