So many of you might remember that we moved into our “forever home” about a month ago. One of the first things we knew we needed to address were the outdoor basement stairs with a safety fence. I lovingly refer to them as the basement stairs of doom!
See what I mean! Crazy unsafe!! They were originally 1″ plumbing pipe placed strategically around the 10′ drop off to the concrete basement stairs. Totally acceptable for adults, but for the three little people running wild around here, not so much!
My sweet hubby had grand plans to build it entirely from scratch, but he works really long hours and we have kids who miss him. So I ran to home depot and picked up 3 of these pre-made picket fences. What the website failed to explain to me as I got all giddy, was that these bad boys were unfinished. Now maybe that’s not a big deal where you live, but in wet western Washington so close to the ocean we get a lot of rain! So these panels had to be stained.
Let me tell you now, you don’t realize how many nooks and cranny’s a fence has until you stain it. It took WAY longer than I thought and I was super over it by the time they were done! Once they were dry (only 30 minutes later in the unprecedented summer day we were blessed with) we began measuring and cutting the panels to fit. In order to attach them to the existing railing we bought pipe clamps. Now let me just say that not a single person knew what I was talking about until I drew this picture!
We lined up the support beams that ran the length of the fence to the rails and screwed them together using the pipe clamps. It was SO easy! That part took less than an hour including measuring and cutting.
All in all we only spent about 3 1/2 hours on this project, but it makes a huge impact on the safety of our yard.
I will admit thaat we still need to attach the gate at the top of the stairs, but for now a baby gate is working just fine!
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Allison @ House of Hepworths says
This was very smart! I don’t know if I would have thought to attach a new fence to the old rail. Such a great idea.
Ashley says
Thanks Allison! I am still totally loving it!
PS. I love your blog and almost peed my pants with excitement about your comment and the fact that YOU read my blog!
Erin J. says
Looks great! Such a cute solution and it gives you peace of mind too!
Ashley says
for sure! if they die now, i am totally at fault!! lol! j/k…