Staining the Deck (July)

I have spent the better part of this entire month staining our decks. The upper one took about 6 hours total (including a single coat of stain and Thompson Water Seal), but the lower one dragged on and on, as it required two coats of stain and the Thompson Water Seal. Oh MAN am I glad to be finished with that project!

Here are some before and after pics!

Before

I did a really bad job of taking any official "before" pictures, as I just couldn't wait to dive right in. I found a few that I had taken earlier this year during different events unintentionally that sort of show how bad the deck had gotten:

And here is a progress shot about halfway through the month: What a HUGE difference! And that was only after one coat of stain.

After

How about a little side-by-side comparison?

Upper Deck

Lower Deck

If you look close, I still do have a little lattice on the left side of the deck stairs. (It was covered by branches that we burned up this past weekend, so I couldn't get to it on short notice) I also feel like the railing needs a second coat of stain, so I might sand the water seal off and re-stain that before applying another coat of water seal. I also do need to water seal the stairs and a small portion of the lower deck, but the stain itself does have a weather seal in it, so it's not an urgent thing. If I get really ambitious, I might put a second coat on the lattice, but I think it looks pretty great as it is!