Remember a few months ago when I posted about my backyard overhaul plans? Well, I made it! It took basically the whole summer, exactly what I didn’t want to happen, but I am in love with everything about this makeover. Today I’m going to tell you about the deck.

When we started, there was worn light grey paint on the deck floor and railing. There was no stain at all on the spindles, posts or outer edges. The deck itself is old, pretty sure original to the house which was built in 1984. So there is a good amount of wear to many of the boards. My plan was to use DeckOver or Deck Correct, a super thick paint, that fills in some of the cracks in the aged wood. I used Behr Advanced DeckOver on my front porch and loved the result.

My vision was to paint it all dark. and to swap out the spindles for modern slats. I would have gone all the way black on the deck but the siding and roof on the house are brown-toned, so I thought true black would clash. I had to find the perfect non-black black. I literally checked every single deck stain choice at both Lowe’s and Home Depot.

BEFORE

The best black-brown option I found was a solid stain color called “Mink,” by Olympic, available at Home Depot. I used the Maximum quality. Which has a flatter sheen than the Elite. I know because they tried to sell me the higher quality when they ran out of the Maximum and a good portion of my deck looked completely different!

Once I made my plan, I was ready to start, I first I power washed the entire deck. Because the deck is so large, I worked in three sections. Then I used Behr Deck Cleaner to wash the section I was working on. After washing I let the section dry for at least 24 hours so I didn’t trap the water under the paint. I also checked the forecast to be sure there wouldn’t be any rain for at least 24 hours. If I was in the clear, I scraped off any loose paint and sanded the railings, which were the worst areas. Once prepped, I used a paint brush to apply one coat of Behr Advanced DeckOver in Flat Top. I used that color mostly because I had some left over from my front porch, but I knew I was going to cover it with the Olympic product.

A little bit about the Behr DeckOver product, it is thick. Like real thick. It dries fairly quickly. I would not recomend getting a 5 gallon bucket. It is heavy and will be very hard to use at the end. In fact I tried to get this paint as close to the time I planned to use it, because it settles so quickly. When I used this on the front porch I used a roller, but it was very hard to spread and stuck to the roller and also left a texture I didn’t love. So for the deck, even though it took a little longer, I applied with a brush. It left a much smoother finish.

Below is what it looked like after I applied the DeckOver.

Once the DeckOver was applied and dried, I put a coat of the “Mink” Olympic Solid Stain" on the deck floor and railings, as well as the posts, and outside of the deck. Once that first coat of stain was dry, we removed the existing spindles, except the few that we used to attach the slats to..

After the spindles were removed I painted the posts and railing frames. I also touched up any areas of the floor and railing that weren’t covered completely. While that was drying, I prepped the slats.

I used pressure treated fence pickets for the slats that replaced the spindles. The exact pickets I used are no longer available online, but they were pre-stained 3 1/2” pickets that cost less than a dollar each, meaning I spent just about $160 swapping out the weathered spindles. I cut each picket to size, gave it a quick sand, then attached slats to the inside posts and spindles I left using deck screws.

Below you can see the difference between the coat of DeckOver and Mink Solid Stain.

You can see in this photo that I left the spindles on each side of the posts and the two in the center to use to attach the slats. I had to use a slightly different technique to attach the slats on the stair railing.

Check out how much the final product looks like the mock-up in this post!

I do want to give the note that the two paint/stain products I used are not necessarily meant to work together, so I am not sure how it’s going to wear. But at least for the moment, it looks like a million bucks compared to what it looked like a few weeks ago.