Missing Walls

To celebrate her grand 1st birthday, my mom ordered Miss Monkey the Little Tikes Cambridge Cottage Playhouse for our backyard. Her daycare has a playhouse that she absolutely loves, so we knew it was going to be a hit.

My mom sent me several links and asked me to pick out a playhouse - which is a little like picking out a car. There are so many color choices and options that you can spend hours trying to find the playhouse that suits your personality.. er, I mean the kid's personality. I will admit that I am slightly jealous that my daughter's house already looks better than mine. I am even jealous of that bright blue roof - who wouldn't want a blue roof? I especially love how the Little Tikes web site describes it: "..as spacious as it is stylish, this playhouse has a stunning brick design, columns and dutch door.." Do they make these in a single-family home model?

I finally picked out this one and have been waiting anxiously for it to arrive. Side note: I love it when your item arrives before the estimated arrival date on Amazon's tracking page. I think they purposely do that so you are more impressed with their shipping capabilities. Tricky Amazon.

Anyways, so the Cambridge Cottage arrives in a huge box today. I was planning to wait for the fiance to get home but decided that I was crazy capable, and cracked open the humongous box.

The only thing worse than trying to put together a huge plastic toy with a screwgun, is having a toddler attempt to "help" you. I guess I should use a different word than "help" - maybe "try to climb on every plastic piece, especially when it's the plastic piece you need to reach for next". I have no idea how she knew, but she was always climbing on the next piece I needed! She must have studied the manuel while I was trying to find the screw gun. I have a genious.

I finally started making headway and was almost done when I realized there was something different about this playhouse than what was described. Little Tikes forgot to include a whole back panel.



Somehow I missed the part about it coming with built-in air-conditioning. The sad part is that this panel had one of the most exciting features: the trap door. Have I mentioned how jealous I am of this cottage?

Luckily the house still stands pretty sturdy with the roof attached to the top, so we've been allowing Miss Monkey (and our drunk friends) to play inside of it.



After having my receipt go to the verification department for 3-4 days, I am happy to announce that our replacement part "L" is on its way.