Cue the oooohs and aaahhs:  It’s BISTRO LIGHT time!

My parents put up bistro lights over their patio a few years ago (for our rehearsal dinner in 2011) and ever since I’ve wanted them in our backyard. One of the main reasons we put in the patio was to put up bistro lights!

First draft of the layout

My Dad was essential for the design help. As with most projects, this one was a lot more work than I initially thought. (We’re facing something similar with the pizza oven right now…) It took me a bit to wrap my head around the guide/guy wire concept, but luckily my Dad had already been through the process once and was patient when explaining it (over and over again) to me. He even provided detailed drawings, like this one.

First things first, I had to buy the lights. I used the same company and products as my parents did: Budget Lighting.

This is what I ordered. The grand total ended up being $154.70 + shipping. BLI has a $25 minimum order, so I ordered double lightbulbs to replace them as they burn out, since ordering additional bulbs later wouldn’t meet the minimum order.

Here’s what all of the “ingredients” of this project looked like:

With the materials in hand, my Dad drew a more detailed sketch and we went to Lowe’s to pick up the remaining tools: “S” clips, tighteners, hooks for the deck and tree and an outdoor extension cord.

We measured and cut the wires to match the diagram. Then we drilled into the trees and connected the wires. Where’d Brandon go!?

From there, we hung the lights, flipped the switch and voila! What do you think? I almost want it to get darker earlier again. Almost.

Last week I detailed my very ambitious plans for the long Memorial Day weekend. The weather didn’t really cooperate and most projects took longer than I expected, but all in all, I’m quite proud of all of the work we did.

Our ambitious original list: (Updates/commentary in bold)

• Buy all of the components for the pizza oven (just in case it doesn’t rain!) <– We hope to finish the design this week and look at sourcing our bricks and insulation boards and blankets (Who knew, right!?)
• Build the pizza oven base and secure the steel sheet <– Way easier than we expected. Just heavy. (And even then, it was mainly Brandon!) 
• Repair (re-do) the step under the new stairs in the backyard (concrete blocks and bricks) <– I think I have most of the necessary project components, but ran out of time — I blame the old cement and rebar that we spent an hour trying unsuccessfully to dig out.
• Put up the bistro lights (!!!)  <– LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! Let the patio parties commence! 
• Cut the wine barrels in half (If it works: stain and remove rust and figure out what to plant) <– Major success on this one. HOWEVER, it took WAY longer than I expected it to. I’m excited to start on the tutorial and share it with my faithful readers, likely in next week’s Wine Wednesday post. Check back on June 5.
• Take a trip to the dump, if there is time  
  
• Paint the new trim in the living room, touch up the wall paint <– I had too much fun celebrating birthdays and visiting with family. I’ll get to it one of these days… 
• Paint the new bathroom baseboards <– Ditto
• Caulk the hallway siding <– Ditto
• Paint the ceiling patch in the hallway <– Ditto
• Put the extra hardy board siding on Craigslist/take it to the dump <– Dump run!
• Buy some Copper River salmon and cedar plank it on the grill. (YUM! One of my favorite culinary times of the year!) <– We shared the deliciousness on Sunday’s Long Weekend Progress Report post
  

And now? I’m exhausted. I need a weekend from my weekend. Time to relax on the couch with the cats.

I’ll leave you with the latest from Megan’s Island: our backyard! At least all this rain is good for something! Most of those plants were planted in the last month!

Hello, gorgeous. I love our backyard!

Have a great week!

Brandon and I took advantage of the nice weather recently and dedicated some quality time to the new stairs and lower deck.

So what did we do? We woke up early, grabbed our 30 percent off coupon and headed down to Sherwin Williams for some deck stain. Oh yeah, deck stain. You know what they say, right? No stain, no gain. “They” don’t really say that, but they probably should, since a little preventative staining helps keep the deck in tip-top shape from sun and water damage.

The lower deck is a knotty cedar, so we wanted to keep the stain pretty natural and let the grain of the wood really shine. We were mainly looking for the water and sun protection and help in blending the looks of the new and old decks. And? Success.

Natural Oil-Based Toner

We bought two gallons and ended up using the Sherwin Williams Deckscapes Exterior Oil Toner Stain in Natural. We were hoping for the water-based toner, which they’ve advertised, but only a handful of stores in the STATE carried it. So, oil it was. We used this stain. It ended up costing ~ $35 per gallon with the coupon.

While we were at Sherwin Williams we also bought a paint pad, specifically used for painting/staining decks. We had the other necessary accessories at home: disposable gloves, a 2.5″ paint brush, about 1 million (12 in actuality) foam brushes, a paint tray and a disposable liner, and a rag for cleaning up and wiping off the stain, once it had set in.

In anticipation of our nice weather, Brandon cleaned with deck with 30-second outdoor cleaner and we let it dry for 12 hours. Boy was it clean!

Before…

I haven’t had any staining experience and Brandon has had lots, so I took his cue on what to do. It was pretty simple: cover all of the wood with stain (don’t let it pool), wait for it to dry, and wipe off the excess. And, try not to get any on yourself. (I failed in that regard.)

First, collect your supplies and re-clean the space you’re going to clean. We have two big trees in the backyard, so quite a bit of debris had fallen in the 12 hours since the last big cleaning. We used our fancy new leaf blower. Here are the other supplies you’ll need. Please note that essentially nothing will be salvageable from this project. The stain is so sticky that everything will need to be thrown away. Make sure you use good disposable gloves.

We started with the stairs and worked our way down, wiping extra stain off of the metal grid as we went. Staining took a lot longer than I expected. I think the stairs, railing and the lower deck took us three hours. It’s really not that long, but compared to my favorite pastime of spray painting, for-real painting takes an ETERNITY! Not really, but you know.

Staining, staining, staining…

We started off with the normal 2.5″ paintbrush in trying to get on both sides of the railing. It didn’t work. Luckily, I had a million-pack varying sized foam brushes. (I only needed a few for a separate project, but the million-pack was such a deal, I bought 20 instead of two. Good thing I’m so resourceful and my craft room is so organized!)  The foam brushes did just the trick, but unfortunately didn’t last all that long. We used all one million (10 or so) on the stairs and deck. Pretty minimal investment for such return.

For the long, straight pieces (think railing and decking), we used pole-mounted sponge pad applicator that looked a lot like a larger version of the tool I normally use to edge paint on walls and trim. This new tool worked great, but the sponge pad kept slipping off of the applicator. It was pretty annoying but didn’t seem to effect our work. For the long decking, we used the foam brushes to spread the stain between the decking and then used the  paint pad with large, long brush strokes. This was a genius idea and I’m glad that I had it.  Once the stain was applied, we went back over it with a rag and removed it. More success!

The final product! That’s a well-stained deck!

Now for that sun to come back, so we can head down those freshly-stained stairs and enjoy the backyard and patio!

With our home to-do list swirling around my head in anticipation of the long weekend, I’ve got lots and lots to think about. The weather reports are undecided on whether its going to rain or not, so I have ideas of both indoor and outdoor projects.

Weather dependent, our grand weekend plans will hopefully include:

• Buy all of the components for the pizza oven (just in case it doesn’t rain!)
• Build the pizza oven base and secure the steel sheet
• Repair (re-do) the step under the new stairs in the backyard (concrete blocks and bricks)
• Put up the bistro lights (!!!)
• Cut the wine barrels in half (If it works: stain and remove rust and figure out what to plant)
• Take a trip to the dump, if there is time
• Paint the new trim in the living room, touch up the wall paint
• Paint the new bathroom baseboards
• Caulk the hallway siding
• Paint the ceiling patch in the hallway
• Put the extra hardy board siding on Craigslist/take it to the dump
• Buy some Copper River salmon and cedar plank it on the grill. (YUM! One of my favorite culinary times of the year!)

What do you think? Think we’ll have enough to do over the long weekend?!

Guess what came in the mail today!? OUR NEW BISTRO LIGHTS! EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

They’re here! Hopefully the guide wire and light bulbs come tomorrow!

It doesn’t look like much now, but combined with some posts and some clips, these will add the finishing touches to our so-close-to-perfect back yard.

We’re hoping to get these up before June, and of course we’ll post photos as soon as we can!