Build your own den part 5 - the big reveal....

We had aikido in the morning and because Ebi-kun had a national demo to attend the following week he couldn't skip class. So after aikido we grabbed some lunch then got straight to it. The first job was to put up the pillars, we used L brackets to do that.

The attached the cross beams for the roof...

There were a couple of re-calculations that had to go on, due to the plans not being quite right but nothing major.

Then they put netting over the roof frame to help prevent bugs and beasties getting in..

And this it was time to put the walls on. Either DH or I helped them put the wall in place and get the first couple of crews in and then the boys got busy and did the rest.

Daddy took charge of the roof. It would have been great if we could have had another weekend to work on it but the following weekend we had plans then we fly to the UK a couple of days later, so it was crunch time and no slacking off was allowed.

And here it is... a lot of sweat, no tears and quite a bit of blood loss (thanks to the mozzies) went into building this! Ebi-kun is one very happy chappy, this incidentally is his birthday present! Nothing quite like having to design and build your own birthday gift. 

I think the experience he will carry with him forever, long past when the den had gone. 

Interview with the designer:

On a scale of 1 - 10, how difficult was this project?

7 because working out all the problems was difficult.

What did you learn from the project?

How to use the tools.

That it was really important to do all the plans first and it's good to have people helping you.

How do you feel about the final result?

It was fun but difficult to build it. It's cool and turned out better than I thought it would!

What I feel he learned from the experience was project planning, that it's sometime slow and boring but vital to get get a good end result. That you have to be prepared to make changes along the way and that creative thinking will help solve a problem. 

And that big projects don't happen over night, that perseverance is very important and that quitting half way through is not an option. I think this is really important these days as we live in a time when everyone expects instant results and life really doesn't work like that.

I'm really proud of what he has achieved and I'm sure hours of fun will be had in the den. He has yet to do the interior, I will be sure to give you a tour when we get back from the UK. I did suggest a trip to Ikea for interior design but they both look at me as if I were mad! can't imagine why...

Build your own den part 3

We left you hanging, wondering about the solution to the concrete foundation blocks! Before that got figured out the boys measured the frame and cut the wood to size.

Starting off with the hand saw..

But soon moved onto the power saw. Once all the frame pieces were the right length, we set about the foundation blocks - OMG this was such a huge job!

This is where we needed daddy muscle on site, the blocks are really heavy and he decided that the best thing would be to dig holes and level them that way. Easier said than done! Eventually we got all 7 blocks in.

There was a lot of taking out and putting in. I'm pretty sure this wasn't the most efficient way to do this job! Part of the learning curve.

Ebi-kun filling in the soil around the blocks after checking the wood was level.

Finally, this took hours. We finished off all filthy and exhausted! The wood hasn't been fixed on here so that went back in the car. We'd have to wait until the following weekend to continue on the project...

Introducing Morning Papers

We are embarking on something new over spring break. I really want Ebi-kun to write more in English as he doesn't get as much practice as he does in Japanese. So I asked him if he'd like to try doing "morning papers". 

For those who don't know, morning papers is a practice often used by writers or creatives to get the rubbish out of your head and the creative juices flowing. You set a timer for 30 minutes and just write. The topic isn't important, it is more about the process.

I don't know if this is something he will stick at or just something he will try out for a while but so far he is enjoying it and I'm happy that he is getting writing practice!

I don't correct his work but I do take note of any common mistakes and stick mini post it notes on them so he can figure out what is wrong and how to correct it. We will watch and see where this takes us...