The Light at the End of the Tunnel

And what a long tunnel it has been!  Almost three years now.  You may be asking yourself, what is she referring to?  What I'm referring to is my deck.  When we bought our house, the inspector told us that we'd need to replace the deck in about 5 years, and after 6 years we knew it was really in bad shape.  It was green in one corner from never getting any sunlight and splintering badly, pieces were crumbling away.  I was afraid to have anyone over in case they ended up with a piece of our deck in their foot.  So In April 2008, we started ripping our rotting deck apart.

That's my MIL, FIL, and hubby taking down the railings.



My BIL.  Notice the awful condition of the deck.  Horrendous!

 That took some time.  After all the clean up, we realized that there was a small concrete pad under the deck that needed to be ripped up.  So $400 later, a big burly guy and his hugely pregnant wife came swinging sledge hammers and broke that bad boy up for us. 

Now fast forward a year to August 2009.  Mark has planned the heck out of this deck.  It's going to be the greatest deck known to man-kind.  It bigger, both wider and longer.  He's making a fancy outer border, wrap around steps, 45 degree angled cuts at the corner.  A thing of beauty.  A masterpiece.  At least that is what I'm hoping for, because it's now been two summers without a deck and it's a pain.  So we rent a post hole digger and make some really big ass holes, 19 of them to be exact, 48 inches deep.  It's exhausting work for everyone. (I have pictures of this process but I can't find which folder I put them into.  Grrr!)  But we have holes!  Holes that some baby skunks keep falling into.  Skunks that need rescuing.  Stinky!

One of the big holes.

The two baby skunks getting a bath because they were covered in mud.

We had to call an animal rescue group to come and relocate them because they kept coming back and falling in.  One ended up dying which was sad because they have such cute faces.  But, ya know, stinky!  We eventually put in the posts, and fill the holes up with 10 gazillion pounds of concrete.  Those suckers are NEVER coming out. 

Fast forward another year, June 2010.  Have you been noticing how many years it's been now?  Do you think I had a reason to be cranky about this?  Just in case you're unclear, the answer is YES, Jaime you deserve to be upset by your husband's slow way of working on things.  It may end up being wonderful but is it worth the aggravation?  I'm not so sure.  Seriously, any time someone would ask be about the deck, I'd see red.  Everyone else thought it was sooooo funny that it was taking so long, but it wasn't impacting their lives now, was it?

Framing!  It's glorious!

Once all the framing was in, we bought the first of our composite decking.  Deep, dark walnut to be the outer border and the edging of the deck.  He put in a few pieces but then the weather turned and we went to Disney and then it was too cold to work on a deck.  So we are now up to Summer 2011.  Also known as The Year That The Deck Must Be Finished And Inspected Or Else.  Yeah, back in January we get a friendly knock on the door.  It's one of the town's building inspector's wondering if we forgot to have the final inspection done.  Do you know how embarrassing it is to tell him that it's no where close?  The look of complete surprise and then hilarity on his face about my husband's slow process.  We were told that our building permit would be expired in August and he left.

Working hard with his power tools.

See the pretty walnut.  See the border and fascia boards.  Can you picture the pretty?  I almost can!

So tomorrow, Mark is going out with my dad to pick up the last of our composite decking.  He needs just a few more of those walnut boards and the then he can put the teak down in the middle.  Luckily the store had enough because it's in close-out now.  Woo, we saved a little bit of money!  After he finishes with the decking, Which I'm hoping he'll finish before the end of the month, we just have to buy and install the railing, get it inspected, and we are done!!!!!  I will be having the mother of all deck parties.  I will finally be happy!  Then he can finish up the crown molding in the dining which I've been waiting for for 2 years.

See my one, lone piece of crown?  I would love to show off pictures of my super cute dining room but it's not yet finished!