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Garage (and Mudroom) Reveal!

Dec 23, 2016
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  To say this has been a long time coming is an understatement.  I began the journey of completely finishing and organizing my garage back in MARCH and now (5 months later) I am ready to show the "new" garage to you: Can you believe that is the same place? Wait.. let me step back a little farther so you can take it ALL in.

If you don't remember, my goal was to get five distinct areas for things I needed to house in the garage (plus my giant mini-van).  They were:

#1: Storage #2: Workshop #3: Mudroom #4: Freezer #5: Trash Here is the original plan I drew up back in April:

I am happy to say that I was able to successfully incorporate all those areas, and more! Let me give you a little tour.

#1: Storage

This was a biggie.  I wanted to sort and organize all the junk that we keep in the garage.  Holiday decorations, camping and sporting gear, kids clothes and equipment, suitcases, coolers.. you name it.  We don't have a basement or attic so everything is stored in the garage.   There was some rough shelving already installed, but it was quickly overflowing with our stuff:

I taped, mudded and painted the walls (and ceilings), as well as painted the shelves, sorted and boxed all the stuff and labeled it all with my label maker.  It is amazing how much stuff can fit once you just get organized!

The niche to the right of the shelves was the perfect spot to house.

 #2: Workshop: The full reveal of the workshop can be found here (in case you want to see how I was able to figure out exactly how to fit all my tools, lawn equipment, paint, workbench and paint.) Needless to say I am thrilled with being able to find everything at a glance.

 

And my favorite part of my workshop is still my painted pegboard:
 

 

Previously this side of the garage was stacked with boxes of old kids clothes and lawn/garden equipment.  It was pretty much a disaster.  Now there is plenty of room, not only for my workshop but also to the house.

#3: Mudroom

Without futher ado, here is everyone's favorite part of the garage, the mudroom built ins:

 

This is still one of my most popular posts of all time.   The fact I constructed this unit out of $300 worth of Ikea Cabinets seems to hit home with people:

 

It has been great for us, since it provides a lot of easy-access storage right at the threshold to the most trafficked entry point of the house.  And speaking of thresholds, lets not forget my newly beautified garage door:

 

Before the mudroom install, this space was my workshop, but it was so cluttered with stuff that you were barely able to get to the door.  The grungy white door and unfinished walls made the garage feel like it wasn't a real 'room' of the house.   But no more:

 

#4: Freezer.  I surface mounted an electrical outlet near the shelves above the freezer so I would no longer have to run an extension cord to it.  (I also surface mounted an outlet above my workbench to use with my circular saw and other power tools.) 

 

#5: Trash and recycling bins:

 

Hanging the bikes off the floor, and in front of the furnace and water heater (which are ugly but can't be enclosed) is another great space saver.  And to honor the fact that is a garage, I hung all the license plates we have collected off the cars from all the states we have lived in over the door. I love them!