A new building project--Fort Bragg, Arkansas...

That excited lil' boy in the dentist chair is--surprise--Stephen! We took him for his first official cleaning the other week, and boy did he cooperate nicely! We expected him to struggle and fuss, but he acted like a big boy should, and we were very proud of him. We've been especially busy this spring, with school wrapping up for the kids, and a variety of other events to attend. Below, Kenny gets down to business at a crawfish boil we were invited to:
The square hole in the board is located above a garbage can, making for an easy disposal option. Yes, Kenny was peeling his own "mud bugs" and seemed to enjoy these quite a bit. As did Beth, but she required a bit more help from mom to get her crawfish:
Beth also had a part in a little play her class put on in celebration of their "graduation" from kindergarten:
Below is a picture of Beth getting ready to sing her little heart out at the kindergarten musical:
Note how much less apprehensive she is than the girl in the blue shirt next to her--our kids have always loved these performances! Our big activity over the last few weeks has been the construction of a new playground for the kids in the backyard. Our previous metal and plastic swingset that we bought when we moved into this house had not stood the test of time well, given the weather and heavy use by the kids, so we decided to build our own out of heavier duty materials. Below, the kids fill in the holes surrounding an upright beam that supports the swingset. The wood is pressure treated pine (yes, I'm going to seal it for the kids), and there is concrete holding down the base of these posts:
I made the support beams out of three 2"x6" boards, and the top beam is three 2"x8" boards secured together (this was cheaper and easier than trying to find large beams out of single pieces):
We then added some more braces, some heavy-duty swings, and built a side fort out of decking materials, with a ladder behind for the kids to climb:
Quite a bit of work, but "Fort Bragg" is quite solid, and should be quite durable, lasting well into the future. We'll eventually add a slide off of the front, and probably some monkey bars on the opposite side of the swings. One final activity to mention--we attended a farewell party for some friends of ours, David General and his daughter Denise:
David was a grad student and research associate at UAM over the last 5 or 6 years, while his daughter came over about 3 years ago to also try her hand at a master's degree. David is an ant expert, and he is shortly going back to his home country of the Philippines to begin a faculty position at a university there. Denise is also headed back to the Philippines, although I don't know if she's figured out what she's going to do. Both Dave and Denise were contributing members to our small local Catholic community, and their cheery smiles will be missed!!

Comments

Anonymous said…
nice handiwork you guys! i'm sure the kids will just love it. also, i love beth's beaming face during that performance.

lulu
6:50 AM
Lisa said…
That's a very nice backyard swingset you guys built! Definitely more polished than the "Fort Bragg" structures you and Bob built as kids in Rhinelander. You've become quite the handyman.
6:05 AM
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