Simple Deployment from Sandbox to Production

I just tried to deploy new custom tab, custom objects, application, pagelayout, visualforces, and a document from my Salesforce Developer sandbox to Salesforce production using Force.com IDE. Pretty simple. Here are the steps, assuming you make the changes directly in your sandbox and wish to deploy the changes to the production org:

1. Create a new Force.com project on your Force.com IDE from your Salesforce Developer sandbox. If you have created the project previously, make sure you "refresh" or "add meta-data" to the project to make sure that you have the latest changes downloaded into your project.
2. Deploy to Server (Force.com > Deploy to Server)
3. Login to your production org 
4. Select the items to deploy
5. Test the deployment by clicking "Validate Deployment"
6. If succesful, click Next and Finish

Once it's deployed, you want to make sure that you login to the production org and provide necessary access to the components that are deployed. It's best if you have deployment runlist to make sure that these are documented properly.