All Decked Out

Have I mentioned how handy my husband is?  He gets it from his father. If you've been reading this blog for a while, then you've probably read about how Mr. Hartley made this cradle for Tate and our beautiful dining table.  Thankfully, he passed these skills down to David. A couple of years ago, I wrote this blog post about the sofa table he made for us.  He has since then made a cabinet for our kitchen, but will posted at a later date.  For now, I want to show you his BIGGEST project thus far, our deck!

Our deck has been a sore subject since we moved into the house.  We knew it would need replacing when we bought the house, and that urgency became even greater once we had a child.  Neither one of us liked walking on it barefoot for fear of getting splinters (and that fear actually coming true), so we knew we did not want Tate playing on it.  Once he became mobile last fall, it became evident it had to be done before summer of 2010.

So in April, David set out to conquer the rotten deck.  (You didn't think he would actually pay someone to do it, did you?)  I wanted to help, but was forced to watch Tate while he was awake.  That meant I could asssist David for about 2-3 hours, tops, per day while the little stinker napped.  Needless to say, I barely did anything but put my 2 cents in.  David did get a little bit of help from Shawn and our neighbor across the street, but did 90% of the work on his own.  We didn't do a complete overhaul (our bank account thanks us), but extended it 3 feet and resurfaced the deckboards.  And I must say, I think it is impressive.  :)

Oh, and I must mention that with the leftover wood, David made a picnic table for Tate (that's big enough for adults too).  Here's some pictures we took during the process.  Please excuse the feather wreath in the "after" photos.  I was getting ready to host a baby shower.  Now, I promised to sand and/or pressure wash the old stain off the outside joists.  Ugh.