Here is our deck in 2013, when we had just pressure washed it.

And here is our deck after painting Behr Deck Over onto it.

You can see that there is a lot of space, which meant a lot of painting, and also meant that we didn’t want to tackle this project every summer.

For the past few summers I’ve given the deck a light scrub with a push broom, some outdoor cleaner, and a hose.  It’s worked great to get the pollen and green gunk off of the boards.  The Deck Over held up perfectly!

So, here we are in 2018.  I just had a stroke and the deck is finally showing some wear.  This needs to be the summer of Behr Deck Over Round 2.  Unfortunately, I have been on a strict “do nothing” routine prescribed by my doctor.  No repetitive movements like painting or exertion of any type that might hinder healing in my artery.  Fortunately, for me, my kids were my chief workers with Behr Deck Over Round 1.  At that time, they were 9 and 13.  Fast forward 4 years and my kids are even better workers at 13 and 17.  I’ll just sit in a chair in the grass and tell them when they miss a spot.

Seriously, friends, this is my happy place in the summer.  Once the dry weather hits you’ll find me in the corner of that couch with the fire going and the heater on full blast.  (I said it gets dry here, but most days aren’t too warm.)  I plan to use Behr Deck Over again and I’m hoping they have the same color.  I want to say the name either had something to do with chocolate or coffee.  It was the perfect color.  Our house is a light gray with white trim.  Although I love the look of a white deck, that’s not the best idea when you have kids, a dog, and green blecky stuff that seems to grow on everything around here.

It’s Behr Deck Over for the win!  Happy painting!

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We started by pressure washing the whole thing and replacing a few boards.

Side story:
My sister owns the truck in the family, so whenever I need dirt, sod, lumber, or furniture, I call her.  So, after her run one day, she stopped by to pick me up and take me to our local lumber store.  As we were standing in line, the man in front of us finished up his order and the salesperson said, “It’s just so refreshing when someone actually knows how to order lumber.”  At that point we both burst out laughing! You can only image how unimpressed he was with us! Oh, and we had to go back twice because I ordered the wrong thing the first time. My sister’s such a good sport!

Back to the deck:
Once it was clean and pressure washed, we had to wait a few days for it to dry out.

(Cooper is always trying to photobomb my pictures!)

We used a new product called Behr DeckOver.  Hindsight, I wish I would have contacted Behr first and asked if they’d like to sponsor this little project.  It has been the talk of the cul-de-sac and also the talk of my recent backyard party.  It seems everyone is ready for a little deck update and they are all very interested in my opinions of this product.  Oh, well.  Hind sight is always 20/20.  So, for this project we started with 4 cans of DeckOver, which I thought would be plenty.  Turns out we needed 6 cans.  It was $34 per can at Home Depot, with a $5 rebate per can. 

We started with all of the hard parts like benches, skirting on the deck, and underneath the benches.  Then we moved on to cracks and crevices.  You can actually use the DeckOver to fill in cracks, which is pretty cool.  It’s also pretty time consuming, so I didn’t do too many areas.  Once we started with the rolling, it went pretty quickly.  We ended up doing three coats because after the second coat, when I was touching up a few spots, the paint didn’t dry evenly and it really bugged my hubby.  I think I could have lived with it, but I know it would have driven him nuts.  Yes, I love him enough to re-roll the entire thing!  It took several more hours, but I think it looks great.

Here’s the deck with the outdoor furniture on it.

We’re ready for a party!
By the way, it comes in 54 colors.  This one looked the best with our house color and furniture.  It’s called Coffee.

Whew!  That was a big job.  I think my deck chairs are calling my name.

I’ll let you know how DeckOver holds up to dogs, kids, and parties.  For now, I’ll be resting and nursing my injuries on the new deck.

One more side story:
Apparently pressure washers get really hot, and I have two large burns on my leg to prove it.  I also have multiple blisters from spending so much time with a roller and paint brush in my hand.  Oh, and I fell in the window when I was trying to get off the roof after washing the skylights.  I had to wash the skylight before I painted the deck because I didn’t want to get the new deck wet and dirty.  There you have it.  That’s why I’ll be on the deck chairs nursing my injuries.

Happy painting!
 

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I started pressure washing yesterday afternoon.  Luckily my kids love to help.

Lucky for me, they are good little workers. 

We pressure washed all of the benches, nooks, crannies, skirting on the deck, and the long walkway.  All that was left, when my hubby got home, was to move the furniture, repair a board, and finish the main part of the deck.  He’s such a good sport!  He got right to work after dinner.  I’d say that Cooper was a good helper too, but that spot he’s sitting in is actually the bald patch where we just planted new grass seed.  Thanks Cooper.

The herb pot, just outside my kitchen window, didn’t exactly want to be moved.  It fell apart as soon as we pulled it away from the house.  I replanted the herbs and now I’ll have to find new pots for my kitchen garden/herbs.

  Ooooh… there’s my little pressure washer in the corner of the picture below.  It was a gift from my hubby.  Yes, you read that right.  I told him my Mother’s Day wishlist included a hanging basket, rolling compost bin, or pressure washer.  I also told him he could choose the gift and I would be able to tell how much he loved me based on the gift.  He chose the right gift.  He loves me!  Realistically, we REALLY needed this and my hubby always asks for Costco gift cards for his birthday.  He has every intention of buying himself a pressure washer or some fun new tool, but when it comes down to it, he usually buys chicken or toilet paper with his gift cards. It was needed at our house and having a clean, pressure washed, house makes me really, really, really happy. 

Now, back to that project.  So, I got the whole family helping and then I took off to find my camera.  (That’s the way I roll.)

I caught this little guy relaxing in the grass.

He gets a little concerned when we do projects like this and I think he was just feeling sorry for himself out in the yard.

We finished up around 8:30 last night.  The deck is clean and just needs to dry.  Hopefully it will stop raining soon.  We’ll give it 2 days to dry and then we’ll give it a fresh new look.  We’re using a new Behr product called DeckOver, from Home Depot.  It’s fairly new, so there weren’t a lot of reviews out there.  We’re going to give it a try!  I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Happy pressure washing!

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