We are definitely not experts in home DIY. We don’t know much, honestly. So when we decided to make over our backyard, I don’t know why we thought it was going to be a simple task. Seriously though, our bathroom door isn’t even finished/connected to the wall and we started that project like a year ago…

So here is the story of how our weekend deck project turned into a month long Home Depot extravaganza.



Here is what our deck looked like to begin with. The previous owners just painted it an ugly color.



We went to Home Depot when we first decided to start this project to see what we should be doing and what products we needed. They had a video with this stuff and it looked like such an easy way to remove the color. All you had to do was paint it on and then brush it off. Totally simple, right? SO WRONG. After spending a lot of energy on this, it didn’t do anything and we went back to HD.



And we picked up this. It did a little better than the first but it really didn’t do much of anything either.

Apparently, because of CA clean air laws, you can’t get a good stripper anymore….

(What’s up, what’s up.)



This was the result of the strippers. BOOO.



So it was back to HD to get the big guns. AKA a floor sander.





Cody being all manly using heavy machinery.



This totally worked. But it took forever.





We had to use smaller sanders to get in the smaller areas.

Now that we FINALLY had the deck completely sanded, it was time to choose a color. We chose “S”. It is the one on the bottom left.



Annnnd then I had to sand off the paint samples…SO MUCH SANDING.



We then had to prep the deck. Which meant spraying the whole thing down.





Prepping the deck was good anyways because it had rained and made the deck all moldy. Yuck.

This was the one product that TOTALLY worked and we were thrilled. The Behr Premium All In One Wood Cleaner.



We had to wash the deck with it. Don’t worry, I was there working too.

But it made our deck look AMAZING. And it got rid of all the moldy grossness.



We had to let the deck dry overnight and then we could start staining.



See, I told you I helped. And I looked damn pretty doin’ it too! HA!

Pretty deck. 🙂



We are totally thrilled with how it turned out.

PS. It isn’t this orange in real life.

From start to finish. Such a difference!

So that is one project down. About a million more to go before we are totally done.

Linking up with Tori