I live in a place where the winters are long, and cold. Since both my husband and I are from a place where winters like this are not really a thing, we didn’t have many outdoor winter activities we could do.
until now.
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Behold our backyard Ice rink. haha.
ps. I still can’t believe this actually worked. There were many nights I thought it would not.
I have wanted to make the winters more bearable by finding a way embrace the cold, and do something fun in it vs. just sitting around wishing it was summer all the time…..
My daughter has been figure skating at a local rink for 3 years now and has really fallen in love with it. So the idea of building a backyard ice rink began. This was an idea that I wasn’t sure about from the get go. I wanted to try and make it happen for a few years now. I tried to make it happen last year, and my efforts failed….pretty badly. We never got it to a point in which it even resembled a rink. I tried the method where you tamp down the snow and spray it with water. The ground under the snow was just too warm and it kept melting all of my efforts, and the water went right into the ground every time I sprayed it.
This year I tried something different. It was SOOO much work.
but
it
worked
I’ll go through all of the steps I took to make it, including what failed, and what worked. I tried to find some tutorials online to get me started when I first was trying, but everything I found left me with a ton more questions. So I just decided to give it a try, and figure it out along the way. Here are the materials I used:
Materials:
- Wooden stakes- 16″- I would have gotten 24″ after doing this. I got them from my local lumbar yard for $10.
- Plastic sheeting– I got this off amazon. It is thicker at 4mil. It was durable, and opaque. I didn’t need it to be clear ( although that is how it is advertised) but I did need it to be a light color.
- String- I used paracord I had on hand
- Clothespins- I had some on hand, but here is a bulk pack.
- Handheld staple gun + staples. Here is the one I love.
- Water + a hose- I love this one because it was small enough I could wrap it up and bring it inside after layers of water. I didn’t worry about it freezing, cracking, or being huge to store. It also came with a nozzle for different spray applications
Step 1: Prepare your yard space
The ice rink prep starts in the fall before the first frost. You have to start then or the ground will freeze and the next step won’t work.
This prep step is one I should have taken more time on. If you have a level yard and you already know if is perfectly level, no questions, move down to the next part labeled: So you have a level yard already…
I mowed, raked up leaves, and tried to make sure any small twigs, sticks etc. were removed from the grass. I also made sure not to cover any places with sprinkler heads that might stick up etc.
Here is the part where I went wrong. My yard is not level.
I didn’t really notice it until I started to fill up the rink. It is REALLY not level. This created 99% of the issues I ran into.
I would love to be able to set something like this up next winter, but I think in order to do that this summer I am going to need to level out our yard a lot. We had a pretty usable space, it was just slanted.
I think the best way to see if your yard is level is to hammer a stake into both sides of it, the same distance into the ground. Measure to make sure the same amount of inches are in the ground. Then tie a string between them, attaching the string to the top part of each stake. Next use a small level and set it on the middle part of the string, towards where the center part of the rink would be. If the level shows the bubble to one side of the center, your yard is not flat. I think this happens a lot in older yards, where settling etc. has happened over time.
So you have a level yard already…
Well, well, well. You lucky dog…haha. Just make sure your space is free from anything that can puncture the plastic. This includes, toys, sticks, leaves, etc.
Step 2: Pounding in the stakes
** important**
This part has to happen in the fall before the ground freezes!
Next comes measuring and pounding in the stakes. I knew the dimensions of my plastic before I started, so I knew that I couldn’t make the rink dimensions any bigger than the actual sheet of plastic. I used a tape measure to make sure the stakes were even and squared from each other.
I used a mallet and pounded the staked into the ground in the fall.
I purchased 16 in. stakes because looking at the overall height in the store vs. the 12″ and 24″ stakes, I thought 16″ would be plenty tall… When I build it this way again, I would buy 24″.
Once the snow started to pile up, and once I actually put some layers on it, the 16″ stakes were completely covered by snow from shoveling the snow off the rink.
The 24″ ones would have helped with the height difference in my yard as well. Since it slopes away from my house, I would have put the taller stakes in the lowest part of the rink to help sure it up where the most water was going to settle.
I also would have bought triple the amount that I did. I bought a package of 20. I needed more like 50. The gaps in between didn’t seem like an issue at first but it proved to be later.
Step 3: Tie the Cord
In this step, I used cord to tie between each of the wooden stakes I drove into the ground. The purpose was to create a outline for what it would look like, and to help hold the plastic in place once I laid it on. I used para-cord since that is what I had large quantities of laying around, but any strong rope would work.
I tied it around the first stake, and then stapled it as I went along to each stake all the way around. I did it close to the top, but not on the top, although in hindsight this might have worked great.
I used my hand held staple gun to staple the cord to the wooden stakes.
I had to go back a few times and tighten the cord between the stakes. I made it REALLY tight, because it seemed like as I went, the cord got droopy, and started to sag. This would prevent it from being useful at all, since the whole purpose was to create an edge.
Like I said in the previous step, I needed more stakes to make this idea better. There wouldn’t have been nearly as much sag in the rope if I would have had more stakes overall.
Step 4: The plastic
This step was the most exciting during set up. The plastic I bought was pretty long. I made the stakes side to side just about 3 feet short of the overall width of the plastic sheeting so that I could drape it over the stakes nicely.
I rolled it out, and cut it so that it was about a foot longer than the stakes on each end.
Then I opened it up so that it was all spread out. It was perfect.
Once it was draped over all of the sides of the rink and over the cord, I began using the clothespins to secure it.
I pinned the clothespins over the plastic and onto the cord. I also stapled the plastic to the back of any wooden stakes it was draped over for extra strength.
Step 5: Filling it up
This step took about a week in total because I went slow.
I don’t know if it would work differently somewhere else, but it just wasn’t cold enough for me where I live to fill it all at once and expect it to freeze all the way through. I worried that if I filled it too much at once, the top layer would freeze, and the bottom would still be water.
So I did it in smaller layers.
If you have a level yard, this step should be fairly easy in theory. Just fill it in smaller layers waiting for it to freeze overnight before adding another layer. The smaller layers will make the ice stronger overall. You will need about a week or so of good layers at freezing temperatures to make it strong enough to skate on.
I walked on mine later, once it got stronger, and there was cracking.
ACTUALLY a ton of cracking.
So I walked all over it, cracking it everywhere I could. Then I flooded it with more water.
My idea was that once the cracks were exposed, I could fill them with more water, and make the ice even stronger, so that it could support the weight of people skating on it.
There were a few hiccups along the way, and overall it took about a month and a half of constant work, shoveling, and small flooding to get it to be just right. Between the weather not really wanting to cooperate, and then my outside faucet freezing and not being able to add more water once it was cold enough, it took some creative thinking.
In the end. It was worth it.
Some late nights spraying it, lots of snow shoveling, worrying about it not working, and so much time invested, was worth it. We had so many fun nights skating as a family.
And thats all I did.
It wasn’t expensive or fancy, BUT it was a LOT of work.
Hope this helps anyone who wanted to try this themselves, and get out and enjoy the long winter months. I will share more details of my experience and fails below if you are interested in a deep dive:)
Story time on my unlevel yard…..and the fails I encountered.
It turned out I had to do more small layers of water when filling mine, because of my yard being sloped. All of the water that I evenly sprayed and tried to fill in the first layer just went to the bottom corner and left me with spots of plastic everywhere. I also had a very deep bottom corner.
My only issue was not just more water in the lowest corner either. There were several spots within the middle and sides that were like potholes of water. My yard was just bumpy and unlevel, so the water just followed gravity and sunk to all the low spots.
The water was too thick and heavy on the lowest end, and it ended up pushing the plastic under the cord, breaking the clothespin holding it, and water leaked out. I underestimated the weight the water would have.
I had to save it before it all broke out.
I ended up shoring up the bottom corner with cinderblocks, bricks and other things I had laying around that were heavy. Some of the cinder blocks tore tiny holes in the plastic, causing micro-leaking, and overall it was kinda a hot mess.
Once it froze again overnight, the micro-leaking spots were not an issue, and I kept filling slowly over several days.
It took AWHILE to get it all filled so that no plastic was showing. One end was deeper than the other, and the ice on the other side was VERY thin…
Then it snowed.
I considered what happens in nature. There is nobody going to the lakes and ponds shoveling off the snow so that the ice can form under it. So I thought maybe leaving it alone would be the best idea, also thinking that maybe some of the snow would melt and fill in the less full areas.
Spoiler. It didn’t work.
The snow melted unevenly with the next days “warm” temps of 36 degrees, and I was left with a surface that was mushy, and resembled tree bark. It had deep ridges, pits and bumps the size of marbles all over it.
So I began to shovel. It cracked under my feet in the really shallow areas, and the sheets of thin ice shoveled right off leaving plastic exposed in several areas.
I knew I needed to fill it more to get it to eventually level out, and reach the highest point of my yard. So I turned on the hose and let it go on the next cold day I had.
WELLL. Since there was a defined edge, ( think like an edge of a lake that froze) The new water I was filling it with, went to that edge, and then right under it.
Yes, by the end, the rink was more full, but the piece that was frozen in the lowest part of my yard now was floating on top of a bunch of new water. It froze later that night, but it pushed the plastic out even further under the cord.
The cord failed.
If I end up making this rink again next year I wouldn’t use the cord on my yard. It might work for a level yard, but there was just too much slope on mine and the pressure alone from the water pooling at the lowest part broke through several part of the cord. It just wasn’t strong enough.
I have seen several different rink barriers online that are available and look very strong. I was trying to save money and not spend $2000 on a rink for my yard, but I think somewhere in between what I did, and a full edge barrier would work best in my situation. I saved money, but definitely not time.
The reality of an outdoor rink….
- We had several winter storms, that dropped branches and tore plastic, and ruined the surface.
- THERE WAS SO MUCH SHOVELING TO DO.
- It has leaves and other debris that blew onto it, and froze.
- You are at the mercy of the weather and temperatures.
- You can really only skate on it at below freezing temperatures. We tried and sunk through several slushy spots.
- You might have to get creative with how to add water once its freezing temps and your faucet freezes too, or get an insulated faucet.
- The surface is not perfectly smooth. Both from shoveling, and weather elements.
- You will need some kind of zamboni to get the surface skate-able.
I can save a lot of the materials which is great for next year. I ended up using another layer of plastic after a storm blew the thinner side under and folded/ froze in place. one night. It worked great and just allowed me to fill it more on the lower spots first and get a nice even rink.
I did try and string Christmas lights around it. The snow buried some of them, and some broke, but it was fun while it lasted.
Tips for success
Here are a few things that I found worked for me.
- Buy a hose that is small, and can be taken inside after each use. This way you never have to thaw out a hose to re-surface, or flood a layer. I chose one with a nozzle head that had different spray patterns. I liked this and ended up using a ton of different spray patterns during different times. Here is one like I have.
- Find a creative way to still get water to your rink once your faucet freezes ( unless you have a fancy insulated one or a removable one like THIS .) I ended up pulling my hose through a basement window and connecting it to an inside faucet.
- Make sure you have good plastic. I was happy overall with the plastic I got on Amazon. There was enough for more than one layer, which I ended up needing. It only tore under pressure from rock, ice, or staple. Which worked for me. If they had more than 4mil in this plastic I would have like it though. I also like the color. A lot of plastic I found in these dimensions, was black, which I didn’t want since I was worried black would attract more heat from the sun making it melt faster than I wanted it to.
- Make sure your space is level before filling it with water.
- PATIENCE, PATIENCE, PATIENCE. It is not a fast project.
I hope this helps anyone wanting to make an ice rink. Drop any questions you have below and I will try and answer them the best I can. Look for my next post about how I made a DIY zamboni for resurfacing the ice.
See the full list of supplies in my amazon storefront here.
-Amanda