THE DECK
A better alternative to the cheesy stairway that came with this house.
Well here is another one of our projects that even though it wasn't conceived by us exclusively, it still deserves to be recognized on the site. Unlike the storage shed, I didn't take a lot of pictures, in actuality I didn't take any pictures until after we were done building the whole thing. I didn't take any pics because the whole project went so damned fast to my surprise. But at least I did get a couple of pics of the deck and how its set up. The deck is built on a series of concrete deck blocks instead of having the posts planted in the ground. The whole idea behind this was that if we ever plan on moving or if in the next 20 years this house falls in on itself and we build another one, then we can easily move the deck and reassemble it after things have been re-established. The deck is 8' x 12' in size to more than accomodate our space wants for recreation. We can put a grill or deep fryer up here with enough clearance to be safe, plus several chairs for people to sit. For a while I thought about using the old stairs from the house as the stairs for the deck but then I figured that would be really cheesy and generic so I just went on ahead and made a regular stairway with the proper components. We have alternate plans for the old stairway (no not firewood). Anyhow, thats about it in a nutshell, the deck is here, and my focus is now on the host of other projects that are still active.
There is another thing that this deck addresses. Before the installation of this deck, whenever it rained, the area around the back door and the stairway would turn into a bowl of cocoa wheat and would create a terrible mess. At least now with the deck, the super muddy area is now covered and we can at least step up to the door with the minimum of slop on our shoes, and take off our shoes with ease before stepping into the house.