Lattice and Stain-Sealer
Been spending a lot of time at the lake house this year but not boating or fishing - working! First of all, boating is kind of out of the question right now because of Hurricane Rita. The dam at the south end of Lake Conroe was damaged during last year's hurricane and the lake level had to be lowered for the repairs. That was completed during the spring but the lake level is still way down. You can see the problem by comparing the last couple of pictures on the previous page with the third picture below.
Secondly, I really haven't had much time for recreation because I had a couple of projects for the lake house that were already overdue. One thing that had to be done was to enclose the underside of the house, which I had decided to do with lattice. The other project was to seal and stain all the decking around the house and boat slip. This was not only for looks but to protect the wood, some of which was already beginning to warp pretty badly.
This first shot was taken on 5/26/06 at the northwest corner of the house right after I had finished putting up the lattice. I put in three removable panels, one shown at this corner and the other two at the front of the house on either side, to allow access under the house for storage or whatever (e.g. I keep the lawnmower under the front of the house). This picture was taken before any of the staining was done.
This next shot was taken on 6/16 after I had put the stain-sealer on most of the front porch. A couple of things to note in this picture is that I didn't try to apply the stain very far up the tall 8-by-8 post in the center because I didn't have anyway to reach all the way to the top. My builder, Rick, has a 30-foot extension ladder which I'll borrow for reaching the top of that thing. Another thing you might notice in this picture is how "white" the unstained sections of the decking and lattice look. That's because I had to pre-treat all the wood with deck wash before applying the stain-sealer. I lost count but it took 20-something gallons of the deck wash to do everything. However, the wash, which smells like it's about 95% chlorine bleach, was pretty easy to apply with a sprayer ... and it was cheap. And it works in about 5 minutes!
One other thing to note in this shot - this was before the builder had started replacing some of the warped boards as he had promised to do. One of those warped boards is that horizontal 4-by-6, which I had left un-stained since I knew he was going to replace it.
The next two shots were taken on 6/29/06. As you can see, the water level is way down, at least 5 or 6 feet by my estimate. It's been this low since last fall and so the weeds are beginning to take over. My builder's partner, Jim, is shown here with his two sons replacing the warped boards, which included several boards on the large part of the deck, the 4-by-6 mentioned above, a few other deck boards, rails and pickets here and there, as well as a complete re-build of the top of the storage box at the back of the boat slip.
As far as the stain-sealer is concerned, at the time this picture was taken I had completed all the decking and lattice attached directly to the house except for (1) the deck and rail section on the west side between the front and back porches and (2) the aforementioned 4-by-6 and upper part of the 8-by-8.
One last thing to note here is that I installed a ladder at the boat slip. I figured that if I was going to do that, it would be best to do it while the water level was down. I guess a wood ladder would have looked better but, with all the other work I had to do, I figured I just wasn't up to the task (I'm not much of a carpenter). So, I went to WalMart and bought the smallest aluminum extension ladder I could find, separated the two sections, and proceeded to anchor one of the sections into a hole (about 2 feet deep) on the right back side of the boat slip. Then, using some treated lumber scraps, I made a brace to attach the ladder to the side of the slip using large screws and the nail gun. It's fairly secure! The ladder will come in handy if I ever get a small fishing boat that I'll want to tie up right there on that side of the slip. Or, if someone falls in the lake and doesn't want to swim to the other side of the canal, they can discretely climb out using the ladder! If you look close, you might be able to see it just to the right of the lamp post.
This last shot, also taken from the other side of the canal, shows the new pool in the foreground. It's been fully operational for several months. That's my wife testing out a new float!
Last update: 7/3/2006
