Garden Shed Completed

I had this slightly used and very messy storage room off the shop and accessible from many areas of the garden. I tended to toss big junk in here every year and always wished I had a garden shed in which to store my stuff. Sometimes it takes a lightning strike to make good ideas occur to me. I had a lot of snow time on my hands this winter to plot and plan this spring's projects and this one made the list. I really wanted to house all of my garden paraphernalia in one spot and not have to look in the barn, the garage or the man shop to find what I was looking for. Inside the house I am extremely organized, in the yard and garden I am organized. But in the garden tool category I failed. So here is the project; before and after.

This work bench is taller than a normal one. I should have measured the one in my husband's man shop but I thought I knew best. I chose 40 inches because I hate to bend over and since I am 6'4" (not really, I am 5'5") I thought this sounded good. Way too tall. Oh, well. We seriously over built the bench and in the process I hurt my finger, which still hurts 4 days later. I finally drilled a hole in the nail and let some of the pressure out and boy does it feel better. I can touch it now.

We added peg board all the way around the work area so that I could organize in my legendary (laughed about) manner. This room has been paneled for many years with some old salvage paneling. It's original purpose was a fort for my daughter who is now too old to have one. But it is insulated and we plan to add a ceiling soon. For now it functions perfectly. I added a shelf close to the ground and that way I can add grow lights from the underside of the counter, hung on chains so they can travel up and down above new seedlings. This room has power so I plan to start my seeds in here next year. The big window you see above the workbench opens into the shop, which has a wood burning stove, so the seedlings won't freeze in the early spring. See how well this little project came together?

We also recessed a shallow tub into the counter top so that when I am potting up plants or filling seed trays I will have a nice place to hold my dirt. I even bought a garbage can to house all that pretty potting soil. Then when I want to store my dirt back in the big garbage can, I just lift this tub out an dump it all back in. This is something I always wanted.

And lastly, you must have the inspector come and deem all of the work proper and usable. Ollie did this for us free of charge. He quickly found he could scratch his head here perfectly, I think he was thinking this when I took the picture. Isn't he cute? Last week he was about to become a head mount for the new garden shed, this week he isn't head butting as much, he will live to eat another day:-D