Garage organization tips

Let me start with we have no attic. Well, we have a 12-18 inch crawl space depending on where you are in our “attic”. It’s unusable. So, that means we throw lots of random junk in the garage. And now it’s officially time to take back control of the garage!

Here are a few lovely before pictures of our garage. They aren’t pretty people. We’ve been piling stuff up since we moved in back in April 2013. We couldn’t even park cars in here. It was bad. Oh and that 4 wheeler is not ours, it has since been given back to it’s rightful owner. Thank goodness, those things take up a lot of room!

We’ve got 4 random doors leaning against the wall. And a big mirror. And random wood scraps, bikes and yard tools galore.

Andy can’t fit his truck in here, but my small car wants to live under cover. First we decided to utilize our existing peg boards. I mean why the heck not, they were there when we moved in… free storage, yes please! We realized that some of the old peg wasn’t in the best shape. It looked like a dog had chewed on the edge. We also knew this was the wall we wanted the bikes to hang (headspace), and the lawn tool organizer we ordered needed 49 inches of horizontal space. We decided it would go in that corner and take up 6 inches of peg.

So, all of that to tell you we decided to take down the top peg board. Andy removed it in about 5 minutes with a drill and then sawed off the 2 left over pieces of wood.

I used these peg hooks to organize my 2 boards, and I only have a few hooks leftover.

I started with the 32 peice kit. (Here’s a good deal on one from Amazon.) When I discovered I needed more, I decided to go for the mac daddy of peg board organization and get the 43 piecer. I really just wanted the 4 little caddies. This is the only kit that came with 2 tiny canisters and 2 blue buckets for peg. Aren’t they cute?! I used a razor blade to cut a hole in the center of the caddy so the plastic ties things could poke through. Each caddy is holding a different size.

The smaller board is my garden tools and the DIY tools I use the most… paint brushes, paint rollers, levels, spade, picture hanging wire, etc…

And then the other peg board got filled with random things from Andy’s tool box/ stuff on the ground. It’s so nice to be able to actually see what we already have. We own some weird stuff. Cable staples anyone? Veneer edging? I’m not even sure what some of these items do. Oh well, at least we have them and if/ when we need them, we will actually be able to find ’em! You have no idea how happy it makes me to have that extension cord hung up!

Another garage organization tip: Use all of your nooks and crannies. We have a 2 car garage with 2 separate garage doors, which leaves a tiny nook in between the 2 garage doors. Andy realized the edger and weed eater would hang perfectly there. We bought these Tornado hooks from Home Depot for $6.97 each and hung ’em on the wall!

We also got an outdoor storage bench from Wayfair.com to hold outdoor cushions and a few work out things. And as an extra added bonus, I’ve been using our handy little bench as a secret hiding place for Christmas gifts!

The gifts are hiding right under all of those cushions. I’m so sneaky… bhahaha! (Good thing Andy doesn’t read the blog, ha!) Andy will never touch ’em. And I think it’s funny that he’ll stick his paws in there multiple times to get out his weights! I like having the storage bench inside of the garage because it’s really the only place to sit out there! And since I park in the garage, I often tie my shoes up, finish talking on the phone, wait 3 minutes for the laundry to finish or come visit Andy while he’s working out and sit on my handy dandy bench

So, here’s a before and after of the bench/workout space. We’re going to add some flooring and better organize the top of the closet, but baby steps here. Oh and we want to frame out the crusty, free mirror. See the chip in the top of it? Oh and did I mention I put the storage bench together all by myself. True! You don’t even need tools to do it!

And now for hanging up lawn tools… We used this 6 piece wall storage organizer. We debated getting a whole wall system, but since we already have peg boards, we decided against it. Plus those things are way more expensive. Andy just drilled her into the wall and hung up our goodies. Easy peasy. And we still have room to collect a few more!

Garage organization tips:

• Get things off of the ground and utilize your wall storage with hooks.
• Get rid of cardboard boxes. We keep 2 boxes at any given time. I put a free ad on craigslist and stick them at the bottom of the driveway. They are usually gone within a couple of hours.
• Hang bikes on the ceiling (tutorial coming soon)!
• Section your garage into zones: laundry, workout, DIY, wood shop, sports equipment, kids toys, bikes, etc…
• Utilize pegboards! You’ll seriously save money since you will be able to easily see what you already have!
• Don’t forget about your ceiling. There are tons of ceiling storage options out there!
• Use all of your nooks and crannies to hang things up. Even the space between the 2 garage doors!
• Make sure everything has a spot.

Where do you hide gifts? In your garage storage bench, like me? Do you have an organized garage or a big ol’ mess? Do you park in the garage? I’d love to hear…