So, I decided to take on this project of removing the old paint from our deck, not really knowing what I was getting myself into. My girlfriend was eager to have it done in a day, but boy, was I in for a surprise. I thought I could just sand the paint off with an orbital sander, but that turned out to be wishful thinking. The sander barely made a dent in the old paint. It was then that someone at the store dropped the bomb on me – I needed to remove the paint before sanding. So, off I went to get some paint remover.
I spent a good 2-3 hours pressure washing the deck, trying to get rid of as much paint as I could. Then, I spent another hour applying the paint remover, hoping it would do the trick. But guess what? It barely made a difference. The darn paint seemed to be super glued to the deck. To make matters worse, I had to move all the deck furniture and stuff onto the grass, making our yard look like a disaster zone. Needless to say, my girlfriend was not impressed. She said I didn’t plan properly and that I had just made an even bigger mess.
I get where she’s coming from. The deck looks far from finished, and our yard is a chaotic mess. But from my perspective, I was genuinely trying to take charge and figure things out on the go. Sure, I underestimated the scale of the job and probably should have done more research beforehand. But I swear I wasn’t being lazy or careless. I genuinely believed I could get it all done in a day. And when I realized that wasn’t happening, I tried different tactics to salvage the situation.
Now, I’m left wondering – is deck paint removal really a one-day job, or was I just being overly optimistic? Did I mess up big time with my planning, or is this just one of those DIY projects that tends to spiral into chaos before it starts looking better?