Since I retired over 5 years ago, I spend more time on my Mac, especially at TS. I also visit other Mac forums & maintain my web sites. But I have other talents.
My wife & I have a lake (not lake front) house at a gated community in East Texas, about 90 miles from home. We've wanted a deck for a long time, but I've been "too cheap" (my wife's comment) to pay someone to build one. We wanted to put the deck on the front because there are more trees & the front faces East, which will provide shade in the afternoon/evening.
This weekend I finished (except for staining after the treated wood dries) the deck. It's 12 ft by 23 ft. The cost for wood, concrete, hardware & screws was about $1200. Took me about 50 hours to build. I spent several other hours on the design. If I had paid someone to build, it would probably have been about $4000. Not bad for a "gray hair old grandfather" as my grandkids call me.
Between the start & finish of the deck, the house was painted.
The top picture shows the before. The completed deck in shown in the bottom picture.
