Organize your garage

"Garages are particularly interesting because they're the places people put everything they can't decide where to put," says Laura Tanner, professional organizer and owner of Dwelling Space Inc. Unfortunately, that often means there's no room left for the car. With a long, cold Canadian winter nipping at our heels, it's a good time to look at reorganizing their garage space to better fit the family vehicles.

Tanner says life changes are a common time to think about re-organizing garage space, as was true for Shelagh and Colin. Health problems had precipitated Colin's decision to get rid of some of the clutter that had accumulated in the garage - the projects that Colin had always intended to get to, but didn't.

Whatever your motivation for organizing your garage, the process will go more smoothly if you do a little planning.

Step 1: Put together a team
For most people, organizing the job is a massive undertaking. Involve several members of the family, if you can. Many hands make light work. Or, at least, lighter work.

Step 2: Organization day
Be ready. Have a tarp available to stack things on. You'll need large plastic tote boxes (or some type of equivalent containers), garbage bags, markers for labeling, and gloves to protect your hands. You might consider colour coding your tote boxes — one colour for items for the car, another for garden tools, etc.

Decide how you want to sort your clutter. In Shelagh and Colin's case, they selected four categories: garbage, recycle, give away and keep. Garbage can be disposed of immediately. Contact your local landfill to find out how to properly dispose of old batteries and hazardous materials.

Recycling items (bottles, metal, etc.) are also readily disposed of and provides the incentive of a little extra cash.

It's sometimes easier to part with the treasures in your garage if you know someone else can get use from them. Give away — or hold a garage sale — for those items that you can no longer use, but than someone else might have use for.

The most difficult pile to sort will be the "keep" pile. Do you really need the items in that pile? Be tough.