Life With Janaa

What a weekend!  Or more like 4 days.  I have been faced with many insurmountable tasks in my life, yet when in the moment, none have seemed as impossible as putting together a swing set.  Purchased about 2 months ago, it's taken this long to have a window of time to put it together.  Thursday night 7pm:  We open the boxes.  By 8:45, we've lost most of our sunlight.  At 11pm Rachel and I are finishing the "Rock Climbing Wall".  I failed to see in the manual - "Allow 6-12 hours to complete this project."  It took 45 minutes to an hours to put the slide together! 

Friday - nothing.

Saturday Morning - I had also planned to sow grass in the newly cleared side area at our house.  Where the swing set would also be placed.  My trip to get seed, lime and fertilizer took three times as long as it should have, so I didn't get started with that until around 10:30am.  I broke for a short lunch and the area (about 2000 sq ft) was seeded and fertilized by 1pm.  Now let's start putting the set together!  Rachel ran to go get one or two things needed for another project, and I spent the next 30 minutes, putting the frame together using the wrong size bolts (which fit by the way) and just got it corrected by the time she got back.  Then I remembered, "Hey, I've got put straw down on this newly sown ground.  Thankfully Josh had some extra junk bails sitting around that he donated to the project.  I got back with a load of hay around 2:30.

Back to the swing set.  We plodded through and continued piecing the set together, page by page, bolt by bolt, board by board.  Around 8pm...we started feeling a few drops of rain.  Nothing to be worried about.  We had the slide and rock climbing wall attached, and the tarp roof on, and the picnic bench assembled.  Nothing left really except for the single beam that hold the swings.  8 -8:30, the rain has picked up, but we can't quit now.  Trying my best to keep the manual from getting soaked, I had found a small dry spot in the fortress that I could lay everything.  Rachel held the beam up  on one side as I attached 2 of 4 bolts to te main fortress, unaware that I had completely put the framing that held the other end of the beam completely wrong.

8:30 - the rain had picked up.  We were SOAKED. Rachl standing in same plc holdin beam as I am attempting to fix my mistake.  Slippery hands, slippery feet (in mud, because I hadn't had a chance to put down any straw.  Cue the falling piece of lumber on Rachel's head.  Not good.  But she held strong, and continued to encourage me to get it fixed.  Finally, I got the thing to a point where she gcould go inside.  I stayed and got the other 2 main bolts reattached. 

Haven't eaten since lunch.  Fatigue setting in for all of us.  Thankful for Subway.  Watched as rain picked up and muddied the entire area.  Thankfully, none of my grass seed washed away, and Sunday afternoon was spent fertilizing and putting out straw, as well as putting in the last 4 bolts into the swing set.  Janaa even got to take a test swing.  I will post some pictures of the completed set in a few days.

A warning friends, plan your swing set construction way in advance, and nothing other than that for the day.  If you live close enough, we might even come and help you put it together, because no one should have to go through that alone.

Seeding the yard that morning. All seemed to be well.I hoped it would look like the picture.