Few things ever get finished. Most things get to the 90%-complete stage, then people figure out a way to make do with the good-enough solution. So when something is actually finished, its cause for celebration. I finally finished the Deck project at the end of July, just before we left for Oregon for the bike trip. The entire project took less than one calendar year, which I think is pretty good considering the barn still isn't finished and I started that in May 2008.
Here's a reminder of what it used to look like:
The deck was a ridiculous amount of work, primarily due to the difficulty of digging in our yard. Some people think these are called the "Rocky Mountains" because the mountains look rocky from a distance. Obviously they do not look rocky from a distance, and so it makes since that their name derives from just how covered in rocks they are. This makes digging extremely difficult, since after days of surveying, stringing up lines, take measurements, and finally deciding the precise location of your soon-to-be hole, you run into a 3' x2'x18" rock after digging half a foot down. This particular project required 12 concrete piers, which meant 12 holes, 36" deep and 8" in diameter. It took us at least 60 hours to dig those holes, trying all manner of motorized boring equipment, but eventually getting down on our hands and knees and scraping minute amounts of dirt out of the holes with a kitchen ladel.
The process was to fill the hole with water, let it sit for a half our or so, then use the auger to bore about 2" (on a good day) until running into the next rock, then using various scrounged implements (tent stakes, metal fence posts, aforementioned kitchen ladel) to excavate the rock so the process could be repeated. There is one rock in particular that was so heinously stuck, and took such an effort to extract, that I have kept it as a souvenir.
Mid-way through the project, the infamous rock is shown on the left.
This rock was buried at a depth of 30". Now you're probably wondering why not just leave it; 36" can't be much better than 30". Unfortunately Jefferson County doesn't trust me anymore than you do, so they make a point to inspect all of the holes before concrete is poured (and don't get me started on County inspections of personal property). Had I known that the inspection would involve a toothless fellow wandering around my backyard for no more than 26 seconds, I probably wouldn't have put so much effort into this rock. But I didn't know that, so my Catholic guilt demanded the rock be removed. After several hours of work, I had loosened the rock, but this rock was too boig to just be pulled out of the hole. This was a breach baby, and it had to be turned. Now, I'm not the tallest guy, and while I have a positive "ape index" my arms aren't much more than 2 feet long, so to reach the rock I had to basically bury my shoulder into the hole. Once the rock was rotated, it was high enough that if I stuck my nose into the dirt I could grab it with two hands. The rock was too big and too low to get my hands under, so I had to pinch it between my two hands to lift. Once I had a good grasp of the rock it was basically impossible to move, so Kate would squat in front of me, facing me, and grasp my two shoulders and do a squat while I clinged for dear life onto the rock. After a few near misses, the rock was birthed, and that was our first experience with the labor & delivery process.
Once the holes were dug, certified for suitability by the great County of Jefferson, I only needed to lift 28 80-lb. bags of concrete into the van, then into the cement mixer, then into the hole. After that things went pretty smoothly and the main deck surface was finished some time in October 2010. Not much happened over the winter, but in May I finally got around to installing the stairs. This turned out to be a serious pain, and all I will say is, if you ever make anything with stairs, just buy the pre-fabricated stringers they sell at Home Depot, etc. Its not worth the effort to create a custom stair pitch. The fabrication of the stairs actually went pretty quick, but hours upon hours were wasted stairing off into space trying to figure out how I would do this or that. By the time I got around to installing the rails I was a pro, so Kate suggested I re-do the existing rail just for fun. Once the rails were in, it only took another two months to get around to the 1 hour task of sealing the deack boards and we were officially done!
The finished product:
Never again!
The question I get most about this project is, "how do you know how to do all this stuff?" The answer is my Dad. No matter how many times we broke something he was working on, left his prized drill out in the rain, or misplaced his hammer, he never lost the will to pass on his handy-ness. Of course my Dad is what I would call a "Craftsma", that is, someone who makes things that look nice. I just make things that are functional, but that lack of patience is my own fault and not his. Amazingly the deck turned out looking pretty nice too, from a distance.
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