I'm not doing this again for two years.

So, we've needed to clean and waterproof our decks for about oh, 3 or 4 years. It's one of those things that as a homeowner, you need to do. But don't wanna do. Sure, we could pay someone, but after what we've done this weekend, I'm sure it costs about 2 million dollars to powerwash and stain two decks.

We decided to stay in town this weekend - one because there were two sickies in the house with a sinus infection, and two because we wanted to get some work done around the house.

We have a pretty nice deck on the back of our house, and it was in desperate need of a cleaning. We borrowed a power washer, and started cleaning the deck - and oh my gosh, was our deck dirty. I guess, thinking back, it looked dirty, but I just had no idea. It was amazing what the power washer was taking off our deck. It was from a grey icky look wood, back to normal looking wood color.















It took over 4 hours to power wash the entire deck. Jeff and I would go back and forth because it really hurts your forearm to hold the sprayer for that long. I felt like we were going to have Popeye arms by the time we were done.

Another reason it took so long, was our older neighbors came over to check out what we were doing. He let us use his powerwasher - which was a lot more powerful than the one we were using, and then we power washed his deck. We think it was a ploy to get us over there to do his deck. But, luckily, his deck is super small.

When we got done with the back deck, we power washed the front porch. Another long task since we have a wrap around porch.

That was Friday.
Saturday we painted the front porch. You really don't realize how bad stuff looks until you put a fresh coat of paint on something. The previous owners left a huge bucket of stain that they used on the front porch, so at least we didn't have to worry about matching the stain.

We felt incredibly old when our backs and legs and arms hurt after painting the porch. How were we going to make it through the back deck if we're already in such bad shape.

Sunday, we got up and admired our front porch. Aahh.. that looks so much nicer! Good job! All with the back deck looming over our head. The other problem with our weekend tasks, is we had to do them while Alex napped. Jeff would work a little while I fed Alex lunch and then got him down for his nap, and then I would go out and help. With open buckets of stain and fun looking paint brushes, we knew having Alex outside with us would be a disaster. Luckily, he took extra long naps all weekend, so we were able to get a lot done.

On Sunday, we did the railing all around the deck. It took forever, and on Monday we noticed that we had missed a few spindles. hah!

Finally, this morning, it was the end! We decided to start work early instead of when Alex napped because we wanted it done, and it was supposed to get super hot this afternoon. And the deck is in the sun in the afternoon, but in the shade in the morning. So, Alex happily watched Sesame Street, while we were outside staining the floor. When Sesame Street was over, he watched another episode. And then Jeff went inside because he got a huge splinter in his palm, so I stayed outside. I just worked, worked, worked, and finished the deck so Jeff could stay inside with Alex.

Finally, I came in side, threw my hands up and yelled - All Done!! (Alex does this constantly, whether he is all done with whatever he is doing or not) We opened up the door so that Alex could see our beautiful new deck, and he immediately threw a frog toy on the deck. Too bad it was in the middle of the deck, so no one could get it. No stepping on the deck for at least 24 hours!

I'm so glad to be done. We're going to celebrate tonight by grilling out and setting off fireworks. And tomorrow, I'm not doing a damn thing.