The patio furniture we ordered for our deck arrived this morning. After about 4 hours of work to assemble everything, it’s definitely looking like a big improvement over the empty deck we had when we started.

We ordered the 7-piece dining set, 2 chaise lounges, and a set of nesting tables from the River Stone Collection and the 4-piece seating set from the Buckingham Collection – all from Sears. Everything came with some assembly required, but none of it was that difficult. The instructions were pretty clear – it probably took us longer to unwrap everything and clean up all of the packing material than it did to actually put everything together.

We need to work on arranging everything some more – I think the chaise lounges may wind up moving out to the pool area and we need to find a new home for the grill, but here are some pictures:

I placed an order tonight for a couple of deck boxes too. We ordered the Suncast DB9750 Ultra-Large Storage Bench, which will go on the deck and hold the cushions for the seating set when it’s not in use (to keep them from getting nasty and wet when it rains). The other deck box is a Suncast DB7000W Deck Box with Wheels that we’ll put out by the pool to store the chemicals and pool accessories in. It’ll be so nice when they come – our back porch is getting awfully crowded with us trying to store everything there!

We’ve been looking all over at patio furniture ever since the displays started going up in the stores a month or so ago, trying to decide what would be the best combination of things to put on our large side-deck, the smaller, tiled patio off of the sun room, and the deck area around the pool. We’ve basically come to the conclusion that, while we like all of the more expensive furniture very much, we’re going to need a lot more for those three spaces than what we’d want to spend. So, we’d been talking about buying some really inexpensive stuff to start with, just so the deck, patio, and pool area won’t be empty and then accumulate some of the nicer things over time.

This weekend, though, I think we found the perfect mix of not-so-expensive but nice-looking patio furniture. When we came home, I looked it up on-line and found those prices to be $150 or so cheaper than in-store, so I placed the order last night and scheduled a home delivery for next Sunday. We ordered a table that seats six, 2 matching lounge chairs with a set of nesting tables to go between them, and a set of PVC “wicker” furniture. I think all of the furniture will probably fit on our deck (and hopefully fill it out nicely), but the chaise lounges will probably find a home by the pool and the wicker furniture may migrate to the patio, depending on where we find we’re spending most of our time.

I still need to find a large deck box that we can use to store the cushions for the wicker furniture in while its not in use so they won’t get wet and nasty when it rains. I’m thinking we’ll probably wind up with a Suncast or Rubbermaid one since those seem to get pretty good reviews and will probably do a good job of keeping water out. I really like the way some of the wooden ones look, but they aren’t completely weather-proof, which I think is a requirement. I’ve still got a week or so to figure it out, though, so no major rush. I’m just excited to have the furniture on its way – it’ll be so much nicer to spend time relaxing outside once there’s actually a place to sit down!

We ordered a new solar cover for our swimming pool shortly after opening it a couple of weeks ago. It came only a few days later, but we didn’t get a chance to do anything with it until this weekend. The cover we ordered was actually for a pool a little bigger than ours – we ordered an 18′ x 36′ rectangular blue/clear cover for our pool that’s a 17′ by 34′ oval since we couldn’t find one that was perfectly sized to our pool and we’d read multiple places (and the previous owners told us) that it would work out fine to buy one a little larger and just cut it to size.

So, this afternoon, we hauled the new solar cover out to the pool, unfolded it over the pool, and started trying to figure out the easiest approach to cutting it to size. The instructions said that the pool cover would need to lay out for a few days to completely relax so that it could be cut most accurately, so we decided to do just a rough cut today (so it wouldn’t be all wadded up in the pool or laying on the deck) and then we’ll come back and do a more accurate trim after it’s had a chance to relax. We started by measuring the width of the pool and cutting about 13″ off of the width of the cover so it would float without getting all bunched up on the sides. Manufacturing a pool cover must not be an exact science because ours came with edges that weren’t square and it was a little larger than the advertised size, so we figure they must expect everyone to do some trimming, even if the pool cover was ordered to be the same size and shape as the pool. After we got the extra width trimmed off, we ran a pair of scissors along the metal rim on the top of the pool liner to try to get the oval shape of the ends transferred to the cover. It still needs to be cleaned up a little, but it’s a good start. Once the cover has flattened out a little, we’ll go back and do a more accurate cut to get it to the right size for the pool.

We’re hoping that the solar cover will help the water to better retain the heat the water will gain from the sun. Our pool temperature has been averaging somewhere between 58 and 60 degrees since we opened it, so hopefully this will help to raise it a few degrees so we won’t have to run the heater as much when we finally get impatient and decide it’s time to start swimming. The cover is also supposed to help reduce the amount of evaporation and chemical usage. We haven’t really noticed a problem with either of those yet, but I’ll be happy to be able to fill the pool and add chemicals even more infrequently than we’ve had to so far.

Over the last couple of weeks, the furniture we ordered for our sun room back in January has trickled in and everything has finally been delivered. We’re really happy with everything, with the exception that the couch should have had three cushions instead of two. We’re working with the store on it and it sounds like they’ll be re-ordering a new one for us next week, which we should hopefully have in another month or two. Here are some pictures:

We also wound up buying a new LCD television for the room last weekend. It’s a 46″ Sony, model # KDL-46XBR4, which we’ve been really happy with so far. The picture looks pretty good, even without an HD signal, and there’s only a minimal amount of reflection on the screen, which is something we were pretty concerned about given the large number of windows and doors in the room. We currently have the TV hooked up to the home theater PC we built a few weeks ago and it’s been working out well so far. The wireless-N network we’re using to stream our recorded television content has been performing really well, with no skips. We still need to get a remote control working with it (so we don’t have to use the keyboard to drive the TV anymore), but it’s pretty much done otherwise.

We still need to hang some pictures on the walls and I’m planning to get a bunch of green plants to fill in the corners of the room that are basically empty now, but we’re excited about the transformation so far and about spending more time in a room that we basically haven’t used since we moved in last fall.

We took advantage of the warmer weather last weekend and decided to open our swimming pool for the season. This was our first experience with doing any real swimming pool maintenance since we moved in last fall and we debated about hiring a local pool company to open it for us, but, once we figured out that all they would really do was pull the winter plugs, replace the skimmer baskets, and prime the pump, we started reading about our equipment and decided to try opening it ourselves.

As it turns out, there’s nothing complicated about opening a swimming pool, even if you’ve never done it before. So, I thought I’d post the steps we followed in case anyone else finds themselves in a similar position. We also found this How-To page (and others on the same site) to be a pretty good reference for opening a swimming pool and for pools in general.

Step 1
Remove the winter cover from the pool. If the winter cover is the tarp variety, this includes pumping off any water that’s accumulated on the cover over the winter. It’s best to start on this early since it can take some time. We also found that it’s helpful to start rolling the cover back as soon as the water level starts to go down. This helps to keep the water on top of the cover deep enough for the pump and makes it easier to start filling the pool before the cover is completely off.

Step 2
Remove the winter plugs and replace the skimmer basket and eyeball return jets. This will release the anti-freeze into the pool.

Step 3
Inspect the pool equipment and replace the plugs on the pump head and filter. At first, we didn’t know where the plugs would be, but it is apparently standard to store them in the basket inside the pump head for the winter.

Step 4
Start filling the pool to normal operating water level. Since this will take a while, it’s not a bad idea to start this before the winter cover is completely removed from the pool.

Step 5
When all of the water has been pumped off of the pool cover, remove it, hose it off, and store it for the summer. We’ve been told that this is the most important part of opening a pool because it’s difficult correct the problems caused when the yucky green water and algae on top of the cover get into the pool.

Step 6
Using a pool leaf rake, remove as much debris as possible from the surface of the water and the bottom of the pool.

Step 7
Scrub the sides of the pool with a curved brush and shock the pool water. At this point, don’t be worried too much if the water is cloudy.

Step 8
Prime the pump by filling the pump head with water from the pool and replacing the lid. Your filter may differ, but the owners manual for ours said to first backwash the filter by setting it to “Backwash” and then starting the pump and running it for 2-3 minutes. Then, stop the pump, change the filter setting to “Rinse”, start the pump back up and run it for another minute or two until the water runs clean. Then, stop the pump again, change the filter setting to “Filter”, and start the pump back up. Run the filter for the next 24 hours on the “filter” setting, repeating the backwash and rinse steps every time the PSI increases by 10.

When we first attempted to start our pump, it buzzed, but wouldn’t start up. Since the pump had sat outside all winter, we think something must have corroded causing the impeller to not be able to turn. We disconnected the pump from the pump head and turned the impeller by hand a few times, which freed it up and it’s worked fine since then.

Step 9
Shut the pump off to let everything settle over night. Then vacuum the sides and bottom of the pool and start the pump back up to continue filtering the water.

Step 10
Periodically, check the chemical levels using test strips and add the appropriate chemicals to balance the water. Don’t be alarmed if it takes a few days for the water to clear up. Our pump ran for about 3 days before we could see the drain on the bottom of our pool.

When we moved in last fall, our swimming pool was already closed for the season and covered with a tarp-like cover that was weighted down with water bags all around the edge of the pool. Over the winter, rain, snow, and leaves have accumulated on top of the cover, so come this spring, we had a large green pool of water on the cover that needed to be pumped off before we can remove it to open the pool.

We started trying to remove the water last fall with a syphon pump, but it was hard to keep the water flowing, so we eventually gave up. We tried to get the majority of the leaves off of the cover before the winter, but that was about all we did. When the snow and ice on top of the cover started to melt this spring, we decided it was time to start thinking about pumping the water off again. This time we started with a small transfer pump that hooked up to a garden hose. The box said it would pump a couple hundred gallons an hour, so we thought we were good. We also bought a disposable 100ft vinyl backwash hose from the pool store that we unrolled down the hillside into the bottom of the ravine to help avoid washouts on the hillside. We left that setup running for a couple hours at a time, several days in a row, but we weren’t seeing a lot of results. So, we decided to do a quick calculation of the approximate number of gallons we thought we needed to pump off of the pool cover and came up with nearly 2000 gallons (assuming it was about a foot deep in the middle and we didn’t get any more rain, both of which are conservative).

We messed around with using the smaller pump for a few more days, but eventually got impatient and bought a larger 1/4 hp submersible pump that was still light-weight enough to sit on the pool cover. For a more permanent drainage solution, we also bought some black corrugated pipe to run down the hillside, figuring we would use it for backwashing the pool filter as well once we opened the pool for the season. (The disposable hose we started with had burst in a few spots when it got below freezing one night and there was still water pooled in it at places.) The larger pump worked a lot better for removing large amounts of water from the pool cover, but it still took a good 5-6 hours of pumping to get to the point where the cover was starting show in places. Once we got to that point, we went back to using the smaller pump to get the last little bit of water since that pump seemed less likely to get plugged up with leaves.

Overall, it took us a lot longer to get all of the water off of the pool cover than we expected and there was a lot more of it there than we anticipated … I think we now know why the pool company charges $400 to open a pool with a tarp cover, but only $150 to open a pool with no cover. For next year, I think we’ll probably consider getting a mesh cover that’s anchored into the ground all around the pool since that should greatly reduce the amount of effort to open the pool in the Spring – and it should also help avoid all the issues we’ve been having with animals tearing up the water bags over the winter, causing the cover to slide into the pool …

We bought our first piece of “patio furniture” last week: a new hammock for the deck. Not sure if it exactly qualifies as furniture, but we’re still excited about it.

We have a large deck to the side of our house that had two trees growing through it when it was built. Something must have happened to one of the trees at some point because you can see where the deck was patched and now there’s a wooden support there instead. The previous owners had a hammock between the tree and the wooden support when we first walked through the house and we really liked the way it looked on the deck, so we bought one this week to put up in the same spot. We had the option of getting a fabric one that looked really comfy, but we weren’t sure how well it would hold up to the weather, so we stuck with a woven cotton one instead.

Now, we just need to work on finding some real patio furniture we like for the rest of the deck …

Over the last couple of weeks, our yard has started looking a lot more like spring. The grass and some of the ground cover are getting greener and some of the perennials are starting to come up. We’re excited to see what types of flowers and plants we’ll have since a lot of it was done for the year when we moved in last fall.

One thing the previous home owner did tell us about was the 70-year-old peony bushes lining the driveway and circling a couple of the trees in the yard. They were mowed off by the time we first started looking at the house last July, so we’ve never seen them, but they sound pretty. Here are a couple of pictures I took earlier in the week. You can kind of see where they’re coming up … it shouldn’t be long now!