Mama’s at the Hardware Store
Raising Kids
Make a DIY PVC fort kit for your child!
Make your own DIY fort for your child and enjoy countless hours of creativity and construction.
Not long ago while at Target my little boy was admiring a shiny new toy with lots of bells and whistles. He looked at me with excited eyes and I was sure that I knew what was next and it probably wouldn’t fit with my quest to minimize. But I was wrong, he didn’t ask me to buy it for him as I suspected. Instead, he said, “Mommy, let’s make this toy at home”. I was so touched by his confidence in my ability to create magic out of nothing and our abilities to recreate toys we see on the shelves of various stores and proud that my child is thinking like a creator rather than a consumer. This moment crystallized the theme for our Christmas this year. The idea for making a DIY fort was born. We came up with lots of fun things to make for Grandmas and Grandpas as well as for friends. And of course, it inspired me to come up with some unique DIY gifts for him. I am a voracious Pinterester and the DIY PVC fort is one of the many fun ideas I actualized from my pinnings. Two days before Christmas Shelah and I found ourselves in aisle 18 at The Home Depot, AKA Plumbers Lane. There were many plans online that I could have followed but in true Shelah and Sarah fashion we decided to wing it and so we ended buying a smorgasbord of PVC pipes, couplings, connectors and blah blah blahs. I’m sure that the home depot elf helping us was very glad to see us go as we had her cut 40 pieces of PVC pipes.
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Building our DIY PVC fort
Christmas Eve finally came and after my little one was off having sweet dreams I realized that there was no practical way to wrap the PVC pipes and connectors for our DIY PVC fort. Instead, I put all of the couplings and connectors in a gift bag and slipped the bag under the tree. I wasn’t sure how he would react to this bag of plastic pieces but he seemed to know exactly what they were for. I led him to the garage where the rest of the set was being housed and he was thrilled to see how much material he had to play with. Once outside, we began to assemble our first structure. It was an exercise of trial and error which gave way to lots of collaboration between the two of us. And when we were finally finished, the moment of triumph that we shared was better than any gift I could have found under the tree. These moments are the true gifts in life, the moments that stimulate all of our senses and bring us back to that special time. I’m sure that whenever I go to the Home Depot or smell PVC plastic it will transport me back to this magical day that we shared building our DIY PVC fort.
You may want to just buy a fort kit
We had a lot of fun gathering the materials and putting our DIY PVC fort kit together but you may want to just buy a fort kit. There are so many fun options available these days.
Comprehensive Instructions on How to Make Your Own DIY Rebuildable PVC Fort Kit
You may want to be more thoughtful than I was when making your DIY rebuildable PVC Fort Kit. Instructables offers clear directions for you. Or you may prefer the instructions from It’s Great to be Home. Watching a video is also a good idea.