How much use did your kids get ouf of swingset?

[janine]

It's the time of year to consider swingsets! I have 2 DD's (Age 1 and 4) and a relatively small lot. I'm considering a wooden swing set or the small plastic Little Tikes ones. The wood ones are so expensive and when I look at ones in the neighborhood, I rarely see kids on them! If you have/had one, did it get a lot of use and is it worth the step up from the plastic ones which are probably more for the younger set.
We are on the Eastcoast so warm months are about 4...

[infomama]

we have one of the big wooden sets and our kids play on it all the time.....every season even in the snow

[westwoodmom04]

Our house came with a big wooden one (a bit old-fashion but small fort, slide, monkey bars, room for three swings plus one of those horse swings). My kids used in a lot in their preschool days but now it rarely gets used (maybe once a week) and not for very long (they are 5 and 8).

[georgiegirl]

After 4 years of convincing, DH finally relented last year and we got a nice wooden set for our yard. My kids were 6.5 and 3. When we got it, the kids played with it non-stop until the weather cooled off. They also played on it when it snowed...the slide is super fast and it's fun to land in the snow apparently. Now it's finally spring, and the kids are playing on it again regularly. Both of my kids love swinging. It's especially fun when they have friends over.

Ours is a variation of this one
http://www.backyardadventures.com/products/explorer-playsets/mountaineer-explorer/

We have 2 regular swings, one baby swing, a trapeze (which 7 year old DD loves), a tire swing below (huge hit when other kids come over), a climbing rope ladder thing (all the kids like this), a rock wall, an easy "ladder", a slide, and a captains steering wheel.

[MamaSnoo]

Ours gets lots of love from DD (5 yo), both by herself and with playdates.
She is outside a lot overall, though.

I am excited for DS (11 mo) to grow into it.

The little tykes ones are too small IMO for your older DC. If you got one, I think it would really be for your younger DC mostly.

If you wanted something specifically that your younger DC could use, you could consider checking Craigslist for a little tykes. Ours always has them, and it is a good savings. We got our playhouse that way.

Bottom line, I think the wooden sets are worth it. The plastic sets are fun for little ones, but not worth it IMO to buy new.

ETA: The ones in my neighborhood that sit empty are at houses where there are no young children at home anymore (eg all the kids are MS/HS age now). People just don't seem to take the effort to remove the set once it is up. For my neighbors who have kids aged 3-10, they seem to get use.

[bostonsmama]

Consider what they play with when they go to a park. Do they like the challenge of climbing on things? Do they enjoy swinging endlessly? Do they only want to go on a slide? DD hates swings. She will sometimes put her belly over a big-kid swing, but in general she dislikes it. She likes climbing the rock wall, ladders, jungle gyms and sliding down slides. She also is in love with the picnic tables, engaging in pretend play. For that reason we skipped an at-home set and just got her a really good, tallish (Step 2??) slide and Little Tykes picnic table. We go to the park (even though it's at least a mile walk) for everything else. We have a HUGE front and side yard, but our backyard is mostly 2-tiered decking, chairs and beautifully landscaped flower beds. There really is nowhere to put the kind of climb-on play set she'd want.

This spring, however, DH is going to build a treehouse w/ DD. There's a shady spot where flowers keep dying next to a beautiful tall Cypress, and we're going to build a treehouse that has stilts and is raised off the ground 2.5ft w/ a ladder (to encourage the climbing she loves) and some kind of play area (either another kitchen, a bedroom for her dolls w/ furniture, or even a general store approach).

[AnnieW625]

Not even sure if this really counts so I voted go to the playground (ours is less than a 1/4 mile from our house), but DH constantly says this is the best $50 I have ever spent on something for the kids:

http://www.littletikes.com/kids-toys/swingalong-castle-bright (we have an older version I bought off of someone on a mommy board).

I got it when my DD1 was 1 and she is now 7. She still climbs on it. The swing part is ready to give out but both of my kids still enjoy it.

We don't have a large lot and I would love to get something like these ones, but I just haven't gotten around to it yet, plus we'd have to move it to the middle of the grass each time the girls wanted to swing on it:
http://www.littletikes.com/kids-toys/lookout-swing-set
http://www.littletikes.com/kids-toys/clubhouse-swingset

We are considering the little $279 wooden playhouse from Costco instead.

[gatorsmom]

We have A wooden set and plastic set and our kids love both. They have reLly enjoyed both sets- even in the snow. And they are a big hit when friends come over.

[sophiesmom03]

we have one of the big wooden sets and our kids play on it all the time.....every season even in the snow

Same here, we've had it since DD1 was 2 and moved it twice, had parts replaced as they rotted under warrantee just this past year (Cedarworks) so now we basically have a new set again.

Totally worth it, all the kids love it, and all the neighborhood kids love it.

[wellyes]

If you can walk to a playground, do so, is my advice.
If it's a drive that you don't do as often as you'd like, a jungle gym is a good idea.

[khalloc]

We have a wooden swingset from Costco. We bought it about 5 years ago when DD was 2.5 and DS was an infant. They use it ALL.THE.TIME and we have a cold snowy winter here. Even in winter they will occasionally go out and slide down the slide and play out there. They do all sorts of things involving the swingset and use it to play imaginary games like star wars, etc...

We paid about $900 or so for ours and it was worth every penny. Its a decent size, but not humongous or anything. Some of the Costco ones can get pretty crazy.

[Sweetsunshine]

Another vote for wood swingset. My kids love ours and also play on it even in winter. There is a showroom for a swingset company close by us. We brought the kids there to see what they ended up liking the best.

[ourbabygirl]

Yep, we got our big (wooden) Rainbow set almost 3 years ago (when the kids were newborn and just turned 2), and we use it a lot! We got a bigger/ taller set so they can grow into it more, and they've especially loved it the last year or so (although they've been able to use the swings no matter how young they are, as we have two baby swings on it).
Unfortunately our winters are loooooong, and it still isn't very spring-like here, but at least the snow is melted, so as long as that's the case, we go out and enjoy it.
We do have a play ground in our development, but it's been so nice just having something in our back yard to play on right after DS' afternoon nap and before dinner, and also to have to play on during birthday parties, play dates, and family parties. We're moving soon and taking our play set with us. :)

[AngelaS]

My inlaws bought us a basic CedarWorks when my oldest was not quite 18 months old. It is now 13 years old. It still gets played on daily (unless it is winter). My oldest who is 15 still goes out and swings on it every single day. We have added on to it a couple times, replaced some things but it is still worth every penny and their customer service cannot be beat.

[quinnsmom]

We've moved quite a bit so we have had a few different sets. We had a really nice Rainbow swingset that the kids used every day. They loved it and I loved it. But it was expensive. We moved and had a Costco wooden set. The kids didn't use that one as much (they always talked about the other rainbow set). They really only used the swings on that set but I think its because it was in the shade and the fort and slide area had spiders. At this house, since they used the swing on the last set every day, we decided to go with just a basic Lifetime set (http://www.costco.com/Lifetime®-10'-Metal-Swing-Set---Do-It-Yourself.product.11531867.html) with swings only from Costco. They use it every day even in the winter. The swings go so high. They use the bars on the side to climb up and basically climb all over the set. It surprised me that they do this as I didn't see it a set with climbing options. This was very economical too - less than 10% of what we paid for the wooden Rainbow set. They are 6 and 8 - I don't know how much use they would have gotten out of this set if they were younger. Its a great choice for them now. They also play at the local playground every day after school too - then come home and play in the backyard on the Lifetime set. Cant get enough playing!

[melrose7]

We got our big wooden one (from Sam's club) when my girls were 2 and a newborn, so 6 years ago. the first few years it wasn't used too much as DD1 had some gross motor issues due to her global apraxia that we weren't aware of at the time so it was difficult for her to play on. I said 2 summers ago that I finally feel like we have gotten our moneys worth. It took a few years but it was worth it. They can't wait for the mud to dry up since the snow just melted so they can go and play on it.

[AngB]

Man, you guys are making me want one!

[hellokitty]

That depends. I am kind of upset. We bought a childlife swingset with intentions to upgrade to the bigger kid add ons when the time came. Well... the company got bought out and they discontinued the set that we had and all of the parts. So, I feel like we totally got screwed. We also spent a big chunk of cash to build up a flat spot on our tilted backyard. Had I known that this is what would have happened, I would have just bought the set from sam's club, instead of investing in the childlife set. It makes me mad just thinking about it. As for play time, my kids have gotten a fair amount of play out of it, although I find that they seem perfectly fine just playing in the pea gravel with is another, "grrr" kind of moment. DS3 is really interested in the swing set now, so I think that when he is added in the equation it is worth it, but we spent waaay more $ than we should have on it, kwim?

[KrisM]

Our wooden set is 6 years old this June. It's great. It's gotten a lot of play, all year round, for 6 years. We went with a larger deck on top and we are glad, because there will be 5-6 kids up there from 4-8 years old and there is room enough without someone falling off :). I imagine we'll get another 6 years of use from it, at least.

If you were to look out at random times, you'd think my kids were never on it. They are in school, ride their bikes, play in the sandbox, etc as well. But, it gets used multiple times a week and we are glad we have it.

[s7714]

We've had our Gorilla set for about 2 years now.

My 2 year old is a little too small to be left to his own devices on it, but I love that I can take him out there almost daily to swing and not have to stress taking him to parks where the structures are way too big/high for my own sanity. (DS is a climber.)

My 8 and 10 year old DDs love to play on the entire thing, but the swings and gym bar are most used. The two neighbor kids are here almost daily playing on it with my DDs as well. I love that they can be in the backyard playing instead of begging to go a block or so down the street to play at the closest park were there's no swings anyway.

My DH balked at getting a set for years. But he kept complaining that our DCs didn't want to play in the backyard. It took him a while to realize the reason was because we didn't have anything (other than balls and bikes) to really play on or in back there! I think he also finally realized if we had a set it would cut down on the constant "can you drive us to a park with swings?" requests. I don't regret our purchase for a second and only wish we would have gotten it sooner!