It’s no longer really the basic swing set that is the thing, it’s the swing set accessories that are important. There are so many of them now, and they add so much to the original swing set design. These play areas are no longer just your basic metal swing set with an attached slide that once sat in people’s back yards. They’ve evolved into something much more than that. And what is more, you can keep adding to them as new ideas (or, for that matter, new children) come to you. The possibilities are endless.
The accessories category for swing sets is rather broad. At the more prosaic, “hardware” end of the spectrum, you have everything from the aforementioned bolts, to safety handles to add to the sides of ladders, to brackets and chains for hanging extra swings, to clips that allow for the adjustment of swing height. In a way, you might consider these swing accessories to be the behind-the-scenes business of the adults, making sure the mechanics are working so that the children’s fantasies can be safely maintained.
This brings us to the “play” end of the spectrum of swing set accessories, where children’s imaginations can soar. Here, it seems, there’s almost no limit to the accessories available. You can add a fort to one side of the set, and of course you can then add a climbing wall that goes up to it, with a slide coming down. You can hang a tire swing at one end, hang a punching bag on the other, and have walkways to mount steering wheels, telescopes, and “bubbles” that the kids can peek through, and so on. You can create a virtual labyrinth of activities around your backyard swing and slide set.
This is the great feature of the newest generation of swing sets; you can expand them beyond the simple “swing set” category and turn them into virtual swing sets and gyms. Make them varied and interesting, and your kids will hardly realize they’re exercising and getting into good physical shape. The basic swings have always been excellent exercise, but it’s now the swing set accessories that raise them to another level entirely.
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