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Playground Construction
November 16 to 22, 2010

Our new school home at the Mary Peake Center had everything our children needed . . . except a playground. Only a few months after opening, we were able to get our custom-designed playground equipment installed.


July 19
The Mary Peake Center fenced area,
a month before we moved in.
July 19
Site of our future playground structure!


November 16, 9:30 a.m.
The truck arrives! Amazing how decades of joy and
motor-skills development could be held in one vehicle.


November 16, 1:00 p.m.
The structure is under way! It was being positioned beneath
our beautiful front tree, for shade and natural ambiance.

November 17, 11:40 a.m.
The playground is complete, and the mulch bed is begun.
November 22, 10:20 a.m.
The structure was taped off and allowed to sit for five days, so the cement holding it in place could completely harden. Then, first thing the following Monday morning, the children came out.
 

Program Director April Howard warms up the crowd with words of excitement, and also explains playground safety rules.
The wait was agonizing for some of our very excited children!

Come on, come on, we want to play!!!
Any minute now, and they will let us on the playground!
 

At last, Ms. Howard cuts the tape and officially opens up the playground for the children of DHCDC.
Before the children can climb on, the staff realizes that everything is a little too dewey and should be toweled off...

Ms. Howard realizes the best way to dry off the slide will be
to ride down it on a paper towel!
Sometimes doing things for the children means
ending up with a soggy bottom.

Off they go! For the very first time, the playground is mounted by little preschool shoes and fingers.
The slides work!

One brave girl offers to test out the balance beam
(and she didn't fall off!)
Twisted fun.

Making a long-distance call (to a friend on the other side of
the structure) on the playground's innovative "talk tubes."
A happy slider.

Our playground has other exciting activities!
On the blacktop beside our new climbing structure,
children play four-square with staff.
Perhaps the funnest part of the playground construction
was the dirt it turned up! (We might now be adding a sandbox.)

Our playground also has a tricycle trail
that winds around three flower beds.
Light traffic for a Monday morning.