Parents Making own gymnastic equipment...

[Ariana's_Mommy]

So, in our house little Miss. Ariana has a birthday Dec 17th and the following week is Christmas! Can you guess what she wants?? Why yes, a beam, junior bar, rings, mats, oh my the list!! So, I have been looking into prices and oh my are they high!! My husband is a great carpenter and mentioned building the beam and bar himself...I laughed at him of course! But, then I started researching it, turns out he can make it for a fraction of the cost! So, for right now we are going to (well he is) going to build the equipment himself...we understand that when she's a little older we will have to purchase these items for more sturdiness. So, we are cutting the cost by making, and just need to buy the mats! Has anybody else gone this route?

 

[Jen H.]

In all honesty, just buy the mats. The risk of injury far exceeds any benefits that she would get out of in home equipment. Not to mention that she would be learning and practicing poor form and bad habits. Let her create her own "gym equipment" out of the living room furniture.
Leave the gym at the gym!

 

[iwannacoach]

Don't make your own equipment, well maybe a floor beam would be ok but a bar and rings are really a bad idea. I get that your husband is a carpenter, but knowing how to high pressure laminate maple with the proper grain orientation and layer thickness isn't enough to put together equipment that's safe. The equipment industry has invested years in figuring out how to design and manufacture equipment that holds up to the pressure and stress kids put into it under supervision.

So who's going to design the equipment and supervise the way it's used at home?

 

[iwannacoach]

Let her create her own "gym equipment" out of the living room furniture.
Leave the gym at the gym!

Kids... ya gotta love em!

 

[skschlag]

My ds has wanted rings for years. We have refused! I agree...mats are great....you could also make a parallettes to work on strength (girls need that too ) . That is all we have (well, and a mushroom but you don't want/need one of those!)

Good luck!

 

[Ariana's_Mommy]

We aren't making rings lol. Wouldn't even dream of it. The beam will not be off the floor. The junior bar basically for her to get more upper strength not do all the crazy stuff on. And if course she would be supervised!

 

[mouey77]

We aren't making rings lol. Wouldn't even dream of it. The beam will not be off the floor. The junior bar basically for her to get more upper strength not do all the crazy stuff on. And if course she would be supervised!

I think a floor beam would be ok. We have one. And the mat.

Is a bar really a bad idea? A couple of the girls on team have a "gym" at home including bars. I would love to know where people put all of this "gym" equipment in their houses! We found a bar add on to our outdoor play set and were thinking of getting that for Christmas. I do not foresee DD doing giants on this . Probably back hip circles and that mill thing she is dying to nail down. As it is, she uses just about any railing she finds anywhere in public or at parks to "practice" on.

 

[Bajanswife]

I remember DD doing mill circle around the very top frame of the swingset .......

 

[bogwoppit]

After I saw a little kid doing giants in her basement, badly, on a home bar on youtube I realised just how bad a home bar can be when you have crazy parents who think they can coach anything.

 

[2littlegymnasts]

A floor beam and a chin up bar in the doorway would be great. My husband made the floor beam and they loved it for about a month. Now they hardly use it. Glad it only cost us 50 bucks. It's like any other toy they get. The excitement wears off fast.

 

[Jen H.]

After I saw a little kid doing giants in her basement, badly, on a home bar on youtube I realised just how bad a home bar can be when you have crazy parents who think they can coach anything.

Holy crap!!! That is scary!!!

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Omg - that's frightening ! I have visions of her peeling off into the lawnmower! Seriously, at 3 at most I would get a mat. My daughter didn't start gym til she was 6.

 

[bogwoppit]

Okay here is another gem, I have visions of her flying through that window. Having a bar doesn't mean the parent can become a coach.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Hmm, don't you just Love her form on those swings ! NOT !

 

[bogwoppit]

Ooh giants too!!

Now I am only putting these out here because the parents have chosen to make them public one youtube. All of this home coaching takes months and years to uncoach in the gym. Badly learned technique is a coaches nightmare and then kids have to be taken back to basics, they get bored, parents get cranky and kids quit.

Having a beam and mat to play on is one thing, but parents coaching skills they do not really understand leads to a lot of stress. Keep the coaching in the gym, by all means have some gym "play things" at home, but please do not coach skills.

 

[Flossyduck]

Wow. I'm stupified, really. Yep, the one with the window in front scares the bejeebers out of me. Picking up bad habits aside, from a caring parent point of view, why would people put their children in situations like that?!

"My ds has wanted rings for years. We have refused! "

I don't want to speak for anyone here, but what I understood Skschlag to be saying was not about the rings specifically, but more to point out that all kids wants things, but we don't have to let them have them... Most if not all of our kids have begged us for gym equipment for the home and there's a lot of wisdom on here about what is sensible and what is not - both from a coaching point of view and from a parental 'waste of money point of view'. It might be worth reading through old threads to get a sense of what people have said, as there is a lot of consensus nad that doesn't happen often on here!

I see no harm in a floor beam, with a good mat and plenty of space around it. I don't know about how much use a toddler would get out of it, but my 9 year old dd has used hers to work on routines, spins and jumps from time to time. It was passed on by someone else, I wouldn't say she's justified paying for a new one, but it has been worth having a free one.

The other thing we have is a chin up bar which was about $10 and fixes in the doorway. She has used that way more than the beam - to do chin ups and leg lifts and to learn her pullover in the early days. She still uses it to break in new handguards and do split hangs and chin ups. I'd say it gets swung from most days, so a great piece of kit.

 

[mouey77]

Oh my!!

I do not even feel qualified to advise on handstand form let alone coach on bars!!

I figure if we put a bar outside for our DD she will play on it on her own, and assuming she sticks with gymnastics and is in the gym more will save the big stuff for gym time.

 

[maryRS]

Why on earth would anyone "spot" giants with a 5 year old in a house? What is wrong with people!

 

[mommyof1]

We have a folding foam floor beam that did not cost much over $100. We also have a doorway chin-up bar for conditioning (it sits at the top of the doorway and cannot be used for pullovers, etc.). These items are used only sporadically. I do think that a younger child with more free time might use the floor beam more frequently to play "gymnastics meet," etc., not necessarily for practice.

The parents of a kid who used to attend our gym spent something like $300 on a "real" floor beam that took up an entire room and was almost never used.

 

[Quadqueen]

After I saw a little kid doing giants in her basement, badly, on a home bar on youtube I realised just how bad a home bar can be when you have crazy parents who think they can coach anything.

looks like they also have a rope for her to climb!!