TECHNOTES: Organizing Your Garage

This is our last part in our 3-part series of organizing your garage, kitchen, and office.   Summer is a great time to clean up and organize your home and you have the added bonus of having the kids home to help you do it.

Throughout the year, the garage can often be the dumping grounds for…”I’ll get to this later.”  Unfinished projects, sports gear, beach stuff, broken items, misc. bike accessories, overflowing recycling bags, you name it, your garage has collected it.

You have two options in organizing your garage – a through reorganization or a cosmetic clean-up.  To help you better weather what the new school and sports season throw out to you, we recommend taking the time this Summer for organizing your garage, you’ll be so glad you did.

Organizing Your Garage

I am in the process of organizing my garage now.  I’ll be honest, I’m 3 weeks into it and I have at least another month to go.  I’ll go further to say that both of our cars are parked on our driveway, as there is no place for them in the garage as I’m organizing. 

This is very helpful to have the space I need to organize and not have to take things in and out of the garage every time.  It is also a helpful reminder every time I get into my Southern California hot car that I need to keep working in the garage!

Use Those Walls

Years ago when Linens & Things went out of business, we bought a lot of their slat walls.  Slatwalls are made of composite wood and have horizontal grooves to hold things like shelving, baskets, and metal bars to hold clothes, merchandise and more.  You’ll often find them in nicer stores.

Slatwalls are known for their versatility.  You can arrange and rearrange baskets, shelving, and more as much as you’d like without needing to rebuild.  

We put our slat wall in our closets and in our garage.  I cannot tell you how handy they are.  

You can buy slat wall on eBay (for a better deal, look for used ones), retail store fixture places, and I have even found similar systems at Home Depot (Flow Wall) and Walmart (a plastic cheaper version called WorkPro). 

Another option is to look for stores closing near you and ask them if they are also selling their retail fixtures and slat wall.  Bigger stores use liquidators who will put you on their list and call you when fixtures will be for sale.  I’m on the list right now for our local Toys R Us store.

Slat wall is also great for the workbench area – perfect for organizing tools, drill bits, screws, you name it!

Use slat walls for baskets to hold toys, balls, gardening equipment, rope/twine, shoes, backpacks, bike gear, etc.  You can use slat wall hooks to hang brooms, shovels, picks, hoses, extension cords, and so much more.

There are even slat wall hooks for bikes to hand them vertically.  Slatwall is a great tool for organizing your garage, giving you the flexibility to move things around when you need to.

Put Wheels on It!

The past several years I have become fascinated with wheels in the garage.  They make it SO easy to move things around and it’s really not that hard to install them yourself. (Hint: this idea is also great for inside the house – ottomans, tables, storage bins, etc.).

Think of things in your garage that would be great if only you could move it more easily.  Things like:

• Leftover tile/flooring
• Sports baskets/bins
• Filing cabinet
• Workbench
• Work table
• Storage bins
• Christmas tree box
• Christmas storage
• Pressure washer
• Smoker
• BBQ
• Dog food storage bin
• etc. 

You get the picture.  Perhaps you have some old furniture in the garage or even a bookcase with stuff in it.  Wouldn’t it be great if you could move it out of the way if you’re cleaning or working on a project that needs more room?

You have two options for wheels:

1.  Buy wheels at your local hardware store or Harbor Freight.  Ensure you buy wheels that can carry the load.  Check how much weight they can carry to determine the right size.  Also, for a little more money, you can buy locking wheels that have a break on them so they don’t roll away.  
2. Buy a Hardwood Dolly – I bought a couple of them at Harbor Freight for under $10 when they were on sale.  They come in different sizes and can carry up to 1,000 pounds.

I use both in our garage.  The wheels are great for my moving workbench that I can roll it outside to enjoy the sunshine or let sawdust shavings fly in the wind with little cleanup.  I’m also thinking of putting wheels on the heavy storage bins we use for balls and rolls of paper.

Not sure how to start?  YouTube is great, just search for “how to put casters on.”  For some mom-to-mom insight, check out this website.

The hardwood dolly I will use for under some furniture I’m storing in the garage.  Putting it up on a dolly will save it in case any water or rain leaks into the garage.  It also makes it easier to move my wooden furniture out of the way when cleaning or reorganizing.

We have a lot of tile and flooring we store in case we need to replace one in the house or want to do another project with it.  Right now we have this tile and flooring in different locations throughout our garage.  Until I find the right spot for it, I am placing it on one of my hardwood dollies to move it around more easily.

We also like to use our hardwood dolly to bring in heavy or bulky things into the house like our artificial Christmas tree, Christmas storage containers, Christmas presents like the new office chair or Foozeball table we bought in the past.  

Buy a few hardwood dollies when you see them, they are very helpful for organizing your garage and helping you with heavy or bulky things throughout the year.

Technology

Garages are used for more electrical devices than ever before, namely…

• Corded Drills
• Rotary Tools
• Corded Saws & Table Saws
• Chain and Pole Saws
• Compressors
• Pressure Washers
• Some Lawn Mowers
• Edgers
• Hedge Trimmers
• Battery Chargers
• Shop Vacs
• Workshop lights
• Radios
• Some Sports Equipment (pitching machines)
• Excercise Equipment
• Sprinkler Controllers
• Garage Openers

It would be great if all of our garages have enough power outlets to handle our power consumption; however, most don’t.  Through the use of power surge protectors and extension cords, you can make sure you have power right where you need it.

I recently placed my workbench on wheels in a new place in our garage, but there is not much power there to charge my power tool batteries.  I bought this 25ft. Extension Cord Reel with 4 grounded outlets so I can bring power to my workbench.  And when I move my workbench outside, I can extend the cord out to bring power with me.

Another option is this Heavy Duty 8 Outlet Power Strip with an ON/OFF button.  The ON/OFF button is helpful to charge tools when in use but turn the power strip off when not in use.

It would also be nice to have WiFi in the garage for the expanding your home automation.  We use the Rachio sprinkler system and the Chamberlain/Liftmaster MyQ Home Bridge so we can use and adjust our sprinklers and garage door with our apps!  

WiFi is also handy to watch YouTube How-to videos when doing a DIY project or learning how to fix something.  Most people don’t have WiFi in their garage, but now there are some easier ways to increase your coverage.  

If you have old sports equipment, bikes, strollers, etc. your kids have grown out of, or even old exercise equipment you’ve outgrown of, it’s time to get it OUT of your garage.  Free up the space to make the garage more enjoyable…and workable.

Some thrift stores will come out to your home for free to collect things and don’t forget, most garbage companies come out and collect bulkier things from your home for free for up to several times a year.

I know it can seem overwhelming, but once you get started organizing your garage and begin to see the impact you’re making, you’ll realize it’s worth the effort.  Good luck!