Adding Some Simple Play to Your Backyard

The kids are standing at the back door slider, gazing into your backyard. Your sweet, rambunctious children look back at you, and ask “Can we make a playground?” With visions of castles, tag, swings, and slides, you acquiesce and vow, “Children! We will have a playground in our backyard!

After looking at cost and variety, you are underwhelmed by the stale cookie cutter options, sterile plastic and treated lumber, and overpriced gyms that are available from your local building supply store. You decide you will create something magical for your children in your backyard on your own. Well, maybe not magical, but at least not costing you an arm and a leg.

Where to start

Look around, what do you have available as bones to start with? Your amazing home, trees, fences, landscape can all be used as a base for a part of your custom playground. Trees for swings, houses for climbing walls, landscape for sand boxes, fences for forts. If you have all of these things, do you really need anything else?

Yes! There is always room for more things. Anything that you can do to improve your backyard living situation should be considered. Maybe you have always dreamt of building a swimming pool (with all the safety features, of course) in your garden and during the chaos of designing this new garden for your kids, this idea comes back into your head. If it’s not the right timing for this now, that’s fine, but just be sure to keep it on the back burner for now. Let your imagination go full kid for a minute or two, and take in your backyard from their view.

Tree swings

If you have the tree that can support it, installing a tree swing is one of the simplest ways to add some fun to your backyard. Ropes, boards, chain, ladder, and boom! Your kids are giggling as their tummies tickle from the weightlessness of swinging to and fro.

Climbing walls

You may or may not be willing to subject your siding to the onslaught of climbing children. If you are unwilling to sacrifice your house, seek out a sturdy fence or even build a freestanding structure. Any sturdy vertical face that gives the kids the opportunity to climb off the ground will do. Assembling the course is a pretty easy project. Put together some simple, medium, and tough routes. The kids will get good at this pretty quick, so it is ok to challenge them.

Sandboxes

So the plastic turtle sandbox just won’t cut it? Be creative and build a sand pit as a yard feature. Whether it is a part of your landscape, or a simple box the designing your sand play area is really up to you. A cover makes for a much safer experience, and great toys for moving sand make the experience memorable and fun!

Climbing Continued

Climbing is so good for kids, it is worth mentioning some more. Think about climbing ropes. If you have knots at regular intervals, it will help them get better and stronger. Have your ropes over ground that is softened, so if they fall they won’t land on hard ground. If you can find cargo netting, attach one side to a shed, fence, or the house. If you make it, they will climb it.

You can put together a pretty memorable playground, quickly and inexpensively if you are willing to do a little research and use your imagination! Have fun!