As someone who is not the most handy person, I have tried to learn as much as possible about household chores and tasks. Being a first-time homeowner has brought on plenty of challenges, and there are still plenty of jobs I don’t feel comfortable enough with my skills to even attempt on my own. But some of the more basic tasks or maintenance checks that come with owning a home have become part of my yearly routines.
This includes cleaning and changing air filters, switching the direction of the fans in winter and summer, and assembling all kinds of furniture we inevitably acquire as our family grows. Over my time as a homeowner, my tool inventory has grown, especially when purchasing tools for specific jobs. But my basement and tool area, if you can call it that, became a cluttered mess. I had no organization whatsoever, and it became hard to find anything. I took a few initial steps to organize my tools, knowing I need to do a bigger and better job eventually. But here’s where I am now versus where I was.
It became hard to remember where everything was
Over the years, I’ve purchased plenty of tools but also been lucky enough to inherit a few toolboxes from my grandparents and other family members. My wife had a toolbox for her apartment when we met, so her tools were also combined with what I had at the time.
That said, I never really went through the toolboxes to see what I had in each one. I kind of knew some of them had screwdrivers and some of them had hammers and nails in them, and I’d search through them each time I needed something of that nature just to find what I needed. But when you’re searching through the smaller parts of a toolbox just to find a Phillips head screw, you’re not really setting yourself up for long-term success.
The metal toolbox you see above was inherited from my wife’s grandfather and has been a great addition to our garage. I need to have some of these tools outside when I’m either tuning something up or assembling in the garage. I also had two other toolboxes in the basement, so I didn’t really need a third one there. It has proven helpful because of the many screwdrivers and tapes he had assembled in it.
The orange toolbox was mine. You can see what a mess the top is. It has screwdrivers, pencils, miscellaneous parts left over from furniture assembly, wrenches, a penlight (which has been a big help over the years), and just more chaos. And that’s just in the top tray.
I’ve left the metal toolbox in the garage more or less the way it was. For the bit of disarray, it came with at least some semblance of organization, which I understand, so I didn’t want to mess that up.
I had to start small
This was a vital step in the process
Recently, I swapped out the lights on either side of our front door because there was a short in one of them, causing it to flicker uncontrollably. They needed an upgrade anyway, so it was time to modernize them. During the replacement process, I took the previous ones down and had to install a different color backplate as the previous one didn’t match the new lights.
In order to do that, I needed longer screws. Searching through my toolboxes to find six longer screws was a chore. I didn’t have any screws in the same place, so I was looking through multiple toolboxes. Not only that, but I was looking through the bottom sections and different compartments to see if I had any.
I went over to another shelf I have in the basement, where I had some boxes of nails and screws, and looked through those. Finally, I was able to gather six screws and finish the job. When I had finished installing the new lights, I decided I needed a solution. Strangely enough, I was out running errands and had to stop at an antique store. I actually found a 30-bin organizer there, even though I had plans to go to the hardware store later that day. I grabbed it for a few dollars and brought it home.
I went through all the nails, screws, bolts, and random hex wrenches that I’ve accumulated over the years from assembling pieces of furniture (side note: why is it that I never seem to want to throw them away, even though many of them are the same?) I organized them according to size and shape in the organizer. Now I at least have an idea of where any of these parts are when I need them.
My goal is to get a proper setup someday
To find some semblance of organization, I set up a folding table that I had in an area of my basement. I moved hammers and wrenches to one toolbox and screwdrivers, hole punches, and other small hand tools to the other. I set up the two toolboxes on one end. I added the two electric drill / driver sets that I have, along with their accompanying bit sets, on one side of the table.
The 30-bin organizer joined a few items, like a roll of duct tape and a picture hanging tool, because they are items that I use frequently. I can’t tell you how often I’m looking for tape or the picture hanging tool, so I wanted them to be easily accessible and for me to always know where they are. I was gifted a Craftsman Versastack 262-piece SAE Mechanics Tool Set for Christmas, so that felt like a good addition to the other end of the table.
Underneath the table, I positioned my Shop-Vac. I never really know where to keep the Shop-Vac, and it’s been more useful than I care to admit, mostly because I’ve accidentally caused some leaks by trying to fix things myself (don’t bring up the time I accidentally punctured a pipe in our washing machine, and water gushed all over the room to my wife).
I know this doesn’t seem like a long-term solution. But I’m happy that it’s at least a start. I’d like to have a proper tool bench where I can actually cut, saw, or screw on it without having to remove my tools to do so. But I’m still learning and building my tool sets. So this will come.
I needed some kind of organization for my tools
My tools were a mess, and I could never find anything. From screws to screwdrivers and hammers, they were in random places around my house, but not easily accessible. I first started by organizing nuts, bolts, and screws in a 30-bin organizer, which has helped tremendously. Then I organized my two toolboxes by different tools. Putting everything together on a table gave me a surface to work on and a somewhat organized feel for my tools.
