Ground Level Trampoline

When we purchased our new home back in October we knew we wanted to put our trampoline at ground level. We didn't know how...but some how we were going to have our trampoline in the ground. When moved in and started looking at the ground and getting used to the size and shape of things in our yard we were even more excited because we were looking at a yard that was bigger than we anticipated and thus gave us room for the trampoline and room to move. It was nice. Then warmer weather hit.

Our backyard is not finished and so basically it's just a leveled and graded dirt yard. On first observation we thought "this will be easy". On first attempt to push a shovel into the ground though our thoughts changed to "this is going to be work". We spent one weekend digging and digging. We dug a hole roughly two and half feet deep and six to seven feet wide. Not bad...except for the aching backs and the overwhelmed feeling of defeat. The following week we pulled out the big guns...pick axes. Yup that helped expand that hole about two feet wider and six inches deeper. Not what you would call progress. So then came the next big weekend with nice weather. We pulled out the pick axes and got to work...it wasn't thirty minutes later that we 

One of the volunteers

called Sun Rental to get a backhoe. Now the production went into overdrive (is that getting archaic? not sure if people even know what overdrive is...I'm not even sure I know what overdrive is). After riding the backhoe across our front yard (I hope we didn't break any sprinkler pipes) and getting the hang of the controls I was able to accomplish in 5 minutes what took us 5 hours to accomplish previously. We had the backhoe for "half a day" which basically meant 4-5 hours of running time. We only needed 2 hours to accomplish our goal of getting the tramp in the ground.

The bonus...my back wasn't aching and I got to play with a really big Tonka Toy. But our story doesn't end quite yet.  You see our trampoline is a perfect circle...unfortunately the hole was not. This means that there were places with little gap and other places with HUGE gaps between the edge of the tramp and "level" ground. So we knew we had more work. We had to find an effective way of backfilling without undoing all of our work. The weather, fortunately, turned cool giving us time to contemplate the best way to accomplish our backfill project. We thought of using palates and even found six of them that we could use to create a sort of wall to push the dirt against without it filling in our hole. This seemed like a good idea until we found the palates to be too big or too small or ultimately less useful. So we contemplated investing a little money into the project (aside from the very reasonable fee for the backhoe) and buy some lumber to rig up against the legs of the tramp to create our wall. We were ready to purchase a couple sheets of plywood and just attach or lean them up against the legs. It would have been reasonable but a new alternative came to the rescue. Karen's dad was getting ready to remove the wood from his cargo trailer and suggested that we could use it for our tramp. He in all of his generosity and general awesomeness not only removed the lumber and delivered it, he also cut it to size, and then attached the lumber with brackets to the legs using his own tools on his own time (which is really saying a lot since he's an electrical contractor). So now we had free lumber, and labor to help us get the job done. Unfortunately the lumber from his trailer didn't quite cover the whole job so we went and got the last little bit that was needed. Again Karen's dad helped cut, and attach it to the legs. Our project was making progress again just in time for some good weather, we hoped.

Friday night we were planning our Saturday activities and looked out the window to see rain. It seemed our backfill operation was a bust. Thankfully when we woke up we found that the sun was out and the clouds had dropped their fill rather quickly over night giving it some time with the wind to dry up a little. Karen went to an appointment first thing in the morning and I started digging. The kids had lovingly named each of the mounds that surrounded the trampoline and when they saw me cutting away at Pop-Tart Mountain and Lego Mountain they were a little put out but they joined in and started helping me move rocks, boulders, and dirt into the gaps around the tramp. This is when the aching back came back into the project. I moved a 200-300 lbs. boulder half way across our yard to fill in one of the gaps and another one of nearly the same size about half that distance. It was a good work out. By the time Karen returned from her appointment I had done about a third of the total work already. When she got back the work really started. We had about three quarters of the back fill done by 11:00 a.m. and we were ready for a break. We went to Costco to get a new wheel barrow so we could move dirt from Pop-Tart Mountain to Hot Wheel Valley without all the back strain. By 2:30 we had what you see in the following pictures. Leave your comments below.