Yesterday, there was a construction day, at the creative space that one of my daughters attends, three times a week. It's in such a beautiful location, out in the wild, surrounded by mountains. With one of them, called Dragon mountain. There is also a river running along the boundary. I get such a wonderful sense of calm and inspiration, whenever I visit there.
My girls and I, got a lift with another mum. We were a little late, as she was working that day. When we got there, everyone was sitted in the library around the tables, which are lined up in the middle of the room. Where they were each saying what their intention was for the day, alongside how they were feeling. Must were feeling tired. I was feeling somewhere in between.
The kids do a lot of building. One of the first things they learned was how to use hand tools. But somethings are not so easy for our youngsters. Such as heavy lifting. Which was needed, when one of the kids, put forward the idea of building a tower.
Lots of the smaller structures here, were built by the kids. They are pretty good with a drill and saw. But when you want to build bigger construction, you need bigger and stronger materials, with which to build the frame. That's, when the help of the parents is called in which is why we were here, so that we could build a tower. There were other activities you could do. But I chose tower building.
We helped to clear the chosen area,
which included cutting back a fig tree. I dont particularly enjoy cutting living trees, but I was here to help out. So I got myself a saw and began cutting some of the branches. So that one of the big wooden poles could be put in place.
We found found some big flat rocks down at the river, which we dug into the ground a little, so that the pokes could stand on them. Then we used planks of wood, placed at different angles around the pole, to stabilise the poles. That's my daughters blue hand holding the level. She was assigned with the job of making sure, each pole was straight.
I always enjoy getting to build. Especiwhen ots with other people, that I can learn from. I'm no carpenter, but I have down my share about of building with wood and I'm always opened to learning more. Plus it was pretty cool to be helping in the build if a tower.
The kids really just needed us to get the main structure up, as each pole was quite heavy, but they were encouraged to get involve. Like my daughter with the level and another kid who was sawing. They all really helped in clearing the space and the enjoyed sharing their opinions whilst we got the four poles up and connected.
I really enjoyed it. We started later than expected, so we just managed to get our part done before nightfall. There was also some painting to do and the building of a pizza oven. I also wanted to help with the pizza oven build, but you can't have it all. So I made my choice and I can happily say, I don't regret it.
I meant it looks pretty good to me. A great place for the kids to build from. They were all pretty impressed. After that we had a small break where we could get involved in some more relaxed activities. I chose music and headed off to the studio/music space, which is a chat building, full of instruments. I just wanted to get in there and let loose on the drums. It felt great. I had a little jam with three other parents and two of the kids. Then it was dinner time. Vegan lasagne and a beautiful green salad that was freshly picked from the garden.
It was a great day, seeing the parent's and kids work and play, side by side.