Building a Swing Slide Playset

As parents we are constantly reminded that it is our responsibility to encourage our youngsters to be active, to get exercise and not to lie around eating burgers while playing computer games. Many parents will probably agree that tearing their children away from their televisions and computer games can be tougher than pulling teeth.

Last year I invested a significant amount of hard earned cash in a few pieces of outdoor play equipment, chosen by my two youngsters. They always enjoy a visit to our local park where they can race around, swing on the swings, slide on the slides, bounce on the bouncy things and climb the climbing frames. Unfortunately our nearest park is about 3 miles away so these visits are not as frequent as they or I would like. So I bit the bullet and shelled out quite a bit of money on a wooden swing slide playset and a good quality wooden climbing frame for our garden.

Now I would like to report that my generosity has paid off and my children are now fit and active and can’t get enough of their new outdoor toys. But nothing could be further from the truth. Since I installed the equipment (which presented many headaches, took a lot of hammering and quite a bit of swearing) they have probably only played on it three times. Admittedly I didn’t get the equipment until the Autumn of 2008 and since then our weather has been atrocious.

At least that is the reason they give when I try to convince them that they’d enjoy some outdoor fun. It’s too cold, they say. Or they say ‘the swings are too wet to sit on’ when it’s been raining.

I’m hoping that, as we move into spring and the weather improves, they will naturally want to get out into the garden and get some much needed exercise on their new outdoor toys. I’m dreading another miserable, wet summer as this will result in my fat children just getting fatter instead of working off those layers of blubber with a little outdoor adventure. Nobody ever said that being a parent was easy.

Tags: active, children, climbing frame, Exercise, outdoor play, play, swing slide