Garage Progress!

In spite of Ric's five stitches and the random "orbs", we've been making progress on the garage. We have everything framed except for the floating wall we have to build behind the washer and dryer. (I'll explain why further down.)

We have a full wall separating the front from the back half of the garage - AND we've put sheetrock up on one side of that wall for some privacy if we have the garage door opened while we're working. We've also framed in the oil tank with a door for access as well. Above the oil tank will be built in storage shelves/cabinets.

Our biggest issue was what to do with the wall that is on the side of the house. The previous owners had problems with their pipes freezing because they were all under the concrete slab that the house sits on. So, they moved them. You can see them going up and across the blue wall in the picture and then they go into the house through the attic. (They still freeze every once in a while, but at least we can get to them!)

There's no way that we were going to try to move them again. So we finally decided to make a "floating wall" in front of them. We're only screwing it into the adjacent studs so that if we ever have to get to the pipes, we just have to get through the sheetrock. This will make it look a lot cleaner and hide the pipes! :)

So the last wall we have to build will go behind the washer and dryer, with panel access for the water hookups, etc. That will be a job for when both kids are out of the house for a LONG period of time so we can move the washer and dryer, take the current metal cabinet off the wall, and build the new one. In addition to that, we need to have the oil line moved from around the perimeter of the garage floor to up and over the new wall we've built.

It's going a lot slower than we'd like. But since we're not financing this or using any credit cards, we are limited to what we have available in our budget. It means a lot more to us that we're figuring out, paying for, and doing all the work ourselves. (Thanks to parents and grandparents who taught both of us *something* about being handy!)

Whew! That's the update! Much more to come! (Oh...and yes, we did get the rest of the light cans up - with gloves on!)