This is what I did this weekend.

Last weekend I came up with the plan, and my dad and I specced out the wood. I figured that I’d be looking at about $400.00 plus taxes. Looking around at the pre-fab packages, I figured I could do better than theirs for less money, and build something way cooler.

Not sure if I spent less money, since my final total was double my initial estimate, but it’s definately cooler.

Friday night Kaylin, my dad, and I bought wood…boatloads of wood, screws, bolts, and various other lumber type things. I unloaded them all into my garage and got the rug rat to bed.

Saturday morning my dad came over and we picked up the slide and all of the hardware for the play structure. When we got back, we made a 4 x 6 template to figure out where the posts needed to go, then we dug the post holes (which took forever), set them, filled them with concrete, and put in some braces.

After waiting a while to let the concrete set, we built the main platform from 2 x 6’s, and dad called it a day so that he could get ready for dinner out. I stuck it out and worked on the base, where I disassembled it and dug a 2″ trench in the ground, leveled it, and re-assembled it. I ran to Rona again where I got 10 bags of sand, a couple pieces of wood, and some landscaping tarp.

After dinner I went back out and laid the platform down, and put the landscaping tarp down. After that I added the other bunch of 2 x 6’s for the sand pit, put in the bolts, and dumped in 10 bags of sand…interestingly, 10 bags of sand only filled the sand pit 1/3 of the way!

Sunday was rainy and crappy, I did a little cutting, but not much. After going to Toys R Us, and coming back home around 4, I got back to it and built trusses for the roof, did another run to Rona (for more sand, and 22 1×5’s for the roof).

I managed to cut down the tops of the beams for the roof, and I started on the rock wall before calling it a night (and let me tell you, there was some MAD math there!)

This morning my dad came over and we put all of the rails up, got the front and back done, finished the rock wall, put the roof up, added a couple of decorative pieces, did some major sanding, and did a ton of clean up.

All that’s left is to add a few more rocks to the rock wall, finish the stairs (which I need some 2 1/2″ screws for), and add a couple more safety things, and this monstrosity will be done!

Not half bad for a weekend.

Even though I’m over my initial estimate, a lot of that money went into things that I would have had to spend on either way. 22 bags of sand, the slide, some of the hardware, and the cement for the posts would have been extra. In the end it was probably still cheaper than a kit. It’s certainly better made than a kit.

And for those wondering, Kaylin freakin’ loves it.