Deck destruction

Have you ever woken up one day and said to yourself, "Hmm, maybe it would be a good idea to tear out our monster deck and build a raised walkway to the garage before winter comes and we're forced to walk single-file down the very narrow and icy/slushy sidewalk for seven months again"? No? Well, you're missing out, friends.

Seriously, this has been on my mind since the moment we decided to adopt a special needs child -- maybe it's the practical male in me, but it seemed obvious from the get-go that we'd need better access to the house, especially in the winter. Problem is, I hate major carpentry projects, probably because of the potential to seriously screw things up. Fortunately, I have a number of friends who are not so intimidated.

So for the past week or so, we've been tearing apart the deck -- or rather, carefully deconstructing it in order to re-use the pieces in the raised walkway that we're building to the garage. Tonight we had sixteen people come over to help move the deck off its trusses and down onto a new site (over our concrete patio) closer to the ground. It is now the first twelve feet of our raised wooden walkway.

Our friend Eric using a saws-all to cut the deck in half.

Our friend Brian using a table saw to cut the deck in half.

Moving the smaller of the two sections, which will becut in half to become
the rest of the walkway.

Moving the larger of the two pieces of the deck, which will be the first twelve
feet of the walkway, as well as a sort of wooden patio.

This is what community looks like. We have neighbors from down the street,
as well as friends from ECFE and church and book club, all having fun helping out.

Now all we have to do is reattach the posts and railings, build new stairs, rewire the electric, cut up the leftover decking, and create the rest of the walkway. Should be easy, right?