Steps Done!

We wrapped up the steps yesterday and no one is happier about it than I am.  These steps mocked me, taking way longer than I had estimated!  I don't remember the steps taking as long on my last deck, but then again that was a while back.  There are a lot of little details that all take time on steps.

The white railing and trim really pops in the sun-light.  

What's left on the deck?  I have to caulk the white fascia joints / screw heads, clean-up under the deck, and put the tools away.  After that, the next project will involve painting some rooms downstairs.
I took this picture (below) this morning.  A hot air balloon flew over our house and landed in our neighbors yard.  I hadn't realized it until I looked at the picture, but the chase van is driving past the barn.

Go Phillies!!!

One of the senior managers with the company I work for called me in to his office today and asked if I could work overtime today for a "special project."  When I told him I could, he handed me a ticket to today's first game of the playoffs between the Phillies and the Brewers.  I like these kind of work assignments!

I went down with a co-worker who also received a ticket.  We arrived before the start of the game at 3 PM, watched the end of batting practice, then got to our seats.  Despite some light rain, we had an awesome time, particularly because this is the first post-season win the Phillies have had in 15 years.  Go Phillies!

Weekend Washout

The weather did not cooperate this past weekend and I didn't do anything with the deck. Fortunately I was able to catch up on inside work on Friday / Saturday and catch up on a nap on Sunday. I'm hoping that this Friday will be dry so that I can wrap things up on the deck.

We hadn't hung pictures since moving in and we spent a good bit of time on Saturday morning figuring out where most of the artwork was going.  I then spent several hours hanging them.  I still have more to go, but it's nice not having piles of art stacked up.

Good news - The Phillies won the NL East pennant this past weekend!  My condolences to my upstate NY (Mets) friends.

Rainy Weekend

It's been a wet rainy weekend so far.  I've got one day of work left to get the step railings on and skirt board done, but it doesn't look like that is going to happen today.  I'm going to do some indoor jobs today - hanging pictures and organizing the basement.

I got my iMac back from the repair shop yesterday.  They had diagnosed it as a bad power supply. Here's hoping everything is back to normal!

Back to work!

We've had friends from NY visiting for the last several days, here to celebrate my oldest daughters sixteenth birthday. It was good getting caught up with the news from up north. It's still hard to believe that I have a sixteen year old.

I got back out to the deck this afternoon, and got to work attaching the Azek skirtboards. By 7 o'clock, we had all the skirtboards attached. My dad came over for several hours and had some good tips on better ways to do things. I also borrowed his radial arm saw to cut the 12" wide skirt boards. My chop saw can't cut much deeper than 8", so having the extra reach with the radial arm was a great advantage.
At this point, all I have left is to get the skirt boards onto the side of the steps, install the step railings, and some cleanup activities. It's good to be almost done!On the computer front, the Apple store was not able to reproduce the problem I was having after two days of testing. The computer came home on Wednesday, and the problems started again on Thursday. I took the computer back today. Fortunately, the store showed me where the loading dock was, so I won't have to carry the PC through the mall again. The good news - they were able to reproduce the problem today, so hopefully they'll be able to figure out soon.

One cool thing on the work front, my department will be doing a 3 month trial of 4-10 hour days. This will give me every Friday off! We'll be starting this upcoming week.

Til' next time. . .

Rotten Apple

My 9 month old iMac is dead, refusing to start up when the power button is pushed. While I've generally been happy with the computer, this is a major bummer. There is no in home service (unless you purchase an extended protection plan) which means I have to schlep it to the nearest Apple store. Good thing I still have my trusty, though slow, Dell.

Loss of Momentum

I got off to a late start on Saturday morning, having slept in after being awake for part of the night. By the time I got started, it was close to 10 am. Since returning from vacation, I haven't spent any time on the deck project. Work has been busy and I spent 16 hours at work on Thursday working on a problem. Between work and getting things back to normal at home, I haven't been terribly motivated to get back to work on the deck. It was a good thing my Dad was headed over, otherwise I may never had started.

I had thought getting the steps done would be a half day affair. This was an underestimate as things took longer than I had expected. There were a lot of small details to work out, such as how to attach the treads to the risers. I wound up screwing down the back of the rear tread, then using the CONCEALoc fastener between the two boards, and then screwing down the leading edge of the front tread.

As the front treads are not pre-grooved, I had to cut a slot for the hidden fasteners. I spent a bit of time looking for my biscuit jointer in the few unpacked boxes in the basement and am beginning to think that the biscuit jointer "disappeared" in the move. We've already discovered several things that went missing during the move by United Van Lines including a chain saw. Unfortunately I already filed my claim with them and will not get reimbursed for any additional items I find are missing.

By the end of the day, we had all of the start treads attached, the first Azek skirt board cut down and attached, and the Azek for the stair risers cut down.
What's left? Two things: 1) The stair railings and 2) the remaining white skirt boards around the outside of the deck.