backyard playsetsIt's that point of season again: playset season. Enough time when an incredible number of parents get ready to pay out thousands of dollars for small-scale garden jungle gyms for his or her beloved children.For years I'd managed to efficiently avert this requirement of suburban family life. And, 1 day something happened.I cracked.I cannot even blame my kids. They never badgered me or complained. I'm not sure they required a playset. No. I wanted one.If we were outside in the back garden my kids wandered around aimlessly, invariably coming back inside to the couch. I needed to shoo them again outdoors and shout, "Go play!" But using what? We didn't have a pool or swings or perhaps a paved driveway to bring on. I determined for my own sanity and their success we needed a playset.Visions of summer months days whiled away on the swingset or in the attached fort with children's laughter floating by on the balmy breeze, danced in my head. But I wanted one thing to be perfectly clear. If I was going to take out a second mortgage to funding a playset, my kids were going to have to live on it--literally.The playset we eyed-up got a house-like enclosure and a picnic stand and was almost as large as my house. It had been certainly the right dwelling for two smallish people. They could come inside for the wintertime but not until then. And when we ran some electric wiring and domestic plumbing to the fort, I might never have to see them again.But as with most fantasies, once recognized, the facts on the ground don't quite match the eyesight, and so it was with the playset.My research on playsets commenced well before spring because I thought if we bought in the off-season, we may be capable of geting a reasonable price. I used to be mistaken. You will find no affordable prices as it pertains to playsets. I have no idea if the hardware is solid gold or if the framework is constructed of rare, endangered real wood, but bargains are not to be enjoyed. THEREFORE I considered an option a friend suggested: used playsets. One could get a complete playset for fifty percent the price. That possessed my name written all over it.Unfortunately, it didn't have my husband's name written on it. He was against the complete playset idea from the beginning--it would ruin his grass. If, however, I was going to insist he acknowledge he has children and that they require playthings, then he identified he would desire a deluxe model worth being placed atop his pristine lawn.Still, I persisted in my seek out pre-owned models, convinced I could satisfy us both. And I was successful to find a used playset in relatively good condition large enough for two school-age kids. It even got a rock wall membrane. But the best part was it only cost about a thousand bucks. Victory was mine.Then my husband pointed out the playset was someplace beyond your tri-state area, and we didn't have a car large enough to transport it even if we did want to take the half-day drive to look obtain it. I nodded silently. I recognized. And with a heavy heart, I gave up on my used playset search.For those who have never had the knowledge of shopping for a playset, it's a significant daunting task. There are lots of makes and models and heights and configurations to choose from, and all the actual playthings are extra. I suppose you could buy a fairly cheap wooden framework, but your children can do is stare at it wistfully because it would be nothing more than an oversized sawhorse.I continued to comparison shop online for weeks until the day finally arrived when I discovered my dream swing set. It possessed everything I'd dreamed. The sole problem was I couldn't afford it. Over the course of the following weeks, I been to the playset several times, hoping to occur upon a sales. Then, mid-summer, it finally took place. The company got what constituted a storewide sales in playset circles: free gangplank weekend. I got sold.Free gangplank weekend was a huge coup for me, and I breathed a sigh of alleviation that the hunting and agonizing and planning was over. Then the sales guy strike me with the charge. Slightly below $2,000. And it was FREE gangplank weekend!The playset has been bought and payed for, sent and erected inside our yard for nearly a year, but it hasn't been used much. Or possibly I will say it hasn't been played with approximately $2,000 would warrant. We haven't made our cash back onto it yet, but a few items have been worthy of their price. The swings and trapeze club. That's really all you have to. Take it from someone whose been burned.The kids still wander aimlessly about the garden, ignoring the one component, the priciest one, that they lobbied so vehemently, the fort. It rests empty aside from the birds and the squirrels. But maybe if we installed a TV in there...