Requirements: Tree trunks, wood plank, Drill, outdoor screws, screw driver, spirit level/bubble level, measuring tape and creativity.
Experience- Priceless family fun with feeling of creation and accomplishment 😉

The story of the garden bench started when we got our trees trimmed a long time before summer.  Trees and shrubs too have to be manicured, and we get it done each year or at least every other year. But this year the tree trimmers cut out a large tree trunk which was obstructing the growth and direction of other trees.  While branches and leaves were falling down from trees, I was sprouting with ideas to better utilize this big tree trunk.

I asked the tree trimmers to leave the trunk alone till the end of their job and asked them to cut the trunk into blocks of  about one and half feet each. The idea was for a garden bench!  Yes I decided to use these trunks as legs and get wood planks to make the seat of the bench.
Many years ago when we lived in the east coast, I had a tree trunk idea of a different kind.  When we were visiting family, they had salvaged tree stumps of varied heights lying in their backyard. I got them home and sprayed some transparent polyurethane to retain it for longer and used them as plant stands inside my house.

The Garden Bench project this summer was a fun family project.   It involved not much expertise, just good common sense skills, concepts of measurements and balance and creativity.   And most importantly  working smart is important besides working hard.  First task was getting the supplies   from our nearest Home Depot.   Working smart and reduce any work of sawing  the wood ,  I picked  a ten feet wood plank and  asked the staff  there  to cut  the 2*6*10 feet plank into two  five feet planks( The home improvement stores offer this complimentary service).  Next I needed some smaller wood planks to attach the five feet planks side by side. For this I picked the odd planks in the Home Depot’s miscellaneous  lumber section and asked the home depot person to cut out four  pieces of about 14 inches each.  I picked out two sets of outdoor screws in sizes of  2.5 inches and 3 inches for attaching the planks together and for attaching the seat to the logs.

One weekend afternoon, the whole family pitched in their hands and skills to make this bench. My spouse with engineering precision measured and drilled and screwed the planks and legs together while all of us helped in the process.

The stumps of the trunk were not accurately same size, since they were haphazardly cut by the tree trimmers. This required us to dig the ground to bury the base of the stumps proportionately. We used the spirit level/bubble level scale to check the balance throughout the building process. Next we placed the planks on tops and drilled the screws in the seat of the bench on the tree legs.

Voila it was done.
Our very own garden bench   is a proud seat of our creativity and hard work.