Outdoor Table With Benches

So, now that we have this amazing deck, we needed appropriate seating.  We do have 2 deck chairs and 2 deck ottomans (that the dogs chewed and destroyed), but 2 chairs isn't enough for a cookout!  My original plans for the deck included a built in seating area, but we ran out of lumber. While we do plan on adding that later on, we still needed seating for the time being.  I perused walmart.com, amazon, and craigslist, but I wasn't really seeing anything that I really wanted.

When we moved into this house, we found an old door in the rafters of the shed.  Immediately I wanted to do 23048972304710938412 things with it. :)  It was too small to be a king size headboard, I couldn't figure out where I would put it as a bookshelf...and then it hit me!  A picnic table!

My original plan was to purchase legs from Lowes (In case you didn't know, I hate Home Depot and will always and forever go to Lowes for my home improvement needs), but they're in the neighborhood of $20/leg.  Not what I wanted to spend.  Then I searched Pinterest for ideas on using pallets (we have several in the back yard just waiting to be turned into magnificent things).  What I was seeing looked clunky.  I had finally settle on purchasing lumber to make it into a "real" picnic table.  At least if I was going to be purchasing something, I would get seats out of it too.

 Then, I found this picture...

Since having gotten all this wood from the neighbor, our scrap pile has grown quite a bit! Guess what?  We had a door just waiting to be turned into a table, some leftover 2x8s and 2x4s from the deck and 4x4 posts from the fence. 

A few links in, I finally found a tutorial for that table...but it required a lot of things we didn't have.  So, we just did our own thing using that look as our inspiration.

 

The one thing we did use from the tutorial was the table height.  Being that we're not bonified carpenters, we weren't sure what the standard height for a table was.  We used the 96inches as our starting point and subtracted from there to get our piece heights.

 

Being that it is an old door, and that we had extra lumber, we added a 2x8 on each side.  Now there is plenty of room to eat, drink, and be merry!

Last, but not least, we still needed seating.  I wanted benches because you can fit more people on a bench...if you really want/need to.  Plus, they're easy to move if we want to congregate near the fire pit.

 

They were really simple, but I LOVE the way they turned out!  The table is a nice solid piece, and the benches feel really sturdy.

We haven't done any sealing kind of coat yet, but I think we will soon.

A friend of mine asked me for a tutorial, but I didn't take pictures as we went.  Shortly after posting this picture on facebook, I got a message from a friend of a friend asking me to make her one!  We're in the process of pricing things right now, but if/when we build her a set, I will definitely do a tutorial!

So, what do you think?

xoxo,

Linda

I Have a Deck!

First of all, I never would have imagined that Kody and I would be celebrating 6 months of marriage in a house we BOUGHT!  Second of all, I never would have imagined that we would be adding a whole back deck another 6 months later.

I LOVE home improvement!  I love making our home ours.  I love seeing my hubby love working on home improvement projects as well.  Its just all around amazing!

So, a little back story on the deck...

Kody has, up to this point, received quarterly bonuses for being a caseworker. We spent his first one on things like a lawn mower, weed wacker, hose, grass seed, etc. (Sometimes I feel weirdly guilty for spending money on my Hot Philosophy equipment, so when we have some extra money, I get excited that Kody is giddy/excited about purchasing these kinds of things...)  This time around, we started discussing adding a back deck.  I went online to the Lowes Deck Builder program and entered in my dream deck.  Just like that we had the plans and a $2,800 price tag. 

Umm...his bonus ain't no where near that big!

I'm not kidding you, literally THE day after I started pricing decks, we found out that our next door neighbors were selling their privacy fence (a project planned for later this year) and you guessed it, their back deck!

I guess the guy that owns the house next door was letting the family in the house live there for a minimum-no rent.  Well, he decided to let the house go into foreclosure, and his lawyer told him that anything he had put into the house himself was his to sell (the privacy fence and the deck and I guess the boiler).

At first we had just discussed the privacy fence because that is all they were taking down at the time.   We threw around a price.  Over the course of a week and a half, we were $200 off on what each of us wanted for BOTH the privacy fence and deck.  Kody and I talked about it, and we just decided we couldn't do it.  So, we told them thanks but not thanks.

I was a bit bummed...for 20 minutes.  Then there was a knock on the door.  Would we come up another $50?  Ummm...YES!

We got both a deck AND a privacy fence for just a fraction of the cost of ONE of these items!  Talk about amazing timing!

About a week and half after having loads of lumber sitting in the back yard (the privacy fence is still there for hopefully not too much longer), we have a deck!

This is the before...well, just about before.  I didn't make it out there before they moved some fencing.  It's kind of hard to explain, but there was a "cut-in" where the fencing came in.  I'm not exactly sure why it was like that previously, but we just moved it, so that the deck could go all the way to the end of the house.  (and by we, I of course mean my amazing hubby and father-in-law)

I came home from work the next day to find a framed out deck!

While I was at work that night, I received this update from my mother-in-law.  I LOVE the slanted decking.  I keep thinking that it actually takes more lumber to do it this way, but it's totally worth it!  Also, they used some of the cedar planks to do cover the underneath of the deck.  We have 2 dogs, and we don't need them under the deck!

It's so beautiful!!  We didn't have quite enough lumber to do exactly what I wanted...but it is plenty spacious and just dying to be the platform for our next cookout!  We do plan on staining it, we do have railings and our yard needs a good cleaning up, but that will come!

Right now, we are just enjoying our deck so much!  I was bummed that I didn't get to be there to help more, but I can't complain AT ALL! It. Is. Amazing!

Who is coming over?

xoxo,
Linda

Mile Marker 11: Wordless Wednesday

I'm excited to participate in another link up today! Say hello to Wordless Wednesday!  I am linking up with Project Alicia.  I LOVE her blog. She is such a talented photographer.  

Wordless Wednesday is something that I would like to start doing every Wednesday as a way to sort of get my photography juices pumping!

I found this amazing tree as I was scouting locations for an upcoming photo shoot.

At first glance, I would not say that this tree inspires spring very well, however, it makes me think of the song by Jon Forman that says, "For these seeds to give birth, first they must die."  For everything, there is a season

Thanks for joining me for this not-so-Wordless Wednesday!

I can't wait to see what the rest of Wordless Wednesday has photographed!

xoxo,
Linda