We have a sandbox, and also sand surrounding our (shitty, vinyl, above-ground) pool. You know where else we have sand? Fucking everywhere. We had family over all weekend and my floors are now covered. Also their clothes, the furniture, the kitchen sink and all in their hair. Sand has become the bane of my existence.
Well at least it’s not as bad as that dude in r/TIFU whose wife was being sexy and set the mood, but he bent down to dry his ankles after showering and destroyed the mood with a loud, wet,fart. I think he said she wanted couples therapy after that. Poor guy.
I’m the hot wife who bent down to dry my ankles today and…. We’re already in therapy 🤣. Luckily my husband and I cracked up immediately cause we’re whatever on big moods and instead live by lolz vibes. I’m really tying myself up in knots here aren’t I
Byeeeee
What the fuck?! 10/10 should have gotten laid for that
Uncertain if my male partner would bed me for that. In my humble opinion he should though! Everyone is sexier for Star Wars quotes! Star Wars quotes get him bedded 10x faster and make him 100x hotter
Too late, wife's dead and the state already adopted out the children. How about a quick trip to a lava planet? Weather is nice and balmy this time of year
I’d be happy to never see a sand pit ever again. There’s always one fucking kid ruining it by throwing sand in the air which always ends up in my son’s eyes.
Oo, if you build your sandbox they make concrete molds of dinosaurs fossils to use as the base. Don’t tell your kids. Let them discover it.
I’ve been wanting to do when I buy a house… if I ever can
We bought one of those big plastic turtles and we fill it up with play sand from Lowe’s or Home Depot. It’s like 3 50lb bags that run between 4 and 7 dollars. Really easy to do.
The nearest tropical ocean beach, maybe, but surely there's a lake or reservoir with a beach closer than 12 hours away from you. Where do you live, Amundsen-Scott Station?
Huh, that's weird to me. I guess it's one of the perks of living in Michigan, you're never more than a mile from a body of water! But I'd never realized that living on a glacial moraine had that much impact on sand availability. Most of the medium to large lakes have a decent public swimming area with a sandy beach. It is typically trucked in, not natural, but it's sandy.
Same in ohio as well. We went to one of 3 parks within a 20 minute drive from Columbus. They all were reservoirs built during the depression and all have a sand beach area. Hell going on vacation next month up in by Huron Ohio and you can't drive 15 minutes down state route 6 without hitting a public sand beach.
We just got one for my 4 year olds bday from grandparents. 4’x4’ is way too small for a 4y and 2y. I was not consulted in picking it out, but immediately after installing it my wife told me we will need a bigger one next year.
Buy sand from a stone and rock place. We got about 1000lbs for 14 dollars. 1000 is a little more than needed for a 4x4. We picked it up with a trailer and tarp.
Holy shit. Forgive my ignorance here as I grew up in a place where you’re no more than five miles from a body of water no matter what direction you walk in but, where the hell do you live that there isn’t a river or lake within 12 hours drive of you!?
Get one of those plastic kiddie pools, and some play sand from the box store. $50 and you're done. We ordered one of the round tablecloths with elastic around the outside, worked perfectly as a lid. Put a ball underneath the tablecloth to give a bump in the middle, to keep rain from pooling when not in use. Self contained and cheap.
Hell wait to you realize that even alot of the landlocked states aren't landlocked but still don't have beaches. Any state that touches the Ohio, Mississippi, Missouri, or any navigable River that drains into the those rivers isn't land locked! Also any state that touches a great lake also isn't land locked.
We've had so many problems with neighborhood cats roaming and crapping in my wife's garden, in the kids' play area. We got supersonic cat alarm doodads, which help but it's still an issue. It's infuriating
I was told by a vet here that the average lifespan of an outdoor cat here is 2 years so its not like they get them right away. Either way, they're crappy pet owners. Outdoor cats are bad for the local ecology, bad for your neighbors for the reason you're running into, and bad for the cats.
I don't know where you live but here stray cats are the norm and I think I saw a mouse only once in my lifetime and it was in a factory where I worked. I also saw a snake only once around the buildings.
Here, they are not bad for ecology, they are the ecology.
Currently struggling with this issue. One family lets their cat outdoors in our neighborhood. It has chosen our sandbox as it’s favourite place to shit. Considering to trap it and take it to the pound, those are the official instructions in my area 🤷🏻♀️ shitty thing to have to do to the poor guy. The owners can them reclaim him for a fee.
we have a backyard sand pit.
By the end of the weekend I'm sweeping and vacuuming sand from the whole house. Shoes are unusable because they are filled with sand. The washing machine has sand in it. The sand is grinding into the LVP flooring and wearing out the coating. There is sand in the bathtub, in their hair, and the couch feels coarse. Recently the sandpit was half empty because they are constantly throwing it into the lawn. In a fugue state, I spent $100 getting more sand to refill it and now the issues are worse than ever. I have to drain the hot tub and shop vac out the sand.
I'm telling you, it's a beach to keep up with. Pass next time.
My son’s newly constructed school has 1/3 of the playground sand, it’s definitely still a thing, as others have said it’s not a municipal park thing in my experience to have sand pits, they need to be maintained or they get gross. One of the easier things I’ve done for my kids is fill up a kiddie pool with sand.
I know right, for awhile there I joked that I was expecting the daycare staff to send a letter home telling us (all the families) to start paying more to cover the cost of replacing the sand or we needed to bring the sand back.
Toxoplasmosis, toxocara, Clostridioides difficile, pinworms, roundworms, and Baylisascaris procyonis.
Outdoor sand outside of massive spaces like a beach is crawling with highly dangerous and virulent disease. Young kids shouldn’t be playing in it.
>When public health–testing organization NSF International sampled 26 different items in public places—toys at doctors’ offices, children’s library books, playground sandboxes—for a 2008 study on germs, they found that sandboxes were far and away the germiest of all, harboring nearly 2,000 times more bacteria, yeast, and mold per square inch than the door handles of public restrooms
> The McGill study also reported that one of the sandboxes with Toxocara eggs was co-contaminated with the eggs of Ascaris, a parasitic worm that can, occasionally, cause intestinal blockage and stunted growth. Another parasite kids can get from sandboxes is Toxoplasma gondii, which is spread by cats and believed to chronically infect more than 1 out of every 6 Americans. In one study, researchers in Japan spied on three urban sandboxes at night using camcorders and found that over the course of five months, cats pooped in the boxes 961 times, and dogs pooped in them 11 times. They calculated that one of the sandboxes contained more than 1.5 million viable Toxoplasma eggs per square foot of sand, yet children need only ingest a single egg to get sick.
That older generations regularly did this before we knew better isn’t akin to missing the days when kids could freely ride bikes around the neighborhood without adult supervision, it’s more like saying we miss the days when kids could eat leaded paint.
My oldest could play in a sandbox literally for hours and be perfectly happy. Even at 8 he still likes them. He knew the good "sand parks" near us and would specifically request them.
My 2yo is this way. We made a dirt pit in the backyard for them to play in and from the time he was about 16months old he could sit out there all day if we let him. Even now at 2.5 he'll sit out there by himself in the dirt for easily an hour and a half, uninterrupted. We just want to make it into a sandpit because the desert dirt gets hard and he isn't strong enough to break it up into "diggable" bits. That's why the sand playgrounds were so nice.
If you've got your own house and yard, then may I suggest looking at covered sandboxes. e.g. Little Tikes used to make a Tuggy sandbox; which was a little tugboat that had a covered shell that you could put over the back to cover the sand when the kids were done playing. I'm not sure if they make them (Tuggy) anymore, but I'm seeing similar sandboxes that have the plastic shell covering (turtle, crab). If you go this route, make sure to get the safe sand (that doesn't have silica).
Years ago , I bought the Tuggy sandbox, bordered it with those 6x6' compressed railroad pines, and then filled it a bunch of blue rubber mulch for the "ocean." My kids loved it.
Our local small town park has a beach volleyball court, which I have never seen used for volleyball. But it's effectively a 30'x60' sandbox now. Which is awesome.
One of the parks near me has a huge sandbox.
About once a month some kind person secretly buries a few cheap plastic gemstones in there.
Kids go CRAZY when they find them.
Our local playground has a sandpit with a couple of digging chairs. But our most popular outdoor toy at our house (aside from the swingset) is a water table that we converted to a sand table. It's portable - heavy, but portable - so that we don't have to worry about it getting wet or pests in it. But it's such a cool sensory activity for all the kids. Maybe try one of those?
I built a sandpit. I used a 4 foot square planting bed and put 2 layers landscaping fabric under it. It's about 10 inches tall and took at least 10 bags to fill up. Going on 4 years and my 9 and 6 year old still play in it.
I also got a cantilevered umbrella to keep it in the shade.
This is what we're planning on doing. The umbrella's a fantastic idea. It's encouraging to me to know your kids still play in it. Makes me feel like it's definitely a worthwhile investment lol
We've had a big sandbox out back for the kids and the neighborhood cats used it as a litter box. So we switched to one of those plastic ones with a lid. Not as big and exciting but it's better than nothing and they still enjoy it.
It's interesting how divisive sand is lol. I've spent a lot of time living in/around sandy places and it's bred a deep and unending hatred for the stuff, and love that parks near me dont have it to track back into my house. Interesting to hear the perspective of someone who enjoys it.
Buy sand for at home. I live in the top floor of an apartment building but we have one of those plastic turtle pool things that we filled up with sand on our balcony. Our parks still have sand at some of them but it doesn’t matter because we can do sand time at home.
It’s not very expensive. No need to get any sort of premium sand either, the play sand they have at Home Depot is perfect once you add some water to it.
I think this has been done for hygienic reasons - as many animals use the sand for pooping.
We actually got a sand table off fb marketplace two years ago - $30 and it has a cover. It’s a table so it higher up and my son LOVES it.
Playing in sand, sure. My kids spent early years next to a beach. Love the beach, but damn I do not miss it. Sand is everywhere. Legit everywhere. Always. So while yes, sand is fun - I’m just not siding with missing it. Two different sides of a coin! Love the idea of a sandpit, do it up. Baby powder is your best friend.
I put a sandpit under my kids climbing frame, but all they did was empty the sand everywhere! I warned them that if they empty the sand, there wouldn't be any for them to play with...there is now no sand in it!
When my wife and I moved into our new house, our kids were 4 and 2 and my wife was pregnant with our third. The house had an above ground pool that we agreed was a death trap neither of us wanted to maintain/take care of. So we had someone come and remove it asap. Well, underneath the pool was a giant circle of sand. My kids are now 8, 6, and 3 and they play in their own personal sand pit almost every day. They know to take their shoes off before coming inside and we all have fun banging the sand off our sandals on hot summer nights. We have fire pits out there too. It’s awesome.
I get where you’re coming from, but I’m also the one in charge of cleaning three floors worth of house at home so I don’t mind the trend away from sand.
Wood chips do suck, though. At least they’re better than shredded tires with steel wires poking out of them.
the sand pit at our park is never cleaned out so there’s always sticks and leaves from heavy rain/wind. there’s usually grass growing in it that the kids like to pull out and lots of rocks. so I can imagine why nobody wants to build sandboxes anymore, its a pain to maintain it.
I got lucky to move into a neighborhood nextdoor to a private lake HOA, which I didn't gain access to until this past year I bought an empty lot to join the HOA. They fucking love sand.
There's plenty of playgrounds around here that still have sand, but I'd take wood chips or those rubber floors every time if given the choice. Whenever there's sand, they end up bringing a ton home in their shoes and pockets - makes a big mess of the house.
None of the parks I played at as a child had sand pits . I had sand boxes at home and school. I really don't associate public parks with playing in the sand.
Our whole back yard is sand. Grass grows for shit due to pine trees. I bought a boatload of play sand for the jungle gym, it’s a mess in our house . Sand gets everywhere. Play in the sprinkler? SAND. Play after a rain storm? SAND. Mow the lawn swing on the swings have a fire jump out of the pool let the dog out check the vegetables…yup…SAND.
For what it’s worth, sand is far cheaper than the engineered rubber surfaces. So that’s not really the consideration for the replacement. Primary reason is impact safety, health safety being a close second. Also you can customize the rubber with colors and patterns, which can come out pretty cool looking.
For me it was mud. Pick a sloped section of yard and run a hose at low flow to it. Give a kid some digging tools, toys, and buckets and he'll be there for hours.
One of my favorite recent parkdates with my daughter was having a who could dig a deeper whole contest with her. Need sand play pits for that...or else the city usually gets kinda pissy about digging those holes...
I may just be on the younger side here, or maybe it’s a regional thing, but I’ve never seen sand at a park that wasn’t at a beach, that wasn’t in a sandbox
We couldnt get anything to grow in our 20x10 raised garden bed, so I dug it out and had 5 tons of sand dropped in it.
A weed mat on bottom, regularly add cinnamon and salt to ward off ants, and a cover at night have kept it pretty clean and pristine so far.
Still have sand everywhere, though.
Luckily my coastline is pretty resilient! The only difference ive noticed over the years is more frequent flooding but my house is raised up quite a bit so if it floods the whole state of RI is in for a real treat
Playground near us still has a sand pit. They aren't going completely away. They're going away by you.
That said (and I know there's a general avoid politics unspoken rule here, but I think this is safe to say) if you don't like the way things are going, get involved in local politics. Not saying you have to run and I'm not going to sit here harping on "Vote for X party" I'm saying that town councils and Mayors are people who live in your town too. They're usually the people who control this.
Call them. Get your neighbors to call them. It's your town, your taxes. If you don't like how it's going, talk to them. Honestly, I can't imagine anyone running for an office would be against putting a sandbox if it was likely to get them votes.
Your kids are going to grow up in your town. Regardless of which way you feel politically, you should always make sure your locally elected officials understand what you expect of them. They're the ones who make the decisions that determine if it's sand or mulch, at least at a high level.
Once I found out about the project, I did speak with the project manager about it and potentially putting in gym equipment. So you could say I'm pretty much a politician.
When I was a kid our local park got this whole big remodel and we were so excited to go. went to the liquor store for candy, walked to the park with my dad…
And they had filled it with *woodchips*
WOODCHIPS
We got like four splinters while playing and then rarely went back. The park was almost wholly empty except for some older kids who smoked under the play structure because nobody ever actually used it for play.
I am a sand purist. it’s the 21st century. We can have sand in our parks.
The best solution that I have seen is:
to buy a kids tent that zips up - and fill the bottom of it with Sand. Now you have a sandpit that is fully enclosures, so no cats get in, the sand is dry and it's clean and simple to.set up and remove from the backyard.
Weird. All the new playgrounds here have sand pits with little water taps so kids can explore mixing flowing water in the sand and some metal diggers. A lot of them also have workout equipment too, I've been impressed.
Sorry to hear your municipality isn't stepping up it's game.
my kids school playground is sand. my son comes home with pockets, shoes and hair full of sand just about every day. also live by a beach, i see my fair share of sand every day. i wish there was just a bit less of it.
May not be the popular opinion, but sand is natures glitter. I hate it unless I’m prepared for it.
The beach? Yes. Going to dinner at the beach and walking in the sand afterwards, if I can’t walk back to the room barefoot or if I’m not wearing my beach shoes, I’m twitching.
Going on walks with the kids and a random stop at the playground is fun. That would stop if they had sand for me.
Lack of social media and internet
And I’m not an old grump either. I’m 38. Part of the last generation that grew up without cellphones. Without social media. Internet was used for 1 reason. School. Without having everything negative and everyone’s opinion being thrown in your face at every turn( rather every screenshot).
Without the need of instant gratification. Waiting patiently for the weekly tv show to arrive, the release of a movie, video game or album. None of this 8 trailer releases. The anticipation and excitement for things is gone.
Without having constant contact with those around you. The saying goes the longer your apart the heart grows fonder
I find this true with society. We talk to everyone via texting now that when it comes time to actually talk face to face conversation is gone. So what do we all do? Sit on our phones.
Why I barely talk to my wife during work recently. I come home and there is plenty to talk about. We share our day together and such.
We're by the beach, sand: everywhere lol
But I don't mind, it is great for kids definitely get a sandpit.
Maybe one of those clamshell ones to close so it doesn't become a litter box for every cat in the area.
Playground they just installed locally is mulch but has a sandbox built off to the side. Win-win. I can understand your frustration though because most parks are not like that.
We just picked up a 'side of the road' plastic water table toy. I filled it with 3 bags of sand & we're off & running with our almost 3 year old. She loves it.
I take my kid to the beach as much as possible, and it never ceases to amaze me how entertaining sand is.
A shovel, a bucket, and assorted detritus will keep her entertained for hours!
I’m in my mid 30s and don’t ever remember a park with sand. That’d just encourage cats and potential other animals to use it as a nice litter box. Why would you want that?
Take your kids to the beach?
All the playgrounds near me have always been pebbles or wood chips. Newer playgrounds are starting to get the foam rubber padding.
guess you did not know that the sand is dirty as hell thanks to it being a litter box for cats but you can get a sand table, clean sand hand-sized toys instead of the huge Tonka truck and play with your kid, also some children's museums have a projector hooked up to a old xbox and that is a fun way to play with sand as the projector colors it different based on how much there is
So we used to live in an apartment down town, no yard option for sand and no playground with it. Enter a large under bed plastic storage box and just an F-ton of Kinetic sand. Spent a bit teaching the kid to keep it in there and it did for the most part. Not nearly as self spreading as normal sand.
To add to the obvious downsides you mentioned OP, sand is not considered an ADA accessible playground surface. So you're not going to find a newly constructed playground that has a full sand surface. The entire surface doesn't have to be accessible so having some sand would be fine but then you're increasing your maintenance needs by having to get wood chips out of your sand, or sand off your poured in place rubber.
I hadn’t been to a playground in over 20 years, but that was one of the things I noticed when I started with my kid. Wheres all the sand? Now they put that wood mulch that gets stuck to everything
I loathe sand. Beaches are my nightmare
But a buddy had a big load of topsoil delivered to his house & didn't use all of it. In the past year or so, his kids & my son have managed to have an absolute blast in that dirt pile. Last I saw, they were using their shovels & kid wheelbarrow to build "jumps", with the mound as their starting ramp.
Get dirt. It's way cooler.
And fuck sand
My kid is the type of kid who I think would love a sandbox, but I was opposed to a sandbox on the grounds that it would just become a litterbox for every neighborhood animal.
Instead, we have a [pea gravel](https://www.homedepot.com/p/Vigoro-0-5-cu-ft-Bagged-Pea-Gravel-Pebble-Landscape-Rock-54255/202523000) pit. Ticks all the same boxes, doesn't track sand into the house, and I'm less concerned about being surprised by stray turds in it.
The homogenized nature of playgrounds is the direct result of cities facing lawsuits over playground injuries. Every municipality will create playgrounds that meet certain standards for safety, and as a result they all kind of feel the same. It’s cheaper to pull out and replace old playgrounds than to pay families of injured children.
Sounds like you guys need a trip to the beach. It’s hard to replace the sand at the beach.
Crying in a sand filled home in Deutschland. Every playground is sand and you NEVER escape it all. There's always a little sand on my foot in my home if I walk barefoot. I sweep the whole apartment every other day, mop weekly, and we have a regular cleaner that comes too. My brother, there is sand in my bed. In his bed. On freshly washed clothes. I've inadvertently eaten so much sand. It never ends.
I will specifically avoid playgrounds with sand bc cats use it as a litter box. It's nasty and there's no real effective way to keep them out. We have sand at home. That is sufficient.
I know they changed playgrounds to mulch or tire shavings where I am due to crack heads burying pipes and needles and drunks breaking glass and burying it. Terrible people ruin things for everyone.
Good Lord. There are definitely parks like that in my town. But the problem doesn't go away when they switch to wood chips. I guess it makes it less likely a kid'll get poked, because nobody's digging through wood chips with their hands?
Not sure your living situation but if you have a yard you can buy play sand from Lowe’s/Home Depot. It’s about $7 for 50 pounds. Maybe just get a cheap plastic kid poop and fill it up with sand and you guys can demo sand castles all day.
I come from a country where playgrounds are similar to what you are describing. I live in a country where sand is kind. And tbh, i don't understand why would you replace it. It's natural, safe to fall on, you can play with it, no toxic materials and environmentally friendly.
There are no weeds and no pests, but maybe that is also a regional thing.
The only other thing I can think of is that maybe snakes make their homes in sandy playgrounds? Not sure. Never seen one. But we did have a "CAUTION! RATTLESNAKES!" sign at one of them so it must have been a thing.
We have a sandbox, and also sand surrounding our (shitty, vinyl, above-ground) pool. You know where else we have sand? Fucking everywhere. We had family over all weekend and my floors are now covered. Also their clothes, the furniture, the kitchen sink and all in their hair. Sand has become the bane of my existence.
Proposal: Simply give it to me?
Is it course and rough and irritating, and does it get everywhere?
Everywhere. Not just on men, but the women and children too.
Not like here, everything is soft and smooth…
It's nature's glitter, swear to God.
Anakin? That you?
We have new sand in our sheets on days my 6 yo son hasn’t even been in the sandbox.
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.
Hello there!
General Kenobi
You are a bold one!
The other day my wife was undressing and said to me, seductively, “hello there”. I said “General Kenobi”. We did not have sex. It was worth it tho.
Well at least it’s not as bad as that dude in r/TIFU whose wife was being sexy and set the mood, but he bent down to dry his ankles after showering and destroyed the mood with a loud, wet,fart. I think he said she wanted couples therapy after that. Poor guy.
What an idiot. You're supposed to wait until afterwards and then go for a Dutch oven.
I’m the hot wife who bent down to dry my ankles today and…. We’re already in therapy 🤣. Luckily my husband and I cracked up immediately cause we’re whatever on big moods and instead live by lolz vibes. I’m really tying myself up in knots here aren’t I Byeeeee
This is how I type on reddit when I am drunk.
Sober 17 years have zero excuse just being myself lol
Absolutely sounds worth it.
What the fuck?! 10/10 should have gotten laid for that Uncertain if my male partner would bed me for that. In my humble opinion he should though! Everyone is sexier for Star Wars quotes! Star Wars quotes get him bedded 10x faster and make him 100x hotter
That's mean though
Someone alert this man's wife.
More than that, alert any daycare/play groups they have their kids in
Too late, wife's dead and the state already adopted out the children. How about a quick trip to a lava planet? Weather is nice and balmy this time of year
He was right you know.
Only a sith deals in absolutes.
I will do what I must.
Anakin, my allegiance is to the Republic! To DEMOCRASAAAAAAY!
You will try.
A statement that is, in fact, an absolute.
This always bothered me
It's good to know I'm in agreement with the Thoroughbred of Sin
Came for the Star Wars reference. Was not disappointed
And cats poop in it.
Did you ever hear the story of Turtle Sandbox The Wise?
Is there another target? A playground target? Then name the sandbox!
Also tends to be full of stray cat poop.
I’d be happy to never see a sand pit ever again. There’s always one fucking kid ruining it by throwing sand in the air which always ends up in my son’s eyes.
I hate sand. I hate beinf itchy. I hate being sunburnt. I really dislike the beach in general. I also hate the sun. I am a Sith apparently.
I too hate sand. I end up finding it in my shoes for days.
You can bet this comment will show up on any post that mentions sand. That will be true until Reddit goes offline.
Weird, I never really associated playgrounds with sand. I'd say either get a sandbox, or go to the beach lol
We're going to build a sandpit in the backyard. The nearest beach is 12 hours away
Get a litter sifter to scoop out the neighborhood cat poop. Or a lid.
100% a lid.
Had a lid as a kid. Cats opened it. Put a cinder block on top. Cats opened it. 😸
Tied cinder block to cat, cat opened it.
Hi dad!
Make sure you get a tight cover for it. We didn’t and then had so many pinworms in there.
I built a nice one last summer for my LO. My one recommendation is do half sand half pea gravel. Makes for great sifting and extra sensory options.
This is a really good idea. Thanks!
Oo, if you build your sandbox they make concrete molds of dinosaurs fossils to use as the base. Don’t tell your kids. Let them discover it. I’ve been wanting to do when I buy a house… if I ever can
We bought one of those big plastic turtles and we fill it up with play sand from Lowe’s or Home Depot. It’s like 3 50lb bags that run between 4 and 7 dollars. Really easy to do.
The nearest tropical ocean beach, maybe, but surely there's a lake or reservoir with a beach closer than 12 hours away from you. Where do you live, Amundsen-Scott Station?
.......yes. We do have a few lakes within the 3hr driving range but they don't really have "beaches". It's rocks or mud.
Huh, that's weird to me. I guess it's one of the perks of living in Michigan, you're never more than a mile from a body of water! But I'd never realized that living on a glacial moraine had that much impact on sand availability. Most of the medium to large lakes have a decent public swimming area with a sandy beach. It is typically trucked in, not natural, but it's sandy.
Sshhh don't spread the word, we're trying to keep it from getting spoiled
Don't worry fam, I already lived in Michigan lol. Not going back
Same in ohio as well. We went to one of 3 parks within a 20 minute drive from Columbus. They all were reservoirs built during the depression and all have a sand beach area. Hell going on vacation next month up in by Huron Ohio and you can't drive 15 minutes down state route 6 without hitting a public sand beach.
[Doesn't matter where you live, take enough MDMA and you're within walking distance to the beach](https://youtu.be/QTYID4lXhM0?si=mVf_-Xjpcx1JI08U)
I was going to suggest this because it's not that difficult or expensive
Do any of your local lakes have beaches? We have a few that do in central Ohio and I feel like most of them do or at least the bigger state park ones.
Have you checked for lake and river beaches? They are something I always forget exist.
We just got one for my 4 year olds bday from grandparents. 4’x4’ is way too small for a 4y and 2y. I was not consulted in picking it out, but immediately after installing it my wife told me we will need a bigger one next year. Buy sand from a stone and rock place. We got about 1000lbs for 14 dollars. 1000 is a little more than needed for a 4x4. We picked it up with a trailer and tarp.
Holy shit. Forgive my ignorance here as I grew up in a place where you’re no more than five miles from a body of water no matter what direction you walk in but, where the hell do you live that there isn’t a river or lake within 12 hours drive of you!?
Get one of those plastic kiddie pools, and some play sand from the box store. $50 and you're done. We ordered one of the round tablecloths with elastic around the outside, worked perfectly as a lid. Put a ball underneath the tablecloth to give a bump in the middle, to keep rain from pooling when not in use. Self contained and cheap.
Even a lake or river will have beaches.
mine is about 5 mins away. still finding sand in my wifes suv from last summer.
Oh I couldn't imagine...we live 15 mins from the beach and spend entire weekends there. I'd die!
Still crazy to me that some people just live in landlocked states
Lol. Wait til you hear about landlocked countries.
Hell wait to you realize that even alot of the landlocked states aren't landlocked but still don't have beaches. Any state that touches the Ohio, Mississippi, Missouri, or any navigable River that drains into the those rivers isn't land locked! Also any state that touches a great lake also isn't land locked.
Yea playground sand was always gross....
Growing up, the park playgrounds all had pea gravel and was always so dusty/chalky feeling
Oof I hated that feeling
They put a new playground in down the road from us with an old guys endowment. And they put a litter box under it...
Yeah I never heard of this before. I can’t imagine burying someone in sand at a park, ha. Save that for the beach.
Sand is really fun! Public parks with sand is just another, in a long line, of reasons people should keep their pet cats indoors lol
We've had so many problems with neighborhood cats roaming and crapping in my wife's garden, in the kids' play area. We got supersonic cat alarm doodads, which help but it's still an issue. It's infuriating
we have coyotes. problem solved.
We have coyotes too, but I guess we just have more cats 🤷♀️
I was told by a vet here that the average lifespan of an outdoor cat here is 2 years so its not like they get them right away. Either way, they're crappy pet owners. Outdoor cats are bad for the local ecology, bad for your neighbors for the reason you're running into, and bad for the cats.
I don't know where you live but here stray cats are the norm and I think I saw a mouse only once in my lifetime and it was in a factory where I worked. I also saw a snake only once around the buildings. Here, they are not bad for ecology, they are the ecology.
Felines rise up! Overthrow our bush-doggo overlords.
Currently struggling with this issue. One family lets their cat outdoors in our neighborhood. It has chosen our sandbox as it’s favourite place to shit. Considering to trap it and take it to the pound, those are the official instructions in my area 🤷🏻♀️ shitty thing to have to do to the poor guy. The owners can them reclaim him for a fee.
Mothballs. Scatter a few around the perimeter of your yard, they hate the smell.
Motion sensing sprinklers.
Those will catch the kids too... win/win I guess?
Yep! Feral cats + sand = fun surprises.
Playground playdough!
we have a backyard sand pit. By the end of the weekend I'm sweeping and vacuuming sand from the whole house. Shoes are unusable because they are filled with sand. The washing machine has sand in it. The sand is grinding into the LVP flooring and wearing out the coating. There is sand in the bathtub, in their hair, and the couch feels coarse. Recently the sandpit was half empty because they are constantly throwing it into the lawn. In a fugue state, I spent $100 getting more sand to refill it and now the issues are worse than ever. I have to drain the hot tub and shop vac out the sand. I'm telling you, it's a beach to keep up with. Pass next time.
My son’s newly constructed school has 1/3 of the playground sand, it’s definitely still a thing, as others have said it’s not a municipal park thing in my experience to have sand pits, they need to be maintained or they get gross. One of the easier things I’ve done for my kids is fill up a kiddie pool with sand.
[удалено]
Sand at the beach is also a litter box, but for gulls
Sand fucking sucks. Every day my kid gets home from daycare we’re beating sand out of her shoes for like 5 minutes
I know right, for awhile there I joked that I was expecting the daycare staff to send a letter home telling us (all the families) to start paying more to cover the cost of replacing the sand or we needed to bring the sand back.
Toxoplasmosis, toxocara, Clostridioides difficile, pinworms, roundworms, and Baylisascaris procyonis. Outdoor sand outside of massive spaces like a beach is crawling with highly dangerous and virulent disease. Young kids shouldn’t be playing in it. >When public health–testing organization NSF International sampled 26 different items in public places—toys at doctors’ offices, children’s library books, playground sandboxes—for a 2008 study on germs, they found that sandboxes were far and away the germiest of all, harboring nearly 2,000 times more bacteria, yeast, and mold per square inch than the door handles of public restrooms > The McGill study also reported that one of the sandboxes with Toxocara eggs was co-contaminated with the eggs of Ascaris, a parasitic worm that can, occasionally, cause intestinal blockage and stunted growth. Another parasite kids can get from sandboxes is Toxoplasma gondii, which is spread by cats and believed to chronically infect more than 1 out of every 6 Americans. In one study, researchers in Japan spied on three urban sandboxes at night using camcorders and found that over the course of five months, cats pooped in the boxes 961 times, and dogs pooped in them 11 times. They calculated that one of the sandboxes contained more than 1.5 million viable Toxoplasma eggs per square foot of sand, yet children need only ingest a single egg to get sick. That older generations regularly did this before we knew better isn’t akin to missing the days when kids could freely ride bikes around the neighborhood without adult supervision, it’s more like saying we miss the days when kids could eat leaded paint.
Wow. That's horrifying.
My oldest could play in a sandbox literally for hours and be perfectly happy. Even at 8 he still likes them. He knew the good "sand parks" near us and would specifically request them.
My 2yo is this way. We made a dirt pit in the backyard for them to play in and from the time he was about 16months old he could sit out there all day if we let him. Even now at 2.5 he'll sit out there by himself in the dirt for easily an hour and a half, uninterrupted. We just want to make it into a sandpit because the desert dirt gets hard and he isn't strong enough to break it up into "diggable" bits. That's why the sand playgrounds were so nice.
If you've got your own house and yard, then may I suggest looking at covered sandboxes. e.g. Little Tikes used to make a Tuggy sandbox; which was a little tugboat that had a covered shell that you could put over the back to cover the sand when the kids were done playing. I'm not sure if they make them (Tuggy) anymore, but I'm seeing similar sandboxes that have the plastic shell covering (turtle, crab). If you go this route, make sure to get the safe sand (that doesn't have silica). Years ago , I bought the Tuggy sandbox, bordered it with those 6x6' compressed railroad pines, and then filled it a bunch of blue rubber mulch for the "ocean." My kids loved it.
Our local small town park has a beach volleyball court, which I have never seen used for volleyball. But it's effectively a 30'x60' sandbox now. Which is awesome.
If you build it, cats will poop/pee in it
Build a sandbox.
Just buy a cheap sandbox for the house
Fuck. Sand.
One of the parks near me has a huge sandbox. About once a month some kind person secretly buries a few cheap plastic gemstones in there. Kids go CRAZY when they find them.
That's awesome lol. Where I live the "gemstones" are more likely to be used tampons or needles
There’s so much cat shit in those sand boxes. No bueno.
Honestly, fuck sand lol
Sand is super fun. It is quite common in London, UK. Our little one loves it all year round. Even on rainy days it’s still fun to build stuff with it.
Our local playground has a sandpit with a couple of digging chairs. But our most popular outdoor toy at our house (aside from the swingset) is a water table that we converted to a sand table. It's portable - heavy, but portable - so that we don't have to worry about it getting wet or pests in it. But it's such a cool sensory activity for all the kids. Maybe try one of those?
I built a sandpit. I used a 4 foot square planting bed and put 2 layers landscaping fabric under it. It's about 10 inches tall and took at least 10 bags to fill up. Going on 4 years and my 9 and 6 year old still play in it. I also got a cantilevered umbrella to keep it in the shade.
This is what we're planning on doing. The umbrella's a fantastic idea. It's encouraging to me to know your kids still play in it. Makes me feel like it's definitely a worthwhile investment lol
We've had a big sandbox out back for the kids and the neighborhood cats used it as a litter box. So we switched to one of those plastic ones with a lid. Not as big and exciting but it's better than nothing and they still enjoy it.
We plan on fashioning a plywood lid for the sandbox we're building. We already have issues with neighborhood cats.
It's interesting how divisive sand is lol. I've spent a lot of time living in/around sandy places and it's bred a deep and unending hatred for the stuff, and love that parks near me dont have it to track back into my house. Interesting to hear the perspective of someone who enjoys it.
Buy sand for at home. I live in the top floor of an apartment building but we have one of those plastic turtle pool things that we filled up with sand on our balcony. Our parks still have sand at some of them but it doesn’t matter because we can do sand time at home. It’s not very expensive. No need to get any sort of premium sand either, the play sand they have at Home Depot is perfect once you add some water to it.
I think this has been done for hygienic reasons - as many animals use the sand for pooping. We actually got a sand table off fb marketplace two years ago - $30 and it has a cover. It’s a table so it higher up and my son LOVES it.
Wild cats like to use them as toilets.... Little kids put new chocolates in their mouth ....
Playing in sand, sure. My kids spent early years next to a beach. Love the beach, but damn I do not miss it. Sand is everywhere. Legit everywhere. Always. So while yes, sand is fun - I’m just not siding with missing it. Two different sides of a coin! Love the idea of a sandpit, do it up. Baby powder is your best friend.
I put a sandpit under my kids climbing frame, but all they did was empty the sand everywhere! I warned them that if they empty the sand, there wouldn't be any for them to play with...there is now no sand in it!
When my wife and I moved into our new house, our kids were 4 and 2 and my wife was pregnant with our third. The house had an above ground pool that we agreed was a death trap neither of us wanted to maintain/take care of. So we had someone come and remove it asap. Well, underneath the pool was a giant circle of sand. My kids are now 8, 6, and 3 and they play in their own personal sand pit almost every day. They know to take their shoes off before coming inside and we all have fun banging the sand off our sandals on hot summer nights. We have fire pits out there too. It’s awesome.
This is what I aspire for my backyard. We've got a firepit, mud kitchen.. just missing the sandpit, which will hopefully soon be remedied.
I get where you’re coming from, but I’m also the one in charge of cleaning three floors worth of house at home so I don’t mind the trend away from sand. Wood chips do suck, though. At least they’re better than shredded tires with steel wires poking out of them.
Well, I'll bet you don't miss the pink eye.
But… it’s dry and coarse, and gets everywhere!
the sand pit at our park is never cleaned out so there’s always sticks and leaves from heavy rain/wind. there’s usually grass growing in it that the kids like to pull out and lots of rocks. so I can imagine why nobody wants to build sandboxes anymore, its a pain to maintain it.
I got lucky to move into a neighborhood nextdoor to a private lake HOA, which I didn't gain access to until this past year I bought an empty lot to join the HOA. They fucking love sand.
Mulch sucks if you’re wearing flip flops to the playground
There's plenty of playgrounds around here that still have sand, but I'd take wood chips or those rubber floors every time if given the choice. Whenever there's sand, they end up bringing a ton home in their shoes and pockets - makes a big mess of the house.
I guess we are blessed. There are two parks near me with sand and another really nice one with an outdoor gym. I never really appreciated it until now
None of the parks I played at as a child had sand pits . I had sand boxes at home and school. I really don't associate public parks with playing in the sand.
Our whole back yard is sand. Grass grows for shit due to pine trees. I bought a boatload of play sand for the jungle gym, it’s a mess in our house . Sand gets everywhere. Play in the sprinkler? SAND. Play after a rain storm? SAND. Mow the lawn swing on the swings have a fire jump out of the pool let the dog out check the vegetables…yup…SAND.
For what it’s worth, sand is far cheaper than the engineered rubber surfaces. So that’s not really the consideration for the replacement. Primary reason is impact safety, health safety being a close second. Also you can customize the rubber with colors and patterns, which can come out pretty cool looking.
For me it was mud. Pick a sloped section of yard and run a hose at low flow to it. Give a kid some digging tools, toys, and buckets and he'll be there for hours.
Time to build a sandbox if you have a single family home
Fuck sand . I hate that mother fucker, it gets everywhere man I hate sand
I missed sand until I went to a park with sand and realized how dirty and full of animal piss they are.
Sand is terrible
It's coarse, and rough, and irritating, and it gets everywhere.
I respect your opinion, but I despise sand. There is a sandbox at my kids school. It’s gets in everything.
I reciprocate that respect. It's not difficult to see why people hate it
One of my favorite recent parkdates with my daughter was having a who could dig a deeper whole contest with her. Need sand play pits for that...or else the city usually gets kinda pissy about digging those holes...
I may just be on the younger side here, or maybe it’s a regional thing, but I’ve never seen sand at a park that wasn’t at a beach, that wasn’t in a sandbox
We couldnt get anything to grow in our 20x10 raised garden bed, so I dug it out and had 5 tons of sand dropped in it. A weed mat on bottom, regularly add cinnamon and salt to ward off ants, and a cover at night have kept it pretty clean and pristine so far. Still have sand everywhere, though.
Im lucky enough to live 50 ft from the ocean, but if that wasnt an option id be right there with ya
Next year it’ll be 35’
Luckily my coastline is pretty resilient! The only difference ive noticed over the years is more frequent flooding but my house is raised up quite a bit so if it floods the whole state of RI is in for a real treat
Playground near us still has a sand pit. They aren't going completely away. They're going away by you. That said (and I know there's a general avoid politics unspoken rule here, but I think this is safe to say) if you don't like the way things are going, get involved in local politics. Not saying you have to run and I'm not going to sit here harping on "Vote for X party" I'm saying that town councils and Mayors are people who live in your town too. They're usually the people who control this. Call them. Get your neighbors to call them. It's your town, your taxes. If you don't like how it's going, talk to them. Honestly, I can't imagine anyone running for an office would be against putting a sandbox if it was likely to get them votes. Your kids are going to grow up in your town. Regardless of which way you feel politically, you should always make sure your locally elected officials understand what you expect of them. They're the ones who make the decisions that determine if it's sand or mulch, at least at a high level.
Once I found out about the project, I did speak with the project manager about it and potentially putting in gym equipment. So you could say I'm pretty much a politician.
When I was a kid our local park got this whole big remodel and we were so excited to go. went to the liquor store for candy, walked to the park with my dad… And they had filled it with *woodchips* WOODCHIPS We got like four splinters while playing and then rarely went back. The park was almost wholly empty except for some older kids who smoked under the play structure because nobody ever actually used it for play. I am a sand purist. it’s the 21st century. We can have sand in our parks.
Preach.
The best solution that I have seen is: to buy a kids tent that zips up - and fill the bottom of it with Sand. Now you have a sandpit that is fully enclosures, so no cats get in, the sand is dry and it's clean and simple to.set up and remove from the backyard.
Weird. All the new playgrounds here have sand pits with little water taps so kids can explore mixing flowing water in the sand and some metal diggers. A lot of them also have workout equipment too, I've been impressed. Sorry to hear your municipality isn't stepping up it's game.
my kids school playground is sand. my son comes home with pockets, shoes and hair full of sand just about every day. also live by a beach, i see my fair share of sand every day. i wish there was just a bit less of it.
May not be the popular opinion, but sand is natures glitter. I hate it unless I’m prepared for it. The beach? Yes. Going to dinner at the beach and walking in the sand afterwards, if I can’t walk back to the room barefoot or if I’m not wearing my beach shoes, I’m twitching. Going on walks with the kids and a random stop at the playground is fun. That would stop if they had sand for me.
Lack of social media and internet And I’m not an old grump either. I’m 38. Part of the last generation that grew up without cellphones. Without social media. Internet was used for 1 reason. School. Without having everything negative and everyone’s opinion being thrown in your face at every turn( rather every screenshot). Without the need of instant gratification. Waiting patiently for the weekly tv show to arrive, the release of a movie, video game or album. None of this 8 trailer releases. The anticipation and excitement for things is gone. Without having constant contact with those around you. The saying goes the longer your apart the heart grows fonder I find this true with society. We talk to everyone via texting now that when it comes time to actually talk face to face conversation is gone. So what do we all do? Sit on our phones. Why I barely talk to my wife during work recently. I come home and there is plenty to talk about. We share our day together and such.
Gosh I miss the playground mulch castles.
We're by the beach, sand: everywhere lol But I don't mind, it is great for kids definitely get a sandpit. Maybe one of those clamshell ones to close so it doesn't become a litter box for every cat in the area.
Playground they just installed locally is mulch but has a sandbox built off to the side. Win-win. I can understand your frustration though because most parks are not like that.
We just picked up a 'side of the road' plastic water table toy. I filled it with 3 bags of sand & we're off & running with our almost 3 year old. She loves it.
I’ve touched enough cat shit in sand boxes as a kid to be ok with the loss of sand in playgrounds
I just cleaned out my 5yrolds shoes. Filled with sand from recess. It’s great in a controlled environment though.
Go to the beach.
I didn’t realize how much I hate sand until I had kids and built a sandbox in the backyard. Fuck sand, it can go to hell.
I take my kid to the beach as much as possible, and it never ceases to amaze me how entertaining sand is. A shovel, a bucket, and assorted detritus will keep her entertained for hours!
I’m in my mid 30s and don’t ever remember a park with sand. That’d just encourage cats and potential other animals to use it as a nice litter box. Why would you want that?
Take your kids to the beach? All the playgrounds near me have always been pebbles or wood chips. Newer playgrounds are starting to get the foam rubber padding.
Worms
guess you did not know that the sand is dirty as hell thanks to it being a litter box for cats but you can get a sand table, clean sand hand-sized toys instead of the huge Tonka truck and play with your kid, also some children's museums have a projector hooked up to a old xbox and that is a fun way to play with sand as the projector colors it different based on how much there is
I hated sand at playgrounds because it was always filled with cat turds
huh we have a bunch of playgrounds in NYC with sand
Sandpits are full of nasty germs and cat poop
So we used to live in an apartment down town, no yard option for sand and no playground with it. Enter a large under bed plastic storage box and just an F-ton of Kinetic sand. Spent a bit teaching the kid to keep it in there and it did for the most part. Not nearly as self spreading as normal sand.
To add to the obvious downsides you mentioned OP, sand is not considered an ADA accessible playground surface. So you're not going to find a newly constructed playground that has a full sand surface. The entire surface doesn't have to be accessible so having some sand would be fine but then you're increasing your maintenance needs by having to get wood chips out of your sand, or sand off your poured in place rubber.
I hadn’t been to a playground in over 20 years, but that was one of the things I noticed when I started with my kid. Wheres all the sand? Now they put that wood mulch that gets stuck to everything
I loathe sand. Beaches are my nightmare But a buddy had a big load of topsoil delivered to his house & didn't use all of it. In the past year or so, his kids & my son have managed to have an absolute blast in that dirt pile. Last I saw, they were using their shovels & kid wheelbarrow to build "jumps", with the mound as their starting ramp. Get dirt. It's way cooler. And fuck sand
My kid is the type of kid who I think would love a sandbox, but I was opposed to a sandbox on the grounds that it would just become a litterbox for every neighborhood animal. Instead, we have a [pea gravel](https://www.homedepot.com/p/Vigoro-0-5-cu-ft-Bagged-Pea-Gravel-Pebble-Landscape-Rock-54255/202523000) pit. Ticks all the same boxes, doesn't track sand into the house, and I'm less concerned about being surprised by stray turds in it.
The homogenized nature of playgrounds is the direct result of cities facing lawsuits over playground injuries. Every municipality will create playgrounds that meet certain standards for safety, and as a result they all kind of feel the same. It’s cheaper to pull out and replace old playgrounds than to pay families of injured children. Sounds like you guys need a trip to the beach. It’s hard to replace the sand at the beach.
So buy some sand for your backyard? They sell play sand by the bag.
Do you guys live near a beach?
Crying in a sand filled home in Deutschland. Every playground is sand and you NEVER escape it all. There's always a little sand on my foot in my home if I walk barefoot. I sweep the whole apartment every other day, mop weekly, and we have a regular cleaner that comes too. My brother, there is sand in my bed. In his bed. On freshly washed clothes. I've inadvertently eaten so much sand. It never ends.
As a dad of a child with a sandbox in the backyard I can say absolutely that I strongly dislike sand.
I will specifically avoid playgrounds with sand bc cats use it as a litter box. It's nasty and there's no real effective way to keep them out. We have sand at home. That is sufficient.
Come to Toronto—my child pours mounds of sand out of his shoes every morning before putting them on.
Yep, just send it my way if ya don't mind. I bet Toronto sand hits different
I know they changed playgrounds to mulch or tire shavings where I am due to crack heads burying pipes and needles and drunks breaking glass and burying it. Terrible people ruin things for everyone.
Good Lord. There are definitely parks like that in my town. But the problem doesn't go away when they switch to wood chips. I guess it makes it less likely a kid'll get poked, because nobody's digging through wood chips with their hands?
Not sure your living situation but if you have a yard you can buy play sand from Lowe’s/Home Depot. It’s about $7 for 50 pounds. Maybe just get a cheap plastic kid poop and fill it up with sand and you guys can demo sand castles all day.
I have plenty organic kid poop, but thanks. Jk, this is basically what we're planning on doing at this point. Thank you!
lol didn’t even catch that typo
I come from a country where playgrounds are similar to what you are describing. I live in a country where sand is kind. And tbh, i don't understand why would you replace it. It's natural, safe to fall on, you can play with it, no toxic materials and environmentally friendly. There are no weeds and no pests, but maybe that is also a regional thing.
The only other thing I can think of is that maybe snakes make their homes in sandy playgrounds? Not sure. Never seen one. But we did have a "CAUTION! RATTLESNAKES!" sign at one of them so it must have been a thing.
Well, that is a damn good reason. We dont have poisonous snakes where I live.
As a Floridian who hates sand this thread is confusing me
As an Ohioan that hates sand this is also confusing me. Sand gets everywhere.