We're building a deck!

So it's been two and a half years here, and just as long since we updated the blog. So far so good, but in that time we have also continued to work on the house. The lawn is established and doing well. The basement is being finished and is well on its way, with offices, a gym and a rec room started and a half bathroom, closets and finishing work yet to be done. We still haven't replaced the stairs, the master bathroom needs a remodeling already and half the house has been repainted. The girls now have their own bedrooms, so the front bedroom is Katie's space instead of a junkroom.

But the big job at the moment is outside. We have gone two summers without a deck, but no more. There shall be a deck. Due to restricted funds, it is a relatively simple deck and we are building it ourselves.

We started last Thursday (the 18th) when a 65-degree sunny day arrived. Paul had already scheduled the afternoon off work to take care of something else, and took advantage of the weather to get to work. The little platform we built outside the patio door to pass code has been there all this time, but it's time for it to go.

Construction is similar to the old platform. It's built with Dek-Blocks. See www.deckplans.com if you want to know anything about this construction. Basically, no footings, no concrete to pour, no digging. Just put blocks down, install joists, and attach decking. You can make a lot of progress in a hurry, and it's cheaper and less time consuming than the traditional way.

We started out planning to build a 16x10 deck. First step is to build the frame. On Thursday Paul finished the frame, intending to deck it the next day. Here are photos of the work.

Katie likes to help.

As we looked at it we guessed it might be too small. We debated how much larger it ought to be, but eventually Paul gave in and set to expanding it to 16x16. The big problem with doing this was handling the materials. 16-foot treated 2x6s are a righteous pain to move......

So on Friday, instead of installing decking Paul bought more Dek-Blocks and 16-foot joists along with materials to extend the end boards out six feet, and installed it. It had gotten cold, and he was not even a little bit happy about working in the conditions, but the job got done nonetheless. The underpinnings were done; nothing left to do but put the decking on top. We are using 2x6s on top. We know a lot of people like to use 5/4 pine, cedar or composite decking nowadays, but because it's thinner the deck has to have joists 16" on center, which would means twice as many deck blocks and 16-foot joists. We don't want that. Too expensive. Our joists are 30" apart, which is okay with 2x6 decking. So if that means we have to stain the deck every so often, then so be it. We wouldn't use cedar, since we'd like the deck to be gray and spending the extra money on cedar instead of green treated lumber doesn't make a lot of sense if it's going to be hidden anyway.

Saturday it snowed and was very cold. No work. On Sunday the sun came out, and after church Paul went off to Menards to pick up 35 16-foot-long treated 2x6 boards. Holy crap what a nightmare. He decided to rent their truck, since using the minivan would involve making multiple trips. We're not going to go into all the details about what was all involved in getting them home, but suffice to say he loaded the truck by himself and almost returned it late because it took so long to load.

Paul picked up his nephews to help unload the truck.

It took a while to get all the decking installed. Putting it together is like assembling a jigsaw puzzle - you have to flip and turn boards sometimes to make sure all the crooks are side-by-side so you don't have any big gaps. :) Anyway, it became clear that it was going to get dark before we finished. So although all of the boards are attached, most of them are only attached at the ends. We'll screw down the middles ASAP. Then we have to find a board roughly 2x3 to use at the end, since it didn't come out quite even for some reason. After that, then we'll start on the railing and stairs.