DIY Bridge-Style Swing

I must admit that I am quite proud of this endeavor.  I’ve never been too much of a do-it-yourself-er, mainly because I don’t have the time to dedicate to it.  For example, this latest project has literally been in the works for months.  I posted about it in early November, and even back then I said that I’d been taking way too long in making it.  You might remember the huge bridge-style swing base that I had lying around, waiting to be turned into something amazing.

Lola and the bridge swing base

Well, it’s finally turned into that something amazing!  And I think that this has to be my greatest DIY project yet.  I’m really happy with the finished result.  All in all, it didn’t even take that long.  Putting the whole thing together took approximately two and a half hours in total, which was much less than I’d anticipated.  Working with the sisal rope, however, wasn’t exactly fun: my hands were literally bleeding by the end of it.  But hey, what we wouldn’t do to make our birds happy, right?

As I wrote in the previous post, this swing was inspired by the absolutely beautiful triangle, square, and bridge swings by Les Jouets Rosie, who make the most creative and gorgeous swings on the market.  All credit for design and idea goes to them; they are the original creators of these beautiful swings.  Mine is not even close to as aesthetically pleasing, but I’m proud to be able to say it was wrought by my own hands.  Their swings are so carefully made and so time-consuming that the company hasn’t been selling them for the past several months (maybe even year?) now, and I couldn’t get my hands on one anyway.  So I decided to attempt it myself, especially because there were a few things that I wanted to change about the swing anyway.  I have a strange aversion to dowels and absolutely hate them, so that was the first thing I wanted to get rid of.  To go along with the natural wood base, I also wanted it to be made entirely of natural wood toy parts.  Sure, I sacrificed a lot of the pretty factor, but I’m okay with the result.

step one: making the base more interesting

The very first step was to work with the base.  I added sisal rope in between the “rungs” of the bridge, along with some barky willow wood chunks, in order to provide some more enrichment at the ground level.  These strings also make the bridge a lot easier for my little budgies to navigate, since the rungs and each section are a bit too large for the budgies’ little feet.  I’ve left the center section empty for now, but I might add some strings to it later as well depending on how the birds take to them.

close-up of the sisal ropes

I even took the time to teach myself how to make these very fancy Flemish knots to make the swing more decorative and beautiful!

two strings packed with parts: half-way done!

Here’s the swing at the half-way point.  Step two was to start building up the supporting rope (or the suspension) of the bridge.  I decided on a combination of hardwood honeycomb beads, pine wood foraging blocks, cottonwood, willow, and birch coins, fragrant pine wood pieces, and elm and yucca wood sticks, all strung together on the sisal.

the finished product!

from another angle

And there it is!  I hung it up where the Roller Coaster swing used to be and attached the highway from the Crawler to the bridge.  I’ll probably hang a toy in the center eventually but I want to see how they navigate it first as is.  I’m pretty excited!  It combines a lot of irresistible chews with four foraging blocks as well.  I haven’t gotten a chance to let Lola or the budgies explore yet, but I’ll take some more photos when they do.  Yay!  I think I can safely say that this is my best project ever!

New Budgie Setups!

We’re still alive!  No reason for the hiatus really, just taking a break I guess.  Anyway, I recently gave the budgies’ home a makeover (I try to every few weeks or maybe two months at the most).  A lot of the beautiful perches I’ve been collecting have been put to good use.  I’m pretty happy with these setups and the budgies seem to be enjoying them as well.  I like the variety and they’ve actually both been using all levels of the cage too, which is always nice.  The photos actually show the setup before I made the final tweaks, so it looks slightly different from the earliest ones, but I took a few to show the changes I made below.  Here are the earlier ones.

the entire cage

There’s the entire view, which I think looks pretty good!  They both have a lot of different types of perches, swings, toys, and surfaces on their respective sides.  We’ll take a closer look now, starting with Sabrina’s side.

Sabrina's side

the top level of Sabrina's side

Here it is, except the bamboo safety pedicure perch right in front on the door is no longer there; I removed it and replaced it with a manu mineral perch.  (Photos of that are below).  On the top you see that there is her tire-style sleepy swing, of course, a boing, and a single ring swing, all from Grey Feather Toys.  Since they are most likely to roost at the top parts of the cage, I like to make sure that these perches are extra comfy.  She also has one of those great foraging toys and a nice noisy bell toy as well that she loves to ring while playing and swinging on her boing.

the middle level of Sabrina's side

Below the upper level, she has a pine wood platform perch, a cajeput perch, and a beautiful, curvy grapevine wood perch from Exotic Wood Dreams.  There’s a stainless steel water bowl and a food bowl that isn’t visible, along with toys made of shreddables, beads, fleece, and more.

the lower level of Sabrina's side

Down below, Sabrina has a purple safety pedicure perch, two beautiful sandblasted manzanita wood perches from Things for Wings, and another curvy grapevine wood perch as well that is in the door so it’s not visible in this view.  She has one more food or water bowl, and some great toys as well, including soft preening cotton, noisy toys, and beakable beads.

Charles's side

the top level of Charles's side

Here’s Charles’s side!  Up top he has his matching tire-style sleepy swing and boing, and then a supreme cotton rope fluffy swing that he can preen from Big Beaks Bird Toys.  He has some adorable toys too, including a fleece puff, a leather horse, a bunny with seagrass and beads, and a foraging block too.  Just below there you can see the multi-branch dragonwood perch from the Birdsafe Store, which Charles is just obsessed with.

the middle level and part of the front section of Charles's side

Here you can sort of see an absolutely gorgeous grapevine wood perch with a very neat configuration, a manu mineral perch, and a corner dragonwood perch as well.  Up top you’ll also see a pine wood platform perch that is on the “upper level.”  Three food bowls in total on his side as well, along with some great stainless steel toys and a beautiful shredder toy too.

the lower level of Charles's side

This photo actually shows a somewhat better view of the beautiful grapevine wood perch, but it doesn’t quite capture its beauty and its very unique design.  It’s really something.  Down below, there’s a sandblasted manzanita perch and a cajeput perch as well, along with a side-mounted MegaFone from Grey Feather Toys and a lovely shredder toy as well.

changes made to the cage setup

Finally, here are the changes made to the setup: they all happened to be in the front of the cage, on the door.  In this view, you can’t see where the divider falls, but basically right in the middle: so the small ribbonwood perch and the soapbox perch fall on Charles’s side, and the larger flat cajeput platform perch along with the manu mineral perch for Sabrina.  They both like to stand on these respective levels and make longing eyes at each other from across the acrylic divider, silly birds.  (Of course, when I let them play together, it’s instant chaos and aggression.)

the beautiful cage covers

Finally, I absolutely can’t get any flattering photos, unfortunately, but here are the beautiful cage covers!  These photos do not do them any justice at all whatsoever.  They are absolutely gorgeous and made from very heavy, high quality fabric, and are completely lined with a heavy sateen that keeps all the light out.  The seams are hidden and the workmanship is just incredible.  I love that the two fabrics are complementary but they aren’t match-y.  I am so pleased with them!  If you are interested in these beautiful covers please let me know and I will give you the email of the wonderful woman who makes them.  She does not have a site or anything; she is actually a custom curtain and window treatment maker, so she really does quite an excellent job with these.