No – we haven’t suddenly become wealthy.
But a playhouse for the kids – that had to happen.
This playhouse was originally designed and built by a friend for his children.
Half a year later, he moved away and faced the decision: dismantle and take it along, abandon it, or find a buyer. His housing cooperative did not want/could not take over the playhouse because it was self-designed and therefore had no official safety certification.
Since his wife knew we wanted to buy a playhouse for our kids, the solution was close by. Although more expensive than planned, this self-built house is made from solid wood.
Last November, my father and I planned to assemble and dismantle it within one week. Well – in the end, there was only enough time for the dismantling because we had to unscrew everything piece by piece. The original plan was to have part of the house lifted out by an excavator. However, all the companies we asked declined. So we moved everything to our plot (about 300 m (328 yards)) by wheelbarrow and by carrying.
The week before Easter, we started the reassembly: setting everything new, digging in foundation stones, and raising it up. During Easter and the following three days, my father was relieved by his father-in-law and brother-in-law. We then worked (in bad weather) on the swing beam and the roof.
After that, it was quiet for a while because the help was gone and I was a bit puzzled over the sandpit puzzle. How to install the pond liner, create drainage for the sand, and build the cover frame for the sandpit (so the cats wouldn’t turn it into a giant litter box).
Well – this weekend I finished the project. The kids are happy, and I’m finally done. Especially my head is pleased, which received quite a few dents during assembly and dismantling. When beams meet head, the beam usually wins. I also landed hard on my backside twice, like in a comic. It’s a miracle I didn’t have wide, bleeding wounds on my forehead – thanks to what a baseball cap can protect.
Dimensions:
Playhouse post size approx. 2 m (6.5 feet) (matching the sandbox dimensions)
Playhouse including surrounding platform 3.50 x 3.50 m (11.5 x 11.5 feet)
Playhouse (upper section) 2.00 x 2.00 m (6.5 x 6.5 feet)
Swing and climbing beam: 5 m (16.5 feet)
Entry platform 0.5 m (1.6 feet) with railing
Total height approx. 4.50 m (14.8 feet)
Now my wife can finally focus on the lawn that’s still missing after 1.5 years. It has been an eyesore for her for a long time.
Attached are three photos. Take a look:
But a playhouse for the kids – that had to happen.
This playhouse was originally designed and built by a friend for his children.
Half a year later, he moved away and faced the decision: dismantle and take it along, abandon it, or find a buyer. His housing cooperative did not want/could not take over the playhouse because it was self-designed and therefore had no official safety certification.
Since his wife knew we wanted to buy a playhouse for our kids, the solution was close by. Although more expensive than planned, this self-built house is made from solid wood.
Last November, my father and I planned to assemble and dismantle it within one week. Well – in the end, there was only enough time for the dismantling because we had to unscrew everything piece by piece. The original plan was to have part of the house lifted out by an excavator. However, all the companies we asked declined. So we moved everything to our plot (about 300 m (328 yards)) by wheelbarrow and by carrying.
The week before Easter, we started the reassembly: setting everything new, digging in foundation stones, and raising it up. During Easter and the following three days, my father was relieved by his father-in-law and brother-in-law. We then worked (in bad weather) on the swing beam and the roof.
After that, it was quiet for a while because the help was gone and I was a bit puzzled over the sandpit puzzle. How to install the pond liner, create drainage for the sand, and build the cover frame for the sandpit (so the cats wouldn’t turn it into a giant litter box).
Well – this weekend I finished the project. The kids are happy, and I’m finally done. Especially my head is pleased, which received quite a few dents during assembly and dismantling. When beams meet head, the beam usually wins. I also landed hard on my backside twice, like in a comic. It’s a miracle I didn’t have wide, bleeding wounds on my forehead – thanks to what a baseball cap can protect.
Dimensions:
Playhouse post size approx. 2 m (6.5 feet) (matching the sandbox dimensions)
Playhouse including surrounding platform 3.50 x 3.50 m (11.5 x 11.5 feet)
Playhouse (upper section) 2.00 x 2.00 m (6.5 x 6.5 feet)
Swing and climbing beam: 5 m (16.5 feet)
Entry platform 0.5 m (1.6 feet) with railing
Total height approx. 4.50 m (14.8 feet)
Now my wife can finally focus on the lawn that’s still missing after 1.5 years. It has been an eyesore for her for a long time.
Attached are three photos. Take a look:
Koempy schrieb:
Respect. It looks great. Working with wood is always enjoyable.
But as always, it turns out it takes much longer than you think 🙂You’re right. However, that was partly because the original plan (lifting the small house in parts with an excavator, transporting it, and setting it in place) wasn’t feasible.
During the assembly, a second "issue" came up that we had to (re)consider. The previous owner had adapted the support beams to his ground conditions. That means he cut them so that the second floor had a level surface given his terrain. We only realized this when setting the posts. Although we measured the distances and cross-distances between each post and foundation stone exactly, we didn’t anticipate this. So we had to dismantle everything again, remove the foundation stones, and reset them at four different depths (one stone was the baseline, one 4cm (1.6 inches) lower, the next 11cm (4.3 inches) lower, and the last 18cm (7 inches) lower). We could have shortened the posts instead, but we didn’t want to alter the playhouse further. (As it turned out during later assembly, this was the right decision.)
These kinds of things caused repeated delays.
But yes—with the week planned for November, we could have only managed it using the excavator. However, we would have run into the foundation stone problem then as well.
By the way:
We stored all the wood on the property over winter (on pallets). It was covered with tarps.
One of our neighbors told us that when asked by his friends what was under the tarp, he said: The family had stored their BOAT on the property. And they actually believed it 😀.
HilfeHilfe schrieb:
a proper machine with some real power works wonders,,,,,Well—this only helps to a limited extent on hard ground.
We observed this at a neighbor about 1.5 weeks ago.
Not only did the machine bounce over the ground, but the entire operator behind it as well. It looked like a superball in motion 😀.
We don’t know whether the neighbor was working on the original, poor-quality new development soil or, like us, adding topsoil again.
EveundGerd28 May 2016 21:22We actually had all the equipment, but Rhineland-Palatinate is really big 🙄 And if you’re not skilled at handling something like this, you really end up chasing the machine.
I got to try it once as well. My husband wanted to have some fun... at my expense. Admittedly, milling is really not easy. He had already done the rough work beforehand.
I quickly handed over the rest of the work to him. 😀
You can't really call it a lawn anymore.
With a lot of effort, it became more of a meadow. 🙄 The mole seemed very comfortable in it, and the ride-on mower revealed the worst of it today.
Now everything looks even worse than before with the “regular” lawn mower.
Good things take time! 😉
By the way, the house looks great! You could put up our garden shed in the fall. 😀
I got to try it once as well. My husband wanted to have some fun... at my expense. Admittedly, milling is really not easy. He had already done the rough work beforehand.
I quickly handed over the rest of the work to him. 😀
You can't really call it a lawn anymore.
With a lot of effort, it became more of a meadow. 🙄 The mole seemed very comfortable in it, and the ride-on mower revealed the worst of it today.
Now everything looks even worse than before with the “regular” lawn mower.
Good things take time! 😉
By the way, the house looks great! You could put up our garden shed in the fall. 😀
HilfeHilfe schrieb:
but you’ll still do the lawn, right? 😉;)😀 😀 😀
Finally, a somewhat different house.
In the other thread, @Mycraft showed his second house: it must have been available somewhere very cheaply, as I see it in many gardens.
With a fence, it definitely takes on a completely different character.
I find the little flowers on the house and fence a bit puzzling – I would rather suggest something child-friendly, like home-grown radishes or chives 🙂
EveundGerd schrieb:
However, all the equipment is really large in RLP 🙄 And if you don’t know how to handle it properly, you really do end up chasing the machine around.
I got to try it once. My husband wanted to have some fun... at my expense. Admittedly, it’s really not easy to use a rotary tiller. He had already done the initial rough work beforehand.
I then handed over the rest of the work to him. 😀
But you can’t really call it lawn yet. My father gave me the advice to strap some wooden boards to my feet after working the soil with the rotary tiller and sowing, to help level the ground a bit.
We’ll see – if everything works out (and my wife can coordinate the rental schedule), I plan to take care of it next Saturday. Hopefully the weather will be decent (the soil should be slightly moist so it’s easier to work with).
EveundGerd schrieb:
By the way, the house looks great! You could set up our garden shed in the fall. 😀Well, I’ve finished that project in the meantime as well. I never would have dared if the playhouse hadn’t been built beforehand.
We’ll see – maybe my wife wants to go shopping at Ikea Koblenz in the fall 😉.
ypg schrieb:
I find the little flowers on the house and fence a bit odd – I would probably suggest something more child-friendly, like home-grown radishes or chives 🙂 Well – the flowers currently add the perfect finishing touch of “ooh” and “ahh” 😀. So much for attention to detail.
Radishes and chives are already planted in the vegetable and herb garden. They’re much easier to access there.
Besides, it’s good to keep room for upgrades.
My wife has already bought the second set of flowers for the boxes: red dipladenia.
This is slowly turning into an expensive hobby.
ypg schrieb:
In another thread, @Mycraft showed his second house: it must have been available somewhere at a very low price, as I see it in many gardens.
Well – it probably would have been a little house like the one from @Mycraft if we had not been offered this gem. Although, until the offer, we weren’t really sure what exactly was included with the playhouse.
Now we have almost everything. The only thing missing was a slide.
Well – if the kids ask for one, I can always remove part of the railing and add a slide.
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