Home Organization 101: Week 2 - The Garage

So, last time I posted about the Home Organization 101 Challenge, I had just completed Week 1 - The Kitchen. Next, we are onto The Garage.

Wow. The garage. This is by far the hardest part of this challenge for me. See, I started cleaning out the house way back in the beginning of my pregnancy, during my first nesting phase, when I was setting up the nursery. I have been using my garage as my "Donation Station" since then. There was so much... stuff... out there that we couldn't even fit one car, let alone two like it was designed for!

So I have been dreading this week since I first read the schedule. I even considered skipping it and coming back to it, but I didn't want to start down that road. I was afraid I'd end up skipping all of the hard weeks. Then the baby would be born and I would just come up with excuse after excuse and it would never get done!!

So... needless to say, I made it through and am so happy that I did!

Here is the garage. All ready for a car and everything. :)

Once I donate all of the stuff on the shelves (and in front of them) to the left of the picture, we will even have room for both cars in there! I figured that I will wait until I'm done with all of the rooms in the challenge then make one big trip.

Here you can see all of my donation stuff in front of the tool cabinet... which resulted in us just throwing all of our tools on top of that instead of where they go...

And in the "After" picture, can you see the crib parts leaning against the wall near the water heater? I have big plans for those puppies. You'll see more about them when I do the "Playroom" Week and the "Entryway" Week.

In this picture, on display for all, is my large accumulation of cardboard boxes. I have a very bad habit of keeping them "just in case". I don't know why cardboard boxes. It's just kind of my thing. So they were the first to be purged! 

This TV Stand is another donation item. I just moved it over so it wasn't in the direct middle of the garage. Same with the garbage can.

And here is the last corner of the garage. Quite and improvement, right? I am using these shelves for my staging area for the donation items. 

Here is the tool cabinet. As you can see, we had just been piling everything on top. The drawers and cabinets underneath were almost completely empty. So I cleaned them all out and organized it. Now there is actually room on the top for working on things.

There you have it. The garage. I am so happy I got that part done!! It really energizes me for the next project: The Pantry. It should be much easier than the garage!!

Also see:
Week 1 - The Kitchen
Week 3 - The Pantry
Week 4 - The Office (Part 1)
Week 4 - The Office (Part 2)
Week 5 - The Laundry Room
Week 6 - The Master Bedroom
Week 7 - The Linen Closets
Week 8 - The Dining Room
Week 9 - Kids Closets
Week 10 - The Living Room
(And more still to come!!)