A Hobbit-hole in my Backyard: The Mother of all Sandboxes

A hobbit-hole in my backyard? It may sound crazy, but I can tell you that my kids are ecstatic about it. When it is finished, it will be the coolest playhouse ever. Plus, they can enjoy the grassy hill for sledding in winter and water sliding in summer. This was all my wife's idea. She dreamt it, and now I get to be the one to bring it to reality. I'm not a construction expert; this is a total do-it-yourself job by a complete amateur. So far, though, it is turning out rather nicely, I think. Here is a step by step account of the building so far.

Since this is in blog format, the posts are in order from newest to oldest. To read this in chronological order, start with How it all Began and use the "Newer Post" links. Or click on the links under Blog Archive, in order.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

The Mother of all Sandboxes

Our next project was the sandbox. (This turned out to be an important step forward toward the hobbit-hole, as I will explain in my next post.)

The area for the sandbox started out as an old play area, with a worn out play structure on what used to be wood chips--now a nasty weed patch, 28 feet long by 14 feet wide.

We hired a guy to come and dig out the weeds, wood chips, and about 1 1/2 feet of dirt to make way for the sand. We also moved the play structure.

We put down a weed barrier...

We bought 15 tons of cyclone sand, which we had dumped onto our driveway. (The sand was only $10 a ton!) And, with the help of several family members, we filled up the sandbox using shovels and wheelbarrows. (Big job!)

The kids love the sandbox. At least someone plays in it every day, and you can fit a ton of kids in there. (Notice that I even put in a water fountain. The pipe and the base were there when we moved in. I added the fixture.)