REBUILDING part of our pool deck DIY HOME PROJECTS POT PIE RECIPE

We started off spring break finding out that our pool was full of fiberglass. So we ended up tearing it out and replacing it with a steel frame pool instead. And in order to do that we had to dig a very deep hole and then we had to actually add dirt back to it because we dug it too deep. And we got the new pool installed and it actually turned out beautiful. I am really really happy with it. I'm so glad that we ended up going with this one. I will have it linked down below in Now one of the issues that we did find was that we originally built our pool deck around the old pool. So the new pool did not fit the pool deck properly and so we have to redo all of the ledge and I'm going to share that process with you guys today. I'm also going to include a chicken pot pie recipe. I've shared it many times. It's definitely a hit in our house. It's so easy, super cheap to make. So stay tuned until the end of the video and you'll get to see that as well. All right so first step working on the pool deck is just trying to get a plan in place. We knew that we were going to have to use the same type of deck boards that we used originally and just try our best to cut the angles and basically just create a frame around the new pool. And it's not going to be perfect. We quickly realized that we should have probably already bought a better pool before we did all this work because now we're having to like backpedal and there was actually moments where we had to cut the pool deck whenever we were putting in the new pool because it wouldn't fit. It was crazy. I was like oh my gosh for all this hard work just getting thrown away. It was awful but we did end up figuring it out and unfortunately the pool did end up having to go back a little bit more than what we anticipated which is why there is such a large gap which is a complete hazard because you know if you're on the pool deck and you go to jump in the pool or walk and your leg falls in that hole you're done. Like this is not safe. So that's why we're gonna just we're gonna add some bracing in between where the pool is and the current deck and then we're gonna cut this wood and angles and just like I said frame it out. It's gonna look really nice when it's all done and stained but it's definitely a process. Right but we want to try to center it as much as we can here. That should be a 45 right? Use that board to make sure that our angle is right on the next one. We'll use that little board to make sure that our angle is right on the next one. The moment of truth. Is that it? Oh. So we had a lot of configuring to do. This was obviously not part of our plan um and there was some moments where we were just kind of winging it really just trying to figure out what would look best based off of what we could see in front of us at the time. So it wasn't too bad but there is a lot going on out here. Whenever we're working on projects the inside of the house gets totally neglected. I've shared this a million times but projects are like top priority in the moment especially for me. I get hyper focused on it. I gotta finish it. I can't work on anything else until my project's done and as I'm working on my project I'm making a complete mess or the house is just getting out of control. So a huge thank you to Dreamy for helping keep our house clean and crisp while we were out here working. If you have pets then you already know no matter how much you clean there's always gonna be pet hair dust and dander floating around somehow and as someone who likes to keep my home clean but also lived in and cozy I'm always looking for things that actually make every day of keep a little bit easier. So I've been trying out the Dreamy FP10 air purifier and honestly this one is great especially if you have pets. What stood out right away to me is how it handles the hair that's actually floating in the air. Most purifiers just sit there and wait for the hair to drift in but this one actually pulls in the floating pet hair before it settles all over your furniture and floors. And the coolest part is it actually has an active fur collection and self-cleaning system with a rolling brush so it actually collects all the hair in the visible bin instead of letting it clog up the main filter and once it's full you can just quickly rinse it out and it's super simple. It's way less maintenance, you're not constantly dealing with clogged filters and this can be a real issue especially if you have pets that shed a lot. So this can save you a ton on filter replacements over time. I also really like that the app is super easy to use especially if you like to be able to control everything right from your phone. And of course it is using a four stage filtration system with a HEPA filter and this is huge when it comes to air purifiers because it's not just grabbing the pet hair that you can see, it's also helping with the smaller stuff too. The dust, the dander, and all those little particles floating around. If you have been battling pet hair and want something that helps your home feel cleaner without adding more work, this has honestly been such a helpful addition. It is also 30% off right now during their spring sale so you can use my code to save even more. I'll be sure to have the link and the code down below in the description box. Jumping right back to work, this was actually one of the areas that we struggled with the most. So basically this area where the drill is sitting was an afterthought with the deck. The only reason why this ended up happening, having the ledge where you could actually sit with stools, it's kind of like a bar. The only reason why that happened was because we had so much scrap wood left I didn't want to waste it. So I was like what can we do? So we just ended up framing out and making like a really cool ledge that also hid the side of the pool so you couldn't see that from the porch. But the dilemma here is that the actual deck itself is much higher than this ledge. So we were just trying to configure and figure out what would be the best way. Also the 1xs do not come in 12 inch wide. They only come in I think it's 8 and 10 or you have to like custom order them or something. So we ended up having to do the 2x12s around the ledge so that way it was like wide enough to actually like set a plate on or a drink and like pull this you know the stool up to. I didn't want it to be like a super thin ledge and on top of that if we use the thin board it wouldn't get close enough to the pool and then it would just look not the greatest. The whole point of the whole pool deck was to try to make the pool look more custom and like custom built to the house. And so when we had to get the new pool that was where it like screwed our whole plan up. So we're just trying our best to make it look as good as possible. And we did decide to use wood dowels this time around just because the first go around we did realize that the wood does bow over time the sun the water it's going to shift and if you have wood dowels on the corners it won't lift as much so you won't have any of that like crazy lift issue down the line which we did end up having at one point with the original pool. I'm sorry I'm trying to make this make sense but sometimes when I feel like I'm explaining things I'm like what are you even talking about. At this point though we are rocking and rolling it's looking really good and I'm really happy with it because man I'm not gonna lie there was a moment in time where I was like we're gonna tear it all out and start over. We'll just have to rip all the deck boards like the you know main deck boards up and just recut them. But this actually ended up looking nicer in my opinion. So I actually like how this turned out versus the way that we cut the previous time. It was almost like rounded off and then we tried to sand it but it wasn't perfect. This makes it look a lot more professional so yeah I'm not mad at it. I'm actually kind of glad that all this ended up working out although it does suck to have to start the spring off with an expensive pool and more wood and having to fix something that you feel like you already completed. That was a bummer but it all paid off in the end. Oh and I don't know if I mentioned this but you know you can see that this ledge here is much wider than the actual deck boards itself so it does give more of like a high-end look because it's wider and then around the bar height area that is actually a 12 inch board so it's a foot wide. It's wider than the old boards which were only a 10 and I feel like it looks like a lot more chunky and like thicker so that way if like you like I said earlier did I mention that you can actually eat there have a plate have a cup you can set more stuff on that ledge which makes more sense it being like a bar that you can pull a stool up to and we're actually going to start working on that area now so we ended up going to Lowe's and grabbing two by 12 by 12 boards. These were massive very heavy boards and we ended up having to use the skill saw to cut these down just because they were so long and we're going to start configuring this all the angles for this by the way every single angle was different I just wanted to throw that out there we need to figure each one out boy what a process oh god lean on some William got the sawdust all over his face do you see it he's in the construction zone am I doing something so we actually added these to this area the same way we did at the top we screwed them in but we also added wood dowels and liquid nails to make sure that those corners don't very important we had the lifting issue in the past and we wanted to make sure that this looked a little bit nicer we did have one area that we just could not perfect it was right here this took us the longest out of the entire process it was just because of the way that the bar ledge was originally built it was not intended to stay it was supposed to be cut down but I was like oh we'll make it work me over here making more work for ourselves and it ended up working out it just took us a while to figure out a good angle and where to put this board that made sense because every time we tried to push it back against the pool then you could see the deck boards showing where I added them vertically so that was just you know one of those issues that we kept having to address as time went on and we did not like how this looked because every time we cut an angle it was almost like it was too far out so we eventually just slowly started cutting the angle until we got it right I don't even know what angle that was I couldn't tell you but we got it and this is how it ended up turning out I still have a lot of work to do I still need to stain everything but it ended up raining so I planned on letting it dry out first and then staining it right away but then as soon as it got to the point where it was dried out it started raining again so I definitely need to stain it I'll share that with you guys too because there's some other areas around the pool deck I'm going to be touching up so that's going to be a whole process in itself doing all the painting touch-ups as far as outside work goes oh and Dylan decided that we're going to go ahead and finish the porch we're actually going to extend it about five feet I know I know we should have did that to begin with but we didn't so we're going to add to it and we'll be sharing that process with you guys as well and if you don't know what I'm talking about we actually built our porch and it turned out beautiful I will have that video link down below in case you need some motivation to tackle some spring summer projects around your house and that's what my whole channel is about motivating you guys inspiring you to tackle projects that maybe you don't even think were possible I'm here to tell you that if we can do it y'all can do it too I promise you nothing is as hard I mean scratch that some things are harder than they seem but if you put your mind to things you can do anything you just have to want it bad enough you know and one of the reasons why we do a lot of projects ourselves is because we want these things it's just expensive and to hire out someone to come and build a pool deck for us or a porch for us is just on it it's out of the question it would have never happened or it would have took a year or two to save up money to be able to afford someone to hire someone to come do that why when we can do it ourselves we just have to go slow and we're gonna have to make mistakes and sometimes you end up spending a little bit more than what you anticipated because you are making mistakes and having to fix it but I can assure you it's still going to be a hell of a lot cheaper doing it yourself so if you get anything from my channel I hope that it's motivation to get started on some projects because I know you can do it I know you can and you're gonna love your house and it just makes you appreciate things so much more too when you actually put that hard work into it I mean honestly I look at our backyard in an upcoming video actually Sunday's video Sunday's video y'all do not want to miss I'm gonna be doing some landscaping I actually share some like overviews of how our backyard turned out guys it's stunning and I'm so freaking proud of it I could cry like I I have always dreamed of having a beautiful backyard and I didn't think that was ever going to happen in this home to be honest with you because it's small our yard is small and I just kept always looking into the future like well maybe one day when we have more land maybe one day when we buy a bigger house we'll get to have those things but you can have whatever you want in the house you have now you just have to improvise and make it work and that's exactly what we've done and honestly it's turned out better than I ever dreamed of so yeah please stay tuned for Sunday's video it's a good one and yeah in just a moment we're actually going to jump into a chicken pot pie recipe I know it's kind of random but that's we do things around here all right chicken pot pie so darn easy all you're gonna need is some chicken breast any brand doesn't matter chop it up cook it okay you're gonna season it good onion powder garlic powder the whole nine I'll show you all that in a second but you're gonna need mixed vegetables cream of chicken and deep dish pie crust the great value brand is the best in my opinion um I only need one but you can totally double this recipe and make two pies freeze one for later or make it for dinner for tomorrow night or for the neighbor whatever you prefer first thing you're going to do is chop up the chicken and throw it in a pan you're going to start cooking that season it well onion powder garlic powder I like to use this garlic butter seasoning it's super good I just mix a bunch of seasonings together and call it a day um you're going to cook that until it's brown you're also going to preheat the oven to 350 while that's preheating you're going to go ahead and make your mixture once the chicken is fully cooked I don't like to mix anything until the chicken's done but you're going to add one can of mixed vegetables drained sometimes I end up adding two cans depending on how many green beans come in the can and then you add one can of cream of chicken soup and then some heavy whipping cream I eyeball this I don't really have measurements I just go based off of the creaminess that I like if you like it to be more thick do less if you want it to be creamier add more so a little bit of heavy whipping cream and then I add milk milk is what's going to help thin it out and this is about the consistency that I like once this is done you're then going to add it to the pie crust second smells so good already take the pie crust apart so each package comes with two one that's going to go on the top so take the bottom one here and once this is simmered enough I just pick it up and I pour it in there I'm making sure to get every little drop add this pie crust right on top like that and let it sit there for a second and then this pie crust will come off pretty easily you just kind of run your nail or spoon just give it a minute and it'll come apart so it'll look about like that I like to do let's go around the edge and just kind of press the two pies together like so it doesn't have to look perfect oh see this one's overflowing a little bit that's okay it just means that it has lots of flavor in there sometimes when I make the pies they can be a little dry because I don't put enough sauce so just remember I don't have to look perfect okay look at that yummy goodness all right here's how the ledge turned out just one last little overview now that it's like kind of bright it's been raining you can see all the rain it's non-stop I got to get this stained sooner than later the faster we get it stained the better and longer it will hold up the actually I wanted to mention that the stain that we use don't mind my garbage bag the stain we use in sealer actually works really well it like beads the water off so nicely so highly recommend this brand of stain and sealer is the valspar I'll link it below and we use the cannon brown and it turned out so pretty the pool looks so inviting but y'all just know that it's freezing cold all this rain and cold weather we keep getting is crazy for Florida I'm ready for summer y'all but yeah that's that thank you guys for watching I have a video going up on Sunday you don't want to miss have some landscaping to share with you and it turned out so good so ah stay tuned for that and I'll see you guys then bye y'all