Jun
14
How To Make A Tire Swing
by Leslie
Items Needed: A tire. A strong rope. A tree.
Step 1: Drill holes in the bottom of your tire to prevent water from gathering and making it all gross when it rains.
Step 2: Take the tire to the car wash to clean it with a high pressure hose. Also to justify the trip to the ice cream parlor next door.
Step 3: Use a ladder to reach a sturdy tree branch and tie the rope to the branch.
Step 4: Realize that your ladder is a lot taller than it looks when you actually climb up it and that the branch is really high.
Step 5: Put the ladder away.
Step 6: Concoct a brilliant plan in which you place a softball in a sock, tie it to the end of the rope and toss it over the branch.
Step 7: Enlist help from someone that can actually throw.
Step 8: Tie a slip knot and pull it until it reaches the branch. You will have a double rope of unequal size.
Step 9: Tie the rope around the tire using a square knot.
Step 10: Discover that knots are really hard to tie.
Step 11: Go inside and Google How To Tie A Square Knot.
Step 12: Attach the tire using the rope with a whole bunch of the knots you know how to make.
Step 13: Have the heaviest member of your family test the swing to insure its strength. You may not want to tell them that their weight is the reason they were chosen.
Step 14: Untie all those knots and hike the tire a little higher up that rope. Make sure your drill holes are at the bottom. Repeat steps 9 through 13.
Step 15: Let your impatient kid swing, already. You can cut off the excess rope later when her leg gets tangled in it and she falls and gets hurt.
Step 16: Pat yourself on the back and admire your handiwork from the street, just like the neighbors will.
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Ooooooh. Aaaaah.
That is freaking AWESOME! I love that tree, I love that swing, and I love your house!
Thank you. I think the swing fits perfectly!
That is just so cool! What a fun post and clever, too. Love, love, love this.
We really had a good time making that swing, and Julia just can’t get enough of it!
Aren’t you the coolest family in the whole world!?
I like to think so. Except that we’re the kind of cool that comes from being so lame, we circle back to cool again.
I’m not sure there’s anything better than a tire swing. Seriously.
Julia would agree with you completely. She’s all about that swing.
Lovely! YOu have the most gorgeous home and yard!!!
Thank you! I love our house. I hope we stay there forever.
Yayyyyyyyy!!! Plus, look at Dave and your mom so happy!!
That swing really is a lot of fun. And it’s hard not to smile when Julia’s smiling. Her smiles are contagious.
I love those pictures! Your house looks so warm and comforting!!
Thanks. I thought the same thing the first time I saw our house. It fits our family perfectly.
I am giving you an Award. It will be on my post tomorrow (that’s tuesday here)
Great job! This project was amazing - and look at the smile on her face!!! Priceless
I love that smile! I would say it made all the hard work worth it, but it was really a simple project.
That last picture looks like a scene from a movie! Great job! Also, I’m pretty sure you’re the coolest mom ever. I know I begged for a tire swing for years and never received one. (sigh)
Tire swings are the best.
You’re not alone. Dave never had a tire swing, either.
So i realized that I have no idea where you live - but if i can have a porch like that, green trees and green grass, and a tire swing - I am sold!!!!! Abslutely perfect summer day I think!
We live among the corn and cows in Ohio. It’s truly a lovely place to live.
that is too funny. but tire swings are awesome. lol
Yes, they’re lots of fun.
Oh your house looks so pretty! The swing’s pretty cool too
Thanks!
I loved tire swings as a kid. Doubt my chunky thighs would enjoy them so much these days. But, your gal seems to be having a blast.
I found you by way of one of your comments on Fluid Pudding…you refer to your husband as half-robot who still mustered up some emotion over “Up.”
Hilarious.
Love your yard and house, btw. Makes me want to sit on the porch and have a lemonade.
Thanks so much for stopping by! Yay! I think you just made my day.
If I hadn’t seen your kid on the swing I would have thought you lifted a picture from a Norman Rockwell book. Does it more idyllic than that? No!
At my in-laws there is a rope swing that we all love to play on, even the adults.
Swings are the best. I hope that these are the kind of images that come to my kid’s minds when they remember their childhoods one day.
That is so cool! I love tire swings and yours looks perfect sitting in front of your big house! It looks like a picture out of a movie! Bet the girls are having a blast with that!
I covet your yard. Is that terrible?
Sweet swing! I never would have come up with the drilling the holes part or the ball-in-sock thing. You are very smart. I do, however, know how to tie a square knot without the help of Google… it’s called working with Cub Scouts.
I googled & visited several sites on makinging a tire / rope swing. Gave up on the info I saw …. and just before closing the search page saw this site at the BOTTOM (!) of the page. No other site came close to this in terms of explanation, breaking it down, photos - the works. Thank you Thank you Thank you.
I’ll tell you how it goes after I try doing mine over the next week. What great ideas - the sock and tennis ball (the other site said use a rock & don’t let it hit you - thanks!) All the little tips are great. I’ll stop befoer I sound like a certified babbling fool
I’m so glad you found me and that this was helpful! We had so much fun doing it. It’s been one of our favorite things to do this summer. Let me know how yours turned out!
thank you so much! nice photos too! wish you all the best!
OK…you just saved my day…I have been collecting the stuff for a tire swing all week and my husband proceeded to tell me he didn’t want it up b/c all the water that sits in the bottom where mosquitos multiply…drilling holes in the bottom is genius!!
I can’t wait to email him right now!!
One family battle solved!! Thanks Thanks Thanks and my kids will be swinging by tomorrow!!
Yay! I’m so glad you stopped by! We put our swing up about a year ago and we still use it. The kids love it! I hope you’ll enjoy yours as much as we’ve enjoyed ours!
What a beautiful place!