Shelves & Storage

A Space-Saving Kitchen Spice Rack

March 29, 2016 by Ash 42 Comments

I love to cook, and I use a lot of spices – from sweet Hungarian paprika to spicy Jamaican jerk seasoning.

You name it, I most likely have it.

Eileen, on the other hand, loves to bake – so on any given day, we have all the ingredients to make anything chocolate chip bundt cake to spicy Bahamian chicken.

Unfortunately, with such a large spice and baking collection, it was getting very difficult to find something when we needed it.

We were storing all the spices in a corner cabinet, and they took up the entire cabinet. We tried everything for organization – a spinning rack, a mini spice organizer – nothing seemed to save us space or time.

When making a meal, I would have to dig through everything to find what I needed. And Eileen wasn’t happy when she was looking for cinnamon or baking powder, and it was shoved behind the seven spices I used the night before for taco seasoning.

Planning the Spice Rack

Shortly thereafter, we were having dinner at a friend’s house and saw their spice solution.

They were utilizing a 6-inch gap between their fridge and the wall to fit a movable spice shelf, mounted on wheels.

I thought it was such a brilliant idea. I googled the idea later that night and saw it was a very popular spice storage solution.

There were lots of incarnations on Pinterest. I was set on incorporating a similar design into my kitchen, but I wanted to take it up a notch.

I didn’t like the wheeled shelf design. It would limit you to one massive shelf. Also, without some type of track system, I thought the shelf would be wobbly.

After some thought, I settled on 2 independent spice shelves mounted to the wall on drawer slides.

Aside from the drawer slides, I had enough scrap wood in the garage to build my design.

I didn’t really plan this project out much (aside from basic measurements of available space), mostly winging it as I went along. Nonetheless, the sliding spice rack turned out well.

How to Build a Sliding Spice Rack

I started off building one of the shelves. First, I fabricated a box with ¾” thick boards and nailed a hardboard composite backing. I then made some compartments for organization.

I averaged the sizes of my spice jars to determine a good depth and height for the shelves.

Here’s an early picture of the shelf unit:

Determined to re-use scraps from the garage, I attached some wood trim to serve as fences to prevent the spices from falling out.

Also, I couldn’t just attach the drawer slides to back of the shelf structure in the picture above.

I had limited space between the wall and the fridge, and fitting the spices with a drawer slide behind exceeded my available width.

So my solution was to mount the drawer slides above and below the shelf, being almost flush with the shelf backing.

I attached a piece of 2×4 to the top and bottom of the shelf to serve as a mount for the slide.

I then attached some plywood to the front of the shelf and screwed on a handle.

Then I mounted the two drawer slides to the wall, and attached the shelf. The slides were attached directly to wall studs.

I also had to make sure that both slides were equally level. Any discrepancies in the slide angles would most likely result in a jamming drawer.

Here is a close-up picture of the mounted shelf with some spices in it (notice the repurposed wood trim):

Here is a picture from the back, showing how I attached the drawer slides to the DIY spice rack:

I built the second shelf much like the first. However, I increased the height to make the most of the available space.

After mounting this shelf, I painted the front facing plywood, blending in to match the color of the kitchen (see pictures below of the completed spice rack).

Using the DIY Spice Rack

The sliding spice rack turned out great. We adapted the top shelf for our most frequently used spices, while the lesser used ones ended up in the bottom shelf.

Whenever we needed a spice, I just pulled out the appropriate drawer and located it instantly – very different from before!

I should mention too that the corner cabinet that previously held all of our spices was now completely empty, giving us more space for all those pesky tupperware containers.

Anyone have a good storage solution for those?!

Time & Cost

Building the spice rack took about one weekend, and the total cost was less than $50 because of all the scrap wood I used (my estimate is about $70 if you are buying all the wood from the store).

The spice rack became the hit of many parties.

Our friends were always asking about those mysterious handles next to the fridge, and were amazed when the handles revealed a plethora of spices.

Our next door neighbors noticed the spice rack when we were moving out of the house and were fascinated with it, saying, “Forget all those updates you did, this is what sold the house!”

(As an aside, we replaced that dingy pantry curtain with French doors before we moved, check it out here).

If you are looking for a solution to your spices, building a sliding spice rack could be the answer 🙂

Making Sliding Storage Shelves in One Weekend

March 20, 2016 by Ash 74 Comments

My garage was getting a little out of control. Bulky tools from home improvements projects, boxes upon boxes of holiday decorations, gardening tools, piles of landscaping bags – nothing seemed to have a place.

It was hard to get work done efficiently – not to mention, find something when I was looking for it.

It was time to get smart about garage organization and storage.

Determining a Space for the Sliding Storage Shelves

I already had several prefabricated metal garage shelves doing a decent job of garage storage, but they had their shortcomings.

I had been eyeing this corner space next to our garage fridge. The space was 3 feet deep and about 6 feet wide, and it was currently underutilized.

There were just piles of boxes, gardening tools, and other things that had accumulated.

Corner spaces in the garage often become dumping grounds, as ours had become. I decided to capitalize on the vertical square footage, transforming this messy corner into garage storage shelving.

So, after a few days of pondering over garage storage shelving ideas and messing around in TinkerCad (an awesome 3D designing website), I came up with the idea below for garage storage shelves:

Garage Storage Shelf Requirements

I had 3 requirements for the sliding storage shelves project for my garage. My first requirement was deep storage shelves. The area had a lot of depth, and I wanted to make the most of the space.

I went with 3 ft deep shelves; this was twice as deep as the prefab shelves, so twice the garage storage space.

The second requirement (which is not evident in the TinkerCad drawing above) was sliding garage shelves.

Although 3 ft deep garage shelves would hold a lot, trying to reach something at the back seemed very burdensome. You would have to move things out of the way to get back there, which wasn’t very efficient, especially for vertical space.

Therefore, I wanted some of the deep garage shelves to be on drawer slides.

My last requirement was enough clearance at the bottom of the garage shelves to fit some of my taller tools (like my shopvac), and for them to just roll out (without having to drop off a shelf).

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Preparing Space for the Garage Storage Shelves

To start the sliding storage shelves, I first cleared out and cleaned the designated area for the garage shelves.

Then I located the studs in the wall (using my trusty stud finder), and used green painters tape preserve their locations.

The garage shelving unit was going to be bolted to the studs to make it stable.

Here’s the wall with the studs marked:

Building the Shelf Supports

The actual construction of the garage shelves was fairly straight forward. I just followed the design I created to construct the sliding storage shelves.

The whole garage shelf was made of 2 x 4 wood that was cut to different lengths.

Unfortunately, I was so caught up in the construction (it was a pretty fun project to work on), I forgot to take many pictures. Therefore, I’m just going to provide some visuals.

First, I made 3 vertical support structures for the garage shelves. I would install these on the ends and middle.

These supports looked like a 3 ft wide ladder – see pic below:

Next, I used 6 ft cuts of 2 x 4s to connect the 3 vertical supports, and to form a basis for each garage shelf.

I also added 2 extra 6 ft pieces at the back of the structure to bolt into the wall studs.

Adjusting for Sliding Garage Shelves

Before considering sliding storage shelves, I thought about making all of the shelves look like the very top one. However, that was going to be too simple, and I like to make things a little challenging.

Hence, the modifications for the garage sliding shelves.

The shelf slides were going to bear the load of the garage shelves, so it was not necessary to run as many 6 ft planks as the top shelf (which was just a static shelf with no slides). Three connecting pieces per row was sufficient.

Next, I needed structures to attach the slides to. I came up with the design below:

Building Sliding Garage Storage Shelves Notice the 4 slide supports on each row (one on each end and two in the middle). In between each pair of slide supports was going to be the actual sliding shelves.

At this point in the project, it was time to secure the structure to the garage wall. If I proceeded any further with construction, the DIY shelving unit would be too heavy for me to carry (not that it wasn’t already really heavy).

Also, there was just enough room for me to squeeze in between the 2 x 4s to get to back to bolt the structure to the wall studs.

Next, I wedged myself in the middle of garage shelving unit, picked it up like superman, and inched my way over to the wall. I used some lag bolts to secure the shelves to the studs.

Constructing the Storage Shelves

After that, I had to build the actual sliding storage shelves. Here is my design for each sliding shelf:

Building Garage Storage Shelves that Slide

During construction of the garage shelves, I did add an elevated piece to the back of each shelf. I didn’t want items falling off the back as I pulled the shelf forward.

First, I installed the slides on each slide support. Then, using ¼” scrap wood as shims, I elevated each shelf and secured them to the slides.

With the sliding shelves installed, the garage shelf project was pretty much complete. Last, I just had to install some gate handles for each shelf to be able to pull them out easily.

How to Build Storage Shelves for the Garage in One Weekend

Although, I did make a last-minute design decision though – I omitted the bottom row of sliding shelves and replaced it with a static shelf (like the very top one).

I realized that some of my tools (like my miter saw) didn’t have enough clearance to fit on the DIY sliding shelf.

Consequently, I settled for just 2 rows of sliding shelves, which was still plenty of awesomeness.

I took the pictures below of the completed DIY garage storage shelves:

Here you will notice the shelves’ height in comparison to the fridge.

There is also enough space to pull a car into the garage too – with about a foot to spare.

However, I was a little worried about bumping into the garage shelf with the car, so I got a cheap parking sensor to help (it turns from green to yellow to red as you get within a foot of the sensor).

Bonus Storage Shelving

After I finished the garage shelves, I had an extra 2 x 4 leftover. Still in a shelf-frenzy mood, I turned those into some normal shelves on the wall.

To the left of the sliding shelf structure was a hideous area begging for some DIY garage organization, and a prime target for a storage solution:

Creating More Garage Storage - Sliding and Floating Shelves Using some shelf brackets, I bought a while ago, I threw together a simple shelf for the garage with the leftovers from the main project.

Below is what I turned the above disaster into – see shelf at the top of the picture.

Using the Sliding Storage Shelves

The sliding storage shelves truly transformed a disorganized corner. We gained a ton of lost space through building the shelf tower.

Storage-wise, the garage shelves hold more than we could have imagined – most of the boxes of holiday decorations (Eileen loves that she can easily access these), tool boxes, and large tools such as the miter saw.

Underneath the storage shelves, I store the shop vac, jaw horse, and snow blower. It’s the perfect height.

Pleased with the outcome of my DIY garage organization, I found building the shelving unit one of the most fun and creative projects I’ve worked on recently.

I also completely impressed Eileen with doing the whole project in one weekend – that was the best part. She was also thrilled that the cost was less than $200.

If your garage is getting out of control and you have underutilized space, you should definitely think about building these sliding garage storage shelves.

The design worked beautifully, and you can’t beat the turnaround time and low-cost..

With phase 1 of “Project DIY Garage Organization” was now complete. Phase 2 of the garage construction is coming this summer – a dream workbench with fancy storage solutions.

How to Make a Built-In Bookshelf

March 10, 2016 by Ash Leave a Comment

To put it simply, Eileen has more books than anyone I’ve ever known – books from her childhood, books from college, books of poetry – some she’s read and some she just likes to collect.

But long story short, she was running out of room storing them on a wobbly old shelf – in double rows, and then there were the boxes in the closet.

Eileen kept telling me that she had the perfect spot for a built-in shelf, so I pulled out a Post-It note and sketched out a basic design with measurements.

Planning the DIY Bookshelf

First, I planned out all the cuts I needed for the DIY bookshelf and put together shopping list for Home Depot.

I wanted to make a very sturdy bookshelf with minimal visible hardware. So I opted for dado joints and a center support column. Also, I decided to use pine for the lumber.

I did lack the proper tools for making dado joints, so I added a plunge router to the shopping list.

This was going to be my first router project, and I was looking forward to it very much.

Constructing the Bookshelf

After cutting all the wood planks to pre-measured lengths, the next step was to mark all the grooves for the dados.

Dado joints are the simplest joints there are but are very strong and perfect for bookshelves.

They are just grooves cut into the vertical support planks on both ends of the bookshelf, where the horizontal shelves slide right into and rest.

My pine lumber was ¾” thick. So, I needed to use a router bit of the same thickness for the grooves.

After the grooves were outlined on the two vertical support planks, I secured the planks side-by-side to prepare for the routing.

The grooves on the two support planks needed to be in perfect alignment. Therefore, I screwed the planks together from underneath with some strips of scrap wood.

It was important to keep the planks firmly in place to prevent shifting as I cut the grooves.

Routing the Dados

Finally it was time to use my plunge router.

I did a few practice cuts on scrap wood to get the feel for it and was now ready for the real thing.

For each groove, I affixed a straight piece of wood to act as a jig for the plunger. Without this guide, it would have been impossible to cut a straight line.

Below is a picture of the plunge router and some grooves already cut.

You can also see the outlines I made for the uncut grooves, as well as the strip of wood I used for a guide:

Here’s a close-up view of the dado groove. You can see how smooth the cut was.

The router bit went through the soft pine like butter, making a very professional cut:

Assembling the Pieces

With all the dados cut, assembly of the shelves could begin.

With the help of a rubber mallet, I inserted each shelf into its corresponding dado joint and secured each connection with two screws on the outside.

Here you can see how perfectly each shelf fit into the dado:Assembly of the shelves was almost done at this point.

Next came the center support column.

As you can see in the background, I did my work in my man cave. We didn’t have a garage to work in – hence the chaotic background and poor lighting.

Finishing with Wood Putty & Stain

Construction of the DIY bookshelf was completed at this point. All that was left was to fill the screw holes with wood putty and apply a wood stain.

Eileen stained the wood with two coats of a dark MinWax stain.

Securing the Shelf

The final step was to secure the bookshelf to the wall in the office.

I used some metal L brackets to attach a few shelves to studs in the wall. I strategically placing them so they would be hidden from view.

Also, I had to remove some of the wall baseboard trim so that the shelf could fit flush against the wall.

Below are pictures of bookshelf bolted securely to the wall.

I wasn’t too happy about the electrical outlet at the bottom left being partially blocked by a shelf. However, it was too late to do much about it now. The outlet wouldn’t be visible anyway because of the books.

Here is the completed bookshelf with actual books. We later replaced that old wooden door to the room with a white six-paneled one – but we don’t have any pictures of that.

There was no sagging at all with the weight of the books.

Eileen finally had her library organized on this built-in DIY bookshelf. I use the word ‘library’ because who else has enough books to make an Irish Classics section?!

Years later, the shelves remained perfectly straight, thanks to the dado joints and center support column.

Fast forward a few years, in our new house, I made another DIY bookshelf – a bookshelf with a window seat, using the background I had from designing this shelf.

It’s Eileen’s absolute favorite.

From Rags to Riches: French Doors on the Pantry

February 12, 2016 by Eileen 57 Comments

Simply stated, our pantry was an eyesore.

It was a little nook of shelves with old curtains pulled to each side.

We were going to put our house on the market soon, and in looking at the competition, we kept seeing very similar houses with beautiful kitchens.

We looked at our old countertops, painted cabinets, and raggedy pantry….and sighed.

Then, I got an idea – installing double French doors on the pantry.

Who doesn’t love French doors? They add a certain style and class – and it should be an easy, relatively cheap upgrade to a tired kitchen.

Planning for the French Door Installation

I tend to be very particular when it comes to what I want. Installing any old French doors wasn’t going to cut it.

I searched and searched and finally came across a set of French doors on Overstock. Overstock has some great options when you aren’t finding what you want at the typical stores. (I also found my oddly-sized bathroom mirror there!)

French doors can be expensive but a 10% coupon code, which is pretty easy to find with Overstock, helped with the price.

The before picture (below) is so zoomed that I thought I would include the below pictures too. These are unfortunately the best pictures I could find.

The first is a picture of two of my sisters and me, standing in front of the pantry. You can see the old curtains and the tiebacks. It was pretty awkward having the curtained pantry in the middle of our kitchen.

The second is my sister PK, acting like Vanna White, and it shows the curtain rod and the pantry shelves. It needed an upgrade, didn’t it?!

The doors I found were sold as bi-fold doors, but the conversion to French doors was simple, especially because we had an existing opening. This made for a much easier door installation.

Also, the doors were cheaper to buy unfinished – which wasn’t a problem because I don’t mind painting. Amazon also has a lot of French Doors too if you are looking for more options.

How to Install Interior Double French Doors

To install the double French doors in an existing opening, Ash removed the six small hinges that connected the door panels together. These hinges were light duty and were meant to be used in a bi-fold setup with little load.

He purchased six heavy duty door hinges, figuring that due to the glass, 3 hinges per door would be needed to handle the weight. (Aside from that, no additional extra hardware was needed.

If we wanted to keep the doors as bi-folds, we would have needed to purchase a bi-fold track to mount in the door frame.)

The actual door came in several different sizes, so we bought the one that most closely fit the pantry opening. It wasn’t perfect because the door height was just a little short.

So Ash filled the gap at the top with a piece of 2 x 4 wood painted white (as you can see in the picture).

He also had to trim the baseboard at the bottom so that he could have a flush edge for the French doors.

To mount the French doors, he installed the hinges on the doors first. Then he took one door panel and placed it in the ‘open’ position in the pantry, with the hinges open 90 degrees. He used some scrap wood (about ¼” thick) to elevate the door off of the floor.

With the door in position, he used heavy duty screws to secure the hinges to the wall. He then removed the scrap wood supports on the floor and verified that the door swung open and closed easily.

Then, he repeated this procedure with the other door panel. Installing French doors was pretty simple, and although unpainted, the double French doors already looked so much better than before 🙂

How to Paint French Doors

With the double French doors mounted, the next step was painting. I chose a white semi-gloss paint to match the baseboard and chair rails that I just refreshed.

It went on pretty easily with just one coat needed. There was no need to use any masking tape for the glass panels.

This particular door came with a protective plastic film on each glass panel, so it was easy to paint the double doors without prep work.

Unfortunately, as easy as this made the painting process, removing the film was actually very time-consuming. However, we knew this going into the project because we always thoroughly read the online reviews 🙂

How to Attach the Door Installation Hardware

After screwing on the door handles, the last step of the door installation was to attach some magnetic catches at the top to keep the doors closed and to also serve as a stop to prevent the doors from swinging inwards.

A simple task, but the first try was a no go.

The magnets Ash used were way too strong, as they were making a loud, clanging noise as they connected. Also, when we opened the doors, the panels shuddered from the magnetic tension release, which wasn’t good for the glass.

Ash simply replaced them with less powerful magnets that were just as effective.

As you can see, this weekend project of installing French doors turned out great.

Our raggedy old curtains were now beautiful double French doors. A simple swap made a drastic difference.

Here’s another look at the before and after of installing the double French doors. It really updated our kitchen without touching the countertops or cabinets.

Now that we are in a new house, I miss those interior French doors; however, I have a plan to work them into our new house too!

Maybe in my office – they would go with our new built-in bookshelf with a window seat. I’m sure Ash won’t mind installing French doors again. Stay tuned 🙂

How to Make Storage Bins from Cardboard Boxes

February 4, 2016 by Eileen 110 Comments

Before our son was born, we spent a lot of time putting together the nursery. We painted gorgeous gray stripes, decorated the room with a sweet theme, and ordered the best furniture for our budget.

We found a great changing table with open shelving, so I was planning to buy storage bins to fit all the little things you need under the changing table.

However, I ran into a snag. I realized that I could only fit two store-bought fabric storage bins on each shelf. It awkwardly left a lot of open space, but three storage bins just didn’t fit across.

On top of that, there weren’t many colors to choose from on the store-bought fabric storage bins.

Since I was 7 months pregnant with my first and was pretty bored, I decided to make my own DIY storage bins. I tried using fabric from the curtains, but that was a fabric/hot glue mess.

So, I found a much simpler way – making DIY storage bins using contact paper and cardboard boxes! I can’t emphasize how easy it was! It’s definitely fool-proof.

Here is the end result – these customized storage boxes are made out of just contact paper, cardboard boxes, and packing tape! Not bad, huh?

The contact paper on the DIY storage bins easily allowed me to customize the bins in colors of my choice, rather than being tied to store-bought colored storage bins.

How to Make Storage Bins from Cardboard Boxes

I cannot tell you just how much I love these homemade storage bins. The customized storage boxes are so easy to make and you would never know that the base is made from a cardboard box!

You just need a little time and patience and a few easy supplies to make these DIY storage bins.

You can pick out different colored, patterned, or textured contact paper, which brings character to your space.

When making your own DIY storage bins, for just a few dollars per box, you get lots of storage and a pattern of your choice.

DIY Storage Bin Materials

Cardboard boxes
Packing tape
Knobs
Contact paper(s) of your choice

To make these cardboard storage boxes, I ordered a bundle of boxes from Amazon, since we didn’t have any laying around. (Have I mentioned how much I love Amazon prime?!) We were planning to move soon, so we would use the rest of the cardboard boxes then. However, if you have little ones already, diaper boxes and wipes boxes work really well for these cardboard storage boxes.

I also ordered three types of contact paper for the storage bins. The baby’s room was going to be gray and turquoise (gray walls, one striped with a lighter gray, turquoise carpet, and white furniture – check out our nursery makeover).

So, I found a cute, high-quality turquoise patterned paper and a gray one on Amazon. I figured I would alternate colors on the customized storage boxes.

For the inside, I used a less expensive, thinner paper in a neural color from Target. You don’t have to cover the inside, but it is nice to have a storage bin where you can easily wipe the inside.

Instructions for Making Customized Storage Bins

To make DIY storage bins, first measure the area where you want to put your customized boxes. Make sure they will fit length, width, and height-wise. I had to cut a little bit off the top of my cardboard boxes to make them fit.

Next, cut the flaps off of the cardboard boxes. You could use these as dividers, if you’d like 🙂 Use a good pair of scissors or a box cutter if you are cutting your cardboard box.

Now you are ready to cover your DIY storage bin with contact paper. Cover the outer four sides of the cardboard box with contact paper. Pay attention to patterns, if you want everything lined up nicely. Some patterns are easier to work with than others.

I didn’t cover the bottom of the cardboard box with contact paper, so this is what the bottom of the homemade storage bin looks like.

Also, you might need to tape the bottom or inside edges of the contact paper down, depending on the quality of your paper. If you want your customized storage boxes to last, I would get good quality paper, like this one.

Next, if you plan to cover the inside of your DIY storage box with contact paper, you can do that now. Since I was making this batch of customized storage bins for my son’s nursery, I wanted the inside of the box to be nicely covered, so I could easily clean it.

Later on, I made more cardboard storage boxes for various things, like paper storage, and I didn’t cover the insides – so it’s up to you!

Adding Knobs to the DIY Storage Bins

Now, ready for the best part?

This really makes your DIY storage bins look store-bought and makes them super functional.

After I was finished covering the inside and outside of the customized boxes, I was ready to add the knob to the cardboard storage box. The knobs made the storage bins look professionally made and made the bins easy to quickly grab.

I picked the knobs up from Home Depot – they were inexpensive white knobs. Yet, the screw was too long – so I simply swapped the large screws out for the short ones. (Below is the knob, washer, and short screw).

I drilled one hole in the front of each DIY storage box. Then, I added simple, white knobs, so I could easily pull customized bins in and out.

Here’s a picture of what the inside of the DIY storage box looked like, after adding the knob.

I definitely recommend using these knobs for the cardboard storage boxes because they made it so easy to pull out each homemade storage bin.

Later, I made more customized storage bins – for closet storage (winter hats, gloves, etc) and for Ash’s office. I used knobs on all of them and it was so much easier to grab a knob from the top shelf of a closet, then a whole bin.

For less than $5 per box, I had functional customized storage bins that I LOVED.

Time and Cost of Making DIY Storage Bins

The total cost of making customized storage boxes is really just the amount you spend on contact paper and knobs. I made my storage boxes for less than $5 per box.

I was so pleased with cardboard storage boxes that I used the leftover materials for winter storage bins and pantry floor bins. I also used chalkboard contact paper to make paper storage boxes for Ash’s messy office closet. They were fun because you can write on the contact paper with chalk, which makes for easy labeling.

These DIY storage bins are so pretty that you can put them anywhere in your house, leaving your guests wondering just how you made storage bins from cardboard boxes.

Overall, this was one of my favorite thrifty DIY projects – it’s hard to believe that underneath the customized storage bins is a simple cardboard box.

Updated: How did the storage bins hold up?

The customized storage bins have held up great. Three years later, these nursery storage bins still are in tact. In fact, I just tightened the knobs yesterday for the first time. The contact paper has remained on perfectly too.

And, I should mention, these bins get a lot of use!

Three years of pulling the diaper bins out multiple times per day!

How to Build a Storage Shed from Scratch (Phase 1)

February 4, 2016 by Ash 46 Comments

With a larger house comes a bigger yard. I knew my little push lawn mower could only do so much with half an acre. This was proven true after nearly 3 hours mowing the grass, and stopping to empty the bag every 2 minutes.

Because of this, I bought a used riding mower that sped things up significantly, as I can now finish cutting the lawn in just over half an hour.

However, the behemoth was taking up half our garage. I had big plans for our new garage, and as much as I loved my new riding mower, its home was not going to be the garage.

This was an excellent opportunity to work on my dream shed project – teaching myself how to build a storage shed.

Storage Shed Plans and Designs

I worked on building the DIY storage shed single-handedly over the summer. I wasn’t sure that building a shed was in my skill set, but I did a lot of research, watched a lot of videos, and asked some contractor gurus for advice.

The result?

An amazing DIY storage shed that my wife still can’t believe I built.

If you are wondering how to build a storage shed or if building a shed from scratch is within your skill set, keep reading this DIY shed tutorial. I’m breaking it into two posts because of the amount of details.

Choosing a Storage Shed Design

In learning how to build a storage shed, the first thing I had to do was decide on a shed design and plans.

Now if I was going to build a shed, I wanted it to be multi-functional and not just mower storage. I went over several ideas in my head about how I could use the new storage in the shed.

I initially thought it would be nice to have an area of the DIY shed to store bagged lawn clippings and keep it dry from the rain. It was annoying trying to handle soaking wet yard waste bags once exposed to the elements all week.

I also wanted to remove some of the bulkier items from the garage (like the wheelbarrow and fertilizer spreader), so the storage shed needed to be large enough to accommodate these things.

After taking measurements of the riding mower, I padded the size to include additional storage. I settled on a 10 x 16 shed plan.

This would give me ample space to park the mower and store gardening equipment and large tools.

When planning things out, I usually like picturing the end product and doing a walk-through in my head to make sure everything makes practical sense.

I envisioned myself driving the mower into the storage shed, stepping off to the left (bagging chute was on the right), and walking out the shed door.

I knew I wanted the mower entrance to be on the far end, and shed storage directly adjacent. Now if I stepped off to the left of the mower, I didn’t want to be walking into a wall.

I thought it would be a tight squeeze to fit between the mower and the wall, so I wanted to place the mower entrance on the right size of the shed.

Deciding on Storage Shed Plans

With the basic requirements of how to build a storage shed in mind, I started shopping online for storage shed plans. There are lots of sites online selling plans for custom built storage sheds.

I ended up going with www.icreatables.com. They had designs more to my personal liking, and they also had a ton of resources (video walk-throughs of storage shed constructions).

I found a “Cape Cod” shed design that I liked a lot. It came with a large overhang that would be perfect for keeping rain out of my bagged yard waste.

I just needed to add a deck to make a little porch on the storage shed to elevate my bags off the ground. Here’s my first sketch of the DIY shed:

As you can see in the picture, I have the mower entrance on the far right, and a porch on the rear for storing bags of lawn clippings.

I also added a smaller door on the side of the shed to easily access the storage area of the shed. Two windows were sufficient to let in enough lighting. I also factored in a ramp for the mower.

Don’t let the 12 x 16 dimensions fool you. The extra two feet was accounting for the overhang, so the storage shed plan was still 10 x 16.

The shed foundation was going to rest on some 4 x 4 skids, sitting on 18 concrete blocks.

I did look into concrete anchors, but opted for the skid design due to simplicity.

Also a majority of comparable storage sheds in my area were resting on skids, so that gave me confidence that I was making the right decision.

I knew I was not in a flood zone either. If this were the case, I would have had to anchor the DIY shed permanently.

I purchased the storage shed plans for $15 and started going over the material list and putting together a cost estimate.

Preparing for Construction

Moving on to the construction part of how to build a shed – this part of the storage shed construction took quite some time as I had no experience in construction of this magnitude. I had to google lots of techniques and terminology while going through the storage shed plans.

Also I can’t tell you how much of a resource youtube was for me. With each part of the shed construction process in the plans, I had to picture myself actually doing the work to know if it was within my skill set and if I had the correct equipment.

I did have to purchase a number of tools to complete the shed project, but I’ll get to those in a bit.

After mulling over the storage shed plans and materials, I hit a snag.

To accomplish the two feet roof overhang, I needed a 16ft LVL (laminated veneer lumber) beam.

This is essentially a really strong, hard, and heavy piece of wood running across the underside of the overhang. It needed to be strong enough to handle the weight of the shed’s roof.

Unfortunately, the storage shed plans called for a certain size LVL beam that was really expensive for me and was not available at the local Home Depot.

I considered making my own beam, but abandoned this idea out of lack of experience. The last thing I wanted to do was make something unsafe.

At this point, I was also getting a little overwhelmed at the construction design of the overhang.

This was a turning point in my shed project. So teaching myself how to build a storage shed, I ended up abandoning the overhang design and opting for a more traditional shed.

This meant ditching the storage of the yard waste bags. It wasn’t such a terrible loss. If I really wanted to, I could construct a box with a flap at the top to store the bags in.

So, I browsed through more shed designs and bought a simpler one for another $15.

After some tweaks to the purchased plans, here was the final design I ended up going with:

That sketch needed a bit of explanation as it does look a lot different than my original idea and went against my initial plan of the mower entrance being on the far right.

How to Build a Storage Shed

At this point in the shed project, I had already started doing some of the prep work outside that was not going to change, regardless of the shed design.

Specifically, I laid out the 18 concrete blocks for the skids and worked on getting them leveled properly for the storage shed (see pictures below).

Here’s a small tip about leveling the skids for a storage shed. Even though I tried my best to get the concrete blocks perfectly level, there were a few that were off by a little.

This left a gap when the skids were rested on them. So to fill the gaps, I used scraps of roofing shingles. I read this shed tip online, and it helped me out a lot.
After leveling off the concrete blocks and placing the 4 x 4 skids on them, it became very apparent that as flat as the yard looked, there was a subtle slope that made the right side of the shed about a foot higher off the ground than the left side.

This made it very inconvenient to have the shed ramp on the right side. It meant I would need a much bigger ramp (more materials and expense).

Also, that extra foot of height was making me nervous about driving the mower up it. How simple it would be to just have the ramp on the left side of the storage shed, where the ground height was minimal.

So, in my DIY shed design, I relocated the mower entrance. I did some more measurements and decided that the squeeze between the mower and the wall (when exiting the mower on the left) would not be so bad.

Nonetheless, I still kept my fingers crossed it would work out. Also, I had to relocate the storage shed entrance door since that was where the mower was going to park.

I did have to add some steps into my shed design to accommodate the big drop from the door to the ground now.

Additionally, I moved the windows around in my shed plans. The windows are on the front right corner now.

It all worked out for the best as this was the optimal setup to allow the most sunlight in. My yard has lots of big trees, and most of the storage shed is usually under tree shade.

As you can tell in the picture with the 4 x 4 skids, I get the most sunlight from the right side of the shed so relocating the windows to the right made the most sense.

Happy with the new design, I was excited to my DIY shed project – as I was making some good progress constructing the storage shed.

Ordering the Shed Materials

One of the most exciting and anticipated moments in the project was getting the Home Depot delivery of materials. For $75 delivery fee, Home Depot dropped off a gigantic pile of lumber for the storage shed on my driveway.

With my wife’s help, it only took a couple of hours to relocate the lumber into my garage to keep it save from the weather.

It was also very fitting that it happened to be our 5th year wedding anniversary, and wood is the appointed gift for 5 years! So happy anniversary my dear – wood!

Anyway, prior to ordering, I made a saved list called “Storage Shed” on Home Depot’s website, and added all the materials I needed.

Money-Saving Tips for Building Sheds

The total came to around $2000. I was able to knock off an extra $250 though, and here’s how: ebay has lots of 10% off coupons for Home Depot (up to $200 off). I’ve come to realize that these coupons are hard to get a hold of for free. They typically sell for around $35 on ebay.

This was a bargain for me because that $35 that I would spend on the coupon would save me $200 off my storage shed cost.

Incidentally, the day I was going to purchase the coupon on ebay, I checked my mailbox and saw a bright yellow letter from Home Depot. I knew instantly what it was – a 10% off coupon!

What were the odds? We just moved into our new home a few months prior, and Home Depot sent us a coupon congratulating us on our move. Well, we saved another $35. If you aren’t as lucky as me, buy the coupon on ebay for your project, if it makes sense for your budget.

For the other $50 I saved – I used ebay. I was able to purchase 2 gift cards on ebay worth $500 each, but selling for $475 each.

How to Build a Shed Foundation

The next step in learning how to build a shed is to work on the shed foundation. I made the skids out of 6 pieces of 4 x 4 x 8 pressure-treated wood.

Pretty much all wood used in the storage shed was pressure treated, by the way. The wood was treated with a special chemical to keep bugs (and moisture to some degree) out. When building outdoor structures, you really need pressure-treated wood.

A word of caution though, be careful about splinters and sawdust from cutting. Splinters on the skin might sting or give a rash because of the chemicals.

Also, wear a dust mask when cutting the wood. You don’t want to be inhaling chemically treated sawdust.

For the storage shed skids, I needed each of the 3 rows to be 16 ft long, so I joined 2 of the 8 ft pieces with a mending plate.

With the 4 x 4 skids now in place, I finally had a platform to start erecting the storage shed. I followed the directions in the plans to frame the floor joists (see picture).
Looks awesome, right? After framing the floor joists, I secured it to the 4 x 4 skids with some L brackets.

Also, do you see my framing nail gun on the right hand side? I could not have built the shed without it.

I highly recommend this type of tool for building large structures like this shed. The specific gun I have is a Paslode gas framing gun. I bought a used one on ebay for $100. They normally retail for several hundred dollars, so it was a great deal. I did have to buy a cleaning kit though because the nails were starting to jam after repeated use.

Gas framing nail guns are the way to go if you don’t have a pneumatic compressor. They use a special butane fuel cell (a small cylindrical cartridge you insert into the back) and a rechargeable battery.

The nail gun ignites some of the butane to fire a piston forward and drive the nail in.

It’s really powerful (and dangerous if you’re not careful) and makes framing wooden structures a breeze.

Here’s my nail gun and me:

How to Build a Shed Floor

In learning how to build a storage shed, the next step was the actual floor. I used several 4 x 8 sheets of ¾” T&G orient strand board, following the sheeting patterns in the plans. The T&G stands for tongue and groove.

One end of the board has a protruding strip called the tongue, while the other end of the board has a groove. The tongue of one sheet is meant to be inserted into the groove of the next sheet, interlocking them together.

Once nailed down to the floor joists, the T&G system made a very sturdy floor for my shed.

I also applied a deck finish to the floor to protect it from water.

I knew it was going to be a while before the shed roof was installed, so waterproofing the floor was a high-priority (see below picture).

How to Build Shed Walls

After securing the floor to the foundation, the next step was to frame and erect the walls. I followed the plans carefully and cut all the 2 x 4s to proper lengths.

The large shed floor was a perfect platform to build the wall panels on (you can see I started assembling a wall in the last picture).

After finishing a wall section, I stood it up, carefully aligned it with the edge of the floor, and nailed it into the floor joists.

The 10 ft side panel went up first and was easy to raise and nail by myself. However, I needed some help raising the long 16 ft panel.

It was very heavy and wobbly to work with by myself.

Once in position, I secured it to the floor and then to the 10 ft panel already standing up.

At this point, I thought it would be a good idea to use L brackets to more securely join the two wall panels. So I installed 5 brackets which held the panels very tightly in place. I repeated this technique for the rest of the panel installation.

However, this idea backfired a little later in the project (I’ll get to that when I tell you about installing the exterior siding).

The L brackets were a good idea, but unfortunately not this early in the project.

I finished the panel installation. I installed some temporary supports to the open end of the panels to give some rigidity until more panels were installed (see picture).
The two remaining wall panels took me more time to build, as they were more complicated in design. They had openings for windows and doors, which meant building and installing headers.

Remember how I had purchased 2 separate plans in the beginning of the project? It actually worked well for me.

The second plan (which I was basing my shed off) did not include any windows or a small door frame. However, the first plan (with the overhanging roof) had both of those things.

So I merged the plans to create what I had in mind for my shed.

How to Install Door and Window Headers

Next up in my how to build a storage shed project was installing the door and window headers. During the constructions of the wall panels, I had to install headers above each door and window opening.

When you have a large opening in your wall frame, there is no vertical support there to help bear to load of the roof.

So you have to install a strong beam above the opening to transfer the roof load horizontally and then down the sides of your opening. This beam is called a header.

I built my own headers by nailing 3 layers of wood together. I sandwiched a strip of plywood between two pieces of 2 x 6 and it made a very strong beam.

Here is the shed with all four wall panels up. Not bad for someone teaching himself how to build a storage shed.
Ignore the windows that are mounted in the frame. I will install those later, but I was eager to see what they would look like mounted.

I removed them shortly afterwards to continue construction.
My shed project was really starting to take shape at this point. It looked like a professionally constructed building and I was thrilled!

If you are wondering how to build a storage shed or if it is within your skill set, this tutorial will definitely set you on your way.

The second part of How to Build a Storage Shed is continued here – Shed Project Part 2 (siding and roof).

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Preparing Space for the Garage Storage Shelves

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Storage Shed Plans and Designs

Choosing a Storage Shed Design

Deciding on Storage Shed Plans

Preparing for Construction

How to Build a Storage Shed

Ordering the Shed Materials

Money-Saving Tips for Building Sheds

How to Build a Shed Foundation

How to Build a Shed Floor

How to Build Shed Walls

How to Install Door and Window Headers

Constructing the Bookshelf

How to Attach the Door Installation Hardware