Garage Lust

Speaking of Hubby, and his time alone dans le townhouse, is it bad I hoped he'd act in lieu of the DIY fairies and knock out a few projects?  I wanted to have an HGTV-esque reveal and oooo and ahhhh over the lovely changes to our mangy laundry room that was all planned out but only half done when I left . . . 

In truth, he did do some puttering, most notably moving Charlie to winter storage and moving our car back into its cozy hole (Charlie lives in a storage facility when it's winter because we have a single garage and small drive, and I will happily pay any sum of money not to have to scrape frost off the windshield off in the morning, so Charlie gets the boot and I can handle winter with fewer meltdowns).  Although I'm appreciative he did the switcheroo, it had kind of a landslide effect.  With working on the basement, prettying it up, I had displaced some things into the garage.  It didn't matter then because Charlie, once parked in the garage in the spring, stays put.  Piling things up against the garage door or behind him wasn't an issue.  And then I flitted off to Europe with an email that said, "Deal with Charlie."

Even with the gorgeous storage unit Hubby built, there just isn't enough space!   Now with the garage in active use again, there is excess stuff and we need to reassess the lovely job we did making it tidier.

I don't where our bikes ended up (Hubby?) but I have a feeling lots of stuff ended up back in the basement after the car shuffle.  We both have some serious organizing to do in 2013, and back at work in the pit of despair.  We need to make the garage work for us a little better (and finish up some lose ends from the makeover).  So, once again, I find myself ogling people's garages.

On our list: bike storage!  Look how cleverly Carrie, from Dream Green DIY, hung hers.

I think we need more storage, period.  Specifically, we need to make more use of the vertical space, perhaps along the sides or above the garage door, if we can.

Better Homes and Gardens

Better Homes and Gardens

Montel

Family Handyman

Once our stuff is dealt with, I still want to make the garage prettier.  Frankly, in the cold weather months, I see this space more than some rooms in the townhouse.  I love the turquoise storage unit, but we never worked on making what went on it more organized, or coordinated.  And here is proof that garages can look mighty gorgeous.

Better Homes and Gardens

Via Pinterest, Source Unknown

Lastly, after I caught a piece of the garage door with the car and ripped it down (loooong story), new garage doors have been on my mind.

Gorgeous Garage Doors

Prettiest One on the Block

I teased you with news of a big reveal, but then delayed this post because I just had to share the news of my Living Etc. feature. 

We have given our garage a makeover!  Check it out:

We have been planning this makeover for awhile, deliberating color choices and ogling other garages.  Hubby will be fixing Charlie, our DIY'd Dodge Colt, so we can race him and Hubby needs a nice space to work. 

Charlie.

This is what the garage looked like when we bought the house.  The mess was included in the sale price, apparently.

The mess the former owner's left us.

 

After I tidied.  Better, but still dreary.



Tidy was a good start.  Fast forward two years and we painted the garage a pale grey/blue.  It is cheerier than grey, more dirt-hiding than white but pale enough that it doesn't look like a nursery.  The paint chip is by Valspar, but we color-matched it to a primer/paint in one.



Some shots of our work in progress: 

With the garage painted and slightly less cluttered, Hubby built an awesome storage unit using Blu wood.  It is treated to prevent fungus and termites, which isn't really an issue for us.  I'll be honest:  I pushed for the treated wood because it is turquoise.  It worked out to be $15.00 more for the whole project, but it saved me the time and effort of having to paint or stain the wood.  I'm going to beg Hubby to do a guest post and explain how he built the storage shelving. 

BEFORE

AFTER

The chipboard was the trickiest to paint.  It took a few coats and it isn't perfect.  We have plans to paint the floor and step a dark grey, but that will have to wait until next spring.  For now, the garage is brighter and more organized which makes it seem spacious.  Success.

Charlie in his new home.  Is it just me, or is he smiling?

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Pick a Colour, Any Colour

It is kind of funny: last fall we spent so long trying to pick a colour to paint the inside of the garage (and figuring out storage) that the cold weather hit and painting was no longer an option.  Oops.  Well, we're determined to be ready the second it is mild enough to even start decluttering the space.  So, even though there is snow on the ground and an ice octopus on the roof, we're starting the garage plan.  And I picked a colour: a greyish seafoamy colour, kinda beach glass-like.  I love the colour of the back of our television unit - it is glass and a great pale, pale turquoise: 

Hmmm - should take a new pic of this unit because
the stuff at the side has been totally rearranged . . .

Hard to get a good pic, but this is my inspiration.  We reason that it will be cheery & bright because it is so light, but also not look dirty like a white eventually will.  Today I'm going to see if I can find a paint chip that matches.  Yay - progress!

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Inspiration: Fancy Garages

Despite the fact that my neighbour's car is literally buried under a whopping load of snow, I have to hold on to the belief that spring will be here soon.  I grow weary of winter . . .   

I snapped this last night.

Check out these icicles - its like an ice octopus is sitting on the roof;
we need to do some insulating, methinks.

The groundhog didn't see his shadow yesterday.  Yay - spring!  Would a groundhog lie?  Well, we spotted this guy lying around during the summer, while we were tearing stuff up and out.  So, I guess that groundhogs do lie.  Hahaha.  I've been drinking lots of expired Neocitran and it has gone to my head.

With spring in mind, I've been thinking about the garage (which was a total flippin' disaster when we moved in - see here):

We have big plans to make it functional and attractive.  (There's way more crap in there now, but I'm not taking a new photo - did I mention the blizzardy weather?  I'm staying in).  Below are pictures of some pretty impressive garages.  We won't have tons of room, because we are super strange and park our car in there, but we definitely want to brighten it up. 

Source

Source

This one looks fancier than my kitchen:

Source

Do garages thrill you the way pretty rooms do?

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Lesson Learned: Final Walk Through

Reading Young House Love this morning, I learned that some buyers do a final walk through of the property they have purchased, prior to closing.  As first time home buyers, we didn’t know such a thing was possible.  Our buyer’s agent didn’t even suggest it (he was rather unenthusiastic to begin with).  But, armed with knowledge, next time I’m going to insist.  Because, without a final walkthrough, we inherited this:

Other than the worklamp, NONE of this was our stuff. 
Even the recycling bin came stuffed . . .

Click on pics to make 'em bigger. 
Makes my effort look more impressive ;)

They left a note, saying they just plum ran out of time.  So, instead of getting straight to work renovating, I wasted a morning bagging up their garbage, which included disgusting stuff I won’t even mention.  There was junk in the basement too, we just didn't have the energy to photograph it.  I was so angry.  This was just one of many annoying and selfish things the old owners had done (or, in this case, not done).  At least now I know. 

Next summer we are going to make the garage pretty!  We saved the counter from our kitchen for a work bench and will paint it some fun bright colour.  Hubby is pretty excited.

After three hours their crap was bagged and ready to go. 
They even left that chair.  Among unmentionables.

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