Spring time is here, and that means Spring Cleaning and preparing for lots of out door time! We were asked to do a project showing off something we needed to do this Spring, and my husband and I almost instantly thought about staining our deck. He is the big DIY guy for the house, so I asked him if he could give me the play by play for all of you who are looking to do something similar before Summer gets here… Here is what he had to say about the project:
When we first bought our house a few years ago, we discussed several DIY projects we needed to do to make the house our own. Some of those projects were completed and others were deferred until “later”. Our deck was one of those deferred projects. We recently decided it was time to tackle this project and we made a simple plan. We needed to clean the deck first because the sun, rain and snow from the last couple of years has not been gentle. We needed to pick a stain that would look good on pressure treated wood but allow some of the grain to show through. Finally, with both of our schedules tight, we needed a set of products and tools to apply them that would allow us to do it quickly. Off we went to our local Walmart store to pick out everything we needed.
We selected Jomax for our cleaning needs. It seems like a product that has some bleach in addition to other cleaning agents, so do not get it on anything you don’t plan for and follow the directions about wetting vegetation you care about before this product comes in contact with it. I followed the directions to spray the cleaner onto the deck and then I used a scrub brush to make sure I got rid of any debris and hit some tough spots. I let it sit for about 20 minutes and then rinsed for a while with plenty of water. I let this dry overnight and made sure there was no residual moisture before continuing to the next step.
For the stain, we chose the Flood semi-transparent stain in Chestnut (TWF-SEMI). We chose this product specifically for it’s intended use on weathered wood, resistance to mildew and the color allowing some grain pattern to show through. We brushed the stain onto the railings and used a roller for the main deck surface. You will need to use a brush to apply the stain in between the deck boards. The stain was easy to use and covered extremely well. Our deck is 10’ by 14’ and we used about 1.5 gallons to complete the project. The stain dried quickly and later that day we were able to walk across it, although we tried to stay off of it as much as possible for 48 hours.
Using the Flood stain and finally protecting our deck while adding some great color was an easy and fast project and really improved the appearance of the area we spend a lot of time on in the warmer months.
Thanks to hubby for taking on the project and even writing all about it! I really love the new look of our deck. It gives it a fresh new look! All of the supplies we needed for this project cost us less than $50. It was a quick, and fairly inexpensive way to perk up our back yard in time for Spring!
What are some Spring projects that are on your list to do?
