Deck Painting

Or perhaps a better title - how not to paint a deck.

I first noticed a problem with our balcony when I hosed it off for our July 4th housewarming.  The paint flew off in chunks, along with the dust and dirt!  So we knew we'd have to fix it up again before the rainy season came back.

We started by chipping as much of the loose paint off as possible.

We borrowed my grandmother's sander to smooth things down, only we broke it and had to buy a replacement.  Apparently you're not to press down on it with all your might while it's running.  Over stresses the gears and what not. Mmmhmm, did I mentioned we both minored in physics? Embarrassing.

I really wish the deck had been stained to begin with, because this was a lot of work!

We decided to paint a little lighter than the original color.  The deck was chipping the worse in the areas where the sun exposure is the strongest, so my thinking was that a lighter color might help "reflect" a little more of that sun damage away in the future. Yesiree, there's the physics talking again.

Pardon the toes.

We used Behr deck paint in clay pebble color.  Apparently deck paint is made to be scuff resistant, so when you walk on it with shoes there won't be footprints all over the place.  Not that we're wearing shoes.

We painted with roller brushes, which I have no idea is the correct method, but it seemed to work.  Though there was a little paint drippage down through the cracks to the lower deck which I still have to remedy.

Nice shiny deck.

We also did all this painting after work, so it was always a race against the sun!

Sunset was romantic though!

Fog rolling in around Sutro Tower.  

The next day it looked good - but still you could see some of the previous dark paint underneath.  A second coat of paint was in order!

That night, however, was colder than the day before - because the paint was still wet in the morning.  When it did finally dry, it looked like this:

The paint had pooled up and dried all strangely!

Blech.  It was at this point that we had guests come over, so at least we had a funny story to tell about how we are deck painting inept.

The last coat of paint went on (with all our hopes and patience) Sunday afternoon, so as to avoid another cold-night-no-dry scenario.

Success!

Though it's a little lumpy from the uneven paint chipping (probably should have tried to remove all of it), it's covered up now and ready for rainy season! (I hope.)

Now after reading Palindrome's post about her own deck, I really want to dress it up all romantically - strung lights, a cushy love seat, Snuggies for when Sak gets cold...What? Snuggies aren't romantic?

Have you painted in the dark before?  What's your must-have item for a romantic outdoor spot?