Starting to Take Shape

So I know I have been a bad blogger recently with no new posts. But that was mostly because we had been stalled on progress over the past few weeks. Between travelling, weekend errands and rainy weather, we hadn't done anything until last weekend.

Due to a minor brain fart when buying materials, we accidentally set 4x4's for the main swing posts when we actually needed 4x6's. So another trip to Home Depot was required to buy replacement posts, additional cement and the materials for the floor joists. With the additional cement and correct posts, we finally got all the structural posts set last weekend! The only remaining posts to be set are the masts that will be added before we get the floor installed.

Little Dude checking out some high quality dirt.

Leveling the new swing posts.

Cleaning up after helping exploring in the mud and dirt!



Then this past weekend we had a very ambitious goal: to attach of the main joists to the posts. Before that, Little Dude and I decided that we needed to finally get the extra dirt from the post-holes moved so we would have a (semi) flat surface to work from.

"But Dad, I am king of the mountain!"

"So the dirt goes in here?"

"Wheelbarrow's full, time to go dump it!"



Once we got all the dirt moved, it was time to clean up for dinner. Unfortunately, Little Dude did not want to wait for Daddy to help him! I was still down in the yard when I heard water running. I ran up to the house to see this!

"Look Dad, unlimited water supply!"

The next day Unc-da came up for the day to help attach the joists. First we had to make sure the first level was low enough to accomodate Little Dude's new slide. It definitely met his seal of approval, but he was not too happy to see it come down without him getting to slide on it!

"This looks just right!"

"I don't think it is steep enough to slide on, Dad!"

Drilling the holes to attach the main joists.

All the main joists are attached, it is a little easier to envision the two levels now (hopefully.)

 With most of our work done for the day, our foreman decided to show up and check out our work so far.

Looking for his tools.

"Alright you bums, hold one end of the tape so I can measure all of this out!"



I guess everything was satisfactory to Little Dude (that, or dinner was ready and he was ready to go eat!) That's all for now, next time we will cutting off the extra lengths on the posts, fastening the swing cross-post and fastening the deck cross-joists.

Until next time, Cheers!

TWB

Some Progress Is Better Than None At All....

Well we got back to work today on The Becky's Revenge after a two week hiatus. Uncle C went back to Ohio to visit last weekend and we had a rainout the previous week.

Not that we haven't been busy around here though! Last weekend I got the garden box set and filled with bedding mix and we planted our veggies on Friday night! Little Dude was very excited to help plant and water the new plants!

 I also have been busy putting in a small flowered in the front yard.  Another project that has been on my to-do list for 2+ years! We also got a couple blueberry bushes for the backyard (what with LD's love for blueberries.) They are full of blooms now and the bees are busy pollenating. Hopefully we get some berries and can keep the birds away! As usual, my little helper was accompanying me to do the planting!

Anyway, back to the playhouse... In the aftermath of all the rain, the post holes for the front of the ship had caved in quite a bit so we had to clean those out before getting started. Last weekend I had fastened together the front three posts that will secure the prow (and climbing rope) to make them easier to set. With that done, it was just a matter of measuring and leveling out with the rest of the previously set posts then concreting!

Unfortunately, with all of the cave-ins we have had, the front hole had gotten quite large, so it swallowed up the 5 bags of concrete that we had left before we could cement the two front posts. 400 pounds of conrete later, I don't think those posts are going anywhere. Looks like another Home Depot trip is in order to get some more concrete to set the remaining two posts.

You can finally see the outline of the ship with all of the posts set. (Prow of the ship pointing to the left, with the raised deck and swingset to the back right.) Next up we will be leveling the tops of the posts and starting to frame for the decks! 

That's all for now, check back soon!

TWB

Rain Delay!

We made quite a bit of progress this past weekend despite the fact that I think we surpassed the 2011 precipitation total over the course of the last week! On my Friday off, I went out to check the damage to our newly dug holes and this was what I found:

I was going to Home Depot anyway to get some lumber for another project, so I had the perfect excuse to pick up an item I had been wanting to try out for the past couple years. Fortunately, up until this point, I had never had a drainage issue anywhere, but this was the perfect excuse. Plus, it beat the heck out of what we had to do growing up: that consisted of dipping a plastic cup into the hole and cleaning it out a few ounces at a time. I guess I think it is so cool since it is basically the same technology as a rod pump (pardon the petroleum engineering geekiness!)

Even though my hand-powered pump didn't have quite the lifting power of this behemoth (ahh, nostalgic West Texas,) I was confident it could get the job done.

For your viewing pleasure, here is an action shot of Uncle C getting "pumped" to clean out one of the holes! I am happy to say that it worked like a dream!

Once we got all the water out of the holes and cleaned out the minor washouts (watch out for hole-stability issues in an uncased hole! - again, pardon the PE geekiness!,) we were ready to set some more posts and get them concreted in. To get everything squared up properly, we called on Uncle C's ongoing education at prestigious Rice University and his knowledge of the proper deployment of laser technology!

With the back half of the posts stable and square, it was time to mix some concrete! Once again, the foreman showed up to supervise and "help us out" at the most critical moments...

Mission accomplished for this week: we have half of the posts set and concreted and are on track to get the remaining set in the next week or two. In case the picture below doesn't make sense, the two taller posts to the right are for the swing set and the other three are for the raised captain's quarters at the rear of the ship. Now it was time for some Super Bowl viewing and chili eating!

With a little over four months to the christening of The Becky's Revenge, time is slipping by quickly. Check back soon!

PS - For all you non-Mariettans, here is a picture of the Becky Thatcher in all her glory when she was docked in Marietta. The second picture is of her last moments before sinking near Pittsburgh. :*(

TWB

Groundbreaking - It's a Start

Yesterday was the official groundbreaking for the pirate ship project. We initially had planned on renting a motorized post-hole digger, but the more I thought about and the number of post-holes we dug growing up, we decided a little manual labor couldn't hurt us. Besides, we weren't on Trail Run anymore, so the incident rate of rock collisions was bound to be WAY down! Right before it was time to start, the foreman showed up in his brand new car to assess the job site.

Digging went surprisingly easy, except for the first post-hole that Uncle C dug, which was inexplicably solid, sticky clay all the way down... The rest of the holes dug almost as easy as in the sandbox at our Granny's old house (which was pure sand as far down as you could dig - we buried each other up to our necks more than once in that sandbox!)

We thought all the holes were deep enough, but just to be sure, we used Little Dude as a measuring stick. Perfect on every hole!

We were slightly concerned that Chesney was going to start filling in the hole with LD in it!

LD decided that one hole needed to be cleaned out a little more, so he took the post-hole diggers himself. True foreman just finishes up the work when the grunt labor doesn't get it quite right!

With all the holes finished, we proceeded to start setting posts, which took longer than expected, especially with a 19 month old running around, trying to pick up 2x4s to beat the dog, tripping over dirt piles and trying to jump in the other empty holes! By the time we ran out of daylight, we got the two tallest posts (for the swingset) set and ready to concrete.

Next weekend we will continue setting posts and start concreting! Stay tuned!


TWB





1/30/12

Materials - Round 1

After about a month of putting it off, I finally made it to Home Depot this past weekend to get the first round of supplies to put our plan into action. One of two things spurred me into action:

1- Little Dude just turned 19 months old, meaning I have less than 5 months to get The Becky's Revenge seaworthy

2- The Texans finally lost in the playoffs last weekend and the AFC Championship did not start until 2:00, giving me plenty of time to get to Home Depot and back prior to the action starting.

I like to think it was the first, but lets face it, it was probably a mix of the two... So off to Home Depot with materials list in hand, I picked up, among other things, deck screws, duplex nails, 4x4's, 2x4's, a quarter-ton of Quikrete, another post-hole digger (to put Uncle C to work and double our progress), OH, and the materials to build my wife a raised garden bed. So not one, but two backyard improvement projects going on simultaneously. Booyah!

After emptying my wallet (or filling up my CC, either way you want to look at it) the truck was filled and ready to unload.

Luckily, Uncle C had come up earlier in the day and helped carry the lumber to the backyard. While we finished stacking, another helper showed up!

Just like a true foreman, he showed us he could do the work, but chose to direct the grunt labor (Us) to do the heavy lifting. Get to work Daddy and Uncle!

Hopefully this weekend we will do our best imitations of gophers and get the post holes dug and the posts set. Stay tuned...

TWB

1/24/2012

Dreams to Reality

So with the concept of the pirate ship playhouse firmly planted in my head, I went about turning the rough sketch, plus a million other ideas, into a workable project.

Here were some of the things that we decided Little Dude would definitely need:
- Sliding board (to make mutinous crew walk the plank)
- Swing set (to combat sea sickness on rough days)
- Climbing rope (for physical activity to ward off scurvy)
- Captains Wheel (to navigate the high green seas)
- Telescope (to spot the enemy)
- Water gun(s) (to fight off the enemy, even if they are squirrels)
- Mast (to fly the Jolly Roger during times of plundering)
- Ladder (escape as a last resort)
- Crow's nest (to keep an eye out for uncharted land masses)
- Captain's quarters (to chart the next course)
- Oh, and storage for the Captain's father (Me) to store maintenance equipment!

When my parents visited for Christmas, Dad and I sat down and sketched out the plans. His previous playhouse expertise, experience as a draftsmen, and perfectionism yielded the following "blueprints." (Is that what they are called for a ship? Oh well...)

Most of the essential items made the cut, with the main loss being the accessible crow's nest. My wife insisted that I was not allowed to make the ship a 1:1 scale to the real thing, so the crow's nest may just have to be for show. TBD!

Feeling ambitious, we decided to stake the locations of the posts that would form the backbone of the mighty Becky's Revenge. Little Dude decided he was going to help. This is going to be fun! Hopefully he doesn't run away when the time comes to dig the holes!

That's all for now. Next up, we need to go get the materials to set the posts and frame the decks. Stay tuned!

TWB
1/24/2012

Conception

It all began back in November, the way most home improvement projects around our house go: with a seemingly innocous comment by my wife. "Little Dude and I were at the park today and he just loved climbing on all the playground equipment..." With that, the idea was planted in this engineering brain and it didn't take long for me to decide that I was going to build W his very own playhouse. Not one of those pre-built playhouses they have set up at Lowes, but one designed and built by these two hands (with a little help along the way from family and friends, no doubt!) That night, we came up with the rough design - it would be a pirate ship playhouse. Here are the initial sketches. It didn't take me long to start thinking big (or start losing my mind, whichever way you look at it.)

You see, this is getting to be a family tradition. A little over 20 years ago, my dad built my brother and I our very own playhouse from scratch. That iteration was the Byers Brothers Castle, complete with jungle gym, swings, sand box, slide, climbing rope, and yes, a fireman's pole! Here is a picture of it in all of its glory before it was disassembled when my parents moved a couple years ago. By the way, Dad claims it WILL be reassembled by the time Little Dude is old enough to use it!

 

Another trait of home improvement projects at our house is the late night setting of deadlines (usually made after a few beers or a bottle of wine.) In 2009, I <supposedly> agreed that I could lay an 800+ square foot concrete flagstone patio in 3 or so months, just in time for one of our famous (now defunct) backyard parties. It nearly broke me, but I finished the groutwork a couple of days before an epic Easter party. This time, I agreed that I could probably get Little Dude's pirate ship playhouse built by June, just in time for him and all his friends to climb all over it at his second birthday party... Well here goes nothing, we'll see if I can pull this off again! 

 

Edit: Oh, I guess I owe everyone an explanation as to the name of the "pirate ship" we are constructing...it is an ode to The Becky Thatcher, the iconic paddle boat that was docked in Marietta for years before sinking after being moved to Pittsburgh a few years ago. Hence,The Becky's Revenge!

TWB
1/23/2012