Repurposing

I'm sure yall remember our streak of bad luck with wrecked delivery vehicles last year. Well, one of those vehicles was repaired by a friend at a local body shop. To complete this repair he purchased a hideously bright yellow decommissioned truck that he could salvage parts from. He and I agreed to this before he started the work and it did save us some money on the repairs. The deal was that he would have the salvaged truck delivered to him, and after he had robbed all the parts he needed, the rest of the truck would be mine to dispose of. This repair was a long process, so when a half-dissembled van arrived in my yard randomly one day, I was a little confused at first. After remembering the agreement, I allowed the driver to unload the hideously yellow van. Now I had a new yard ornament. Over the next few weeks, I contemplated what to do with this thing. We do not need any more old equipment hanging around, especially in this color. Then last week I received a proposal. I was offered $30 for the cargo box, and $30 to remove it. This offer came in from none other than my son, Atticus. He had devised a plan to move the cargo box down to the creek where they like to play, creating a cabin/clubhouse of sorts. Of course, I counteroffered. I offered the box and relocation services for free with one contingency, that I would not work on it at all unless he was here helping me. He agreed and we started to develop a plan. It was determined that instead of removing the box, we could remove the cab and the engine/transmission. This would leave the box on the frame with an axel underneath, making it much easier to take to the creek. We trimmed the frame just behind the front tires to leave enough frame rails that we could deck that portion with wood, giving a place to store kayaks etc... Somewhat astonishingly, we completed this project in about a week and a half. Now Atticus has a van down by the river (well creek actually). One contingency that I didn't mention above is that he would have to paint it something other than that hideous yellow, so as soon as the weather is better he'll get to that step. It was so fun to do this project with my boy. When I was putting him to bed the night after we moved it to the creek, I told him that I hoped this was only the first of hundreds of projects that we'd get to do together.