It is tough shopping for my husband. There really isn’t much that he needs or wants. We are blessed indeed. I had to get creative for Valentine’s Day this year.

We had been talking about cleaning out the garage for the past few weeks. I know that my husband does not enjoy cleaning out the garage. Although, really who does? It seems to be a project that looks worse as you get into cleaning. It gets much worse, before it starts to look better. I undertook this task the past few days while my husband was out of town on business. My first job to get the project started was to buy a tool storage unit. I found a nice one that would fit in our garage nicely at Home Depot. These units are not cheap! I did have a refund from Home depot and a gift card to put toward the purchase, so the price wasn’t too shocking at the checkout.

IMG_2573I took all three kids to Home Depot to shop for the tool storage unit. While looking at the units Brielle said “But it won’t fit under my bed!”. I had to think for a second trying to understand why she would say that. Then I remembered she had hid the box of chocolates and cards for Daddy under her bed for safe keeping until Valentine’s Day. I told her it was ok, I would store the tool unit in the garage. Funny how the mind of a four year old child works!

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This is the nine drawer HUSKY brand unit I decided to buy. It was out of stock in our Southlake store, so I had to head over to Roanoke to get one. Thankfully, it was in stock, assembled, and ready to go! Three nice workers at the Home Depot loaded it up into the back of my SUV.

Then the real work began. It was a de-cluttering process that involved lots of sorting. I started by making piles when sorting the drawers and clutter throughout the garage:

  1. Give away
  2. Sell
  3. Put away inside the house
  4. Throw away
  5. Put away up in the attic

For everything else that actually belonged in the garage I began the process of putting things away in the correct places where they belong. Here are the before photos of the garage:

It was an interesting working situation, as the kids were playing in our driveway courtyard the entire morning the first day I started working. They decided to come into the garage at one point to “help”. We store an unplugged paper shredder in the garage. We use it inside and then store it in the garage, as it is only used about twice a year. Apparently it hadn’t been emptied since the last time it was used. The twins had no problem finding it and emptying it for me. What kind of mess did this create? Well, lets just say that I was actually vacuuming our driveway yesterday morning. I hope the neighbors didn’t see me and think I was losing my mind.

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Thankfully our Nanny Taylor was able to come that afternoon for 4 hours. I was able to really get some work done without the kids “helping” me. Some photos of the cleaning “in progress”:

Loading up the new unit with tools was a satisfying experience. We finally have one place for all our tools.  Of course I labeled the drawers using my label maker to make it easy to find the right tool at a glace. I also used a drawer liner, so that the tools won’t slide around inside the drawers.

We had two countertop storage units with dozens of small drawers that held things like nuts, bolts, screws, nails, drill bits, and more. I decided to get rid of them, as they were old and breaking down. I made use of the small drawers though. I was able to line them up inside the top drawer of the new tool storage unit and I sorted small hardware into these little drawers now being used as sorting containers.

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IMG_8083I purchased a corner unit to store brooms, shovels, umbrellas, mops, etc. I found this on amazon and I love it! It really cleaned up this corner space and makes it easy to find things when I need them.

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Here is the link for the unit I bought on Amazon- Just click on the photo below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My husband got home after 11 PM last night, on a flight back from California for work. He was surprised to see the garage! Valentine’s Day gift this year is a success! The nice thing about doing it on my own is that he didn’t have to be there to hear any questions like “why do you have 5 hammers?” and “why do you need three of the same type of saw?”. He came home to a clean and organized garage, along with the new HUSKY unit for all of our tools. I get to enjoy the clean garage too! I am very grateful to have this project complete! If I was a REALLY good wife, I would epoxy the garage floor. Maybe next year…