If you build it they will come (continued)

So, yesterday I started sharing about the play park we're developing - and I posted pics of the rocks, mini fort, climbing wall and laying of foundations.

Next came some of the most exciting additions - three free-standing climbing posts. And, amazingly enough, these seem to be the most popular items that we've installed thus far. In fact, I was chatting to my unofficial official 9-year-old tester this evening who informed me that they were her favourite part of the play area by far. She was quite downcast that they had been removed (temporarily). But more on that later.

Climbing posts three

Twins for the day showing how to sit on the posts (but some kids and one Bill the builder actually stand on them too).

The unofficial official tester atop the highest post ...

All three

Next up came the majority of our balance apparatuses. These include an inclined balance beam, a high beam, tyre and stepping posts (for want of a better name).

Most of the wood is beetle-kill pine (read up on it on Google if you don't know what that is) - an amazing metaphor of life coming out of death. And it looks pretty cool too.

The tyre has been filled with pea gravel to weigh it down, and ringed with planks so that kids and other critters can't climb inside. Once again, Bill did much of the work with help from various volunteers. The earth here is pure clay and so digging the holes for the balance posts was quite a challenge with the smaller auger.

Coming along nicely...

Bill bolting the high beam to the tyre.

Brian and Bill making holes for the balance posts.

Just a cool pic of the auger at work.

The balance posts sunk ... All they needed was to be cut to length.

After the frenetic couple of weeks' work we took a bit of a break - mostly tidying up rough edges, coating the wood and the like. Then, this Monday, in came Dave, owner of United Concrete & Gravel, his wife Colleen, Sam and Caleb to dig out the the area below all of the high apparatuses for pea gravel. We tried using the Bobcat between the high posts but eventually just pulled them out to make it easier for us. That was an all-day job, and we carried away three truck loads of earth.

Dave in the Bobcat, Sam in the mini excavator.

Clearing for pea gravel

One of the kids from across the road testing my new hole for the free-standing post.

Heed!

How it looks now.

The seven-year-old boy from across the road in the pic above ("Heed") was chatting to me while helping shovel dirt. It went something like this:

"My grandma and I were just talking today and we both agree that most play parks are pretty boring because they are just too safe. But this one isn't safe at all! We love this one!" And I agree. We must be doing something right if the seven-year-old thinks so!

And that's where we are at. Tomorrow we will be concreting in the free-standing climbing posts, and will be bringing in three truck-loads of pea gravel on Friday. We will also hopefully be going to haul some beetle-kill wood to mill in the next couple of days - for the tree house and to border the pea gravel pit.

Then, on Saturday, we are having a big work party here where we are hoping to get as much of the tree house built as possible! Exciting times...

I'll update you as soon as possible!