Green Street Fair: Home Depot Hosts Kids Building Projects

The was alive with eco-friendly activity on Saturday, and was back again this year with their annual kids workshop.

Several representatives from the national hardware superstore’s Plymouth branch were on hand in , where they had numerous tables set up for families to try their hands at small building projects.

They were handing out wooden kits – including a bird house, a bug house, a flower planter and a sailboat – which children could assemble with a variety of small hand tools that were provided.

“The idea is to start kids at a young age to get interested in building projects and to help them develop an understanding of tools,” said Angi Halliwell, the Associate Support Supervisor at the Home Depot store at 5 Mile and Beck Roads.

Families from all over the fair dropped in with their kids, taking turns gluing and nailing together pieces of their chosen projects.

All of the kits came with easy-to-use instructions, complete with step-by-step photographs of each project – which most parents agreed were helpful.

Execution, they said, was the key, though.

“So far they are pretty easy,” said Livonia resident Karen Fisher, who was working alongside her 6-year-old daughter Riley building a flower pot.

“I’m a little nervous, though,” she said, as she carefully held a tiny wood nail still for her daughter to hammer into place.

The free sessions are held the first Saturday of every month at Home Depot stores. This is the third year that the Plymouth location has participated in the Green Street Fair, Halliwell said.

“It’s become a refocus of the company,” she said, “to make sure that we are engaged in the communities we’re in.”

Upon completion of the projects – which could be taken home – each kid received a pin of completion, each tailored to their chosen kit.

Natalie Conn, 8, of Redford explained as she worked diligently on her bird house that she had participated in one of the in-store workshops with her father once.

“I think that I am going to hang it in the tree in my yard,” she said.

Her mother, Colleen was alternating between her daughter and her two sons, Craig, 2 1/2, and Aaron, 5, all of whom were attempting their own bird houses.

“This is awesome,” she said, as she pressed the roof of a bird house into place.