First hang in DIY hammock
I sent this note to friends. Thought you all might find it amusing.
Notes from last night's first hang.
Well campers, I'm here to report that my first hang in my DIY double layer asym-like hammock was a total bust! I worked on it most of the day. I finished it at 10 pm and have been fooling with it for 2 hours outside in the cold and dark til almost midnight in 30 degree temps.
It started out so well. The cutting and sewing went great. I was preening. I made it 10 feet long and it was like 66 inches wide. I thought this would help with the a-sym. (Big Mistake) I whipped the ends, which I've never done before. I had the one inch webbing with the cinch buckles. Superficially it was a thing of beauty but once I hung it everything went so wrong.
The only good thing I guess is that no one died, but I hurt my back. Wanna guess how!
I tried the whipping where you pull the center end longer and then whip it so you can lay flatter in the hammock. Well I pulled it too much because when I went to lay in it, it was like there was this tight ridge line right in the center. Took it back in the house and re-whipped the ends to get rid of that center tightness.
Went back out and rehung it. Laying in it was better but the thing was so dang wide that it was hard to get situated, there was just all this material bunched up and it was hard to find the center and the two layers kept sliding around. I know that sounds weird. I will say the saving grace were those cinch buckles because I had to tighten and loosen those about a zillion times to get it where my head and feet were at the right height and I could lay asym and be flat. That took about an hour in the dark I swear.
Then I went in and got my Oware pad which is about as wide as Texas and put it between the layers. Since I had it stored folded in half and rolled up, it wouldn't flatten out in the hammock. It kept folding in on itself and there was so much fabric with this wide hammock, it didn't help at all in keeping the pad flat. Plus the pad is only 60 inches long so it took what seemed like forever to finally get it flat and in the right position to where my head was on it and I was in the right position.
I went in and got my underquilt and put that on. Since it was the first time on this hammock, this seemed to take way too long as well! Frustration was mounting.
While I was sitting on it chair style testing it, one buckle gave out because I didn’t have it secured correctly because I was fooling arouund with it so much. I landed on my butt and it frayed the webbing slightly. Oh great.
Finally I got situated and was laying there half on and half off the pad with all that material twisted and uncomfortable but it was the best I could do. The underquilt wasn't in the best place, but again I was tired and I didn't feel like fooling with it anymore.
So it was midnight and I lay there cold and tired trying to convince myself it wasn't as bad as all that. And that's when I hit the ground. Thud! (I'm not kidding.) The webbing came loose from the whipping that I had redone an hour ago and I fell flat on my back. That's when I surrendered and went inside for the night.
I think my ego hurts worse than my back. And here I thought my status in the Clan of the Tree Hangers was going to go up! I'll be lucky if you all don't boot me out with this debacle!!!
PS: My boyfriend thinks I’m taking this waaaaaaaaaay too seriously. "Why do you have to make one when you already bought one????"
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