The husband's domain

I've got to brag on my husband Mark for just a bit here on this part of the Internet. I was feeling sick this weekend and was basically worthless on Saturday and Sunday. He went out and did his usual rounds on the disc golf course with no complaints from me (rare, ask him!), but then he came home and cleaned the whole house and the garage, all unprompted. 

He does love a clean house and garage, so I can't say I'm THAT surprised, but he did such a good job! Since I've shown you every other corner of our house, here is our garage:

We are very much a 'park our cars in the garage' kind of people. I grew up that way and tend to like having everything tucked nicely inside the walls of my house instead of leaving the cars in the street or in the driveway. It looks less cluttered and after you've been through a 15 minute baseball-sized hailstorm, you know how useful a garage can be! That being said, we also store a LOT of stuff in our garage.

Thank GOD Mark drives a Mini Cooper, because otherwise we would have to get a storage shed. Look at all of this stuff we store in front of his car!

(the black trash bag is about 1/4 of a bale of hay we bought in the Fall for Motley's dog house. A little goes a LONG way so we are storing it that way until we use it all up!)

Our awesome previous owners left this utility rack and we have used it since day one. Mark has already collected a bunch of tools in the past 6 months!

They also left this wall mounted bike rack on the right side of the photo, holding up the ladder. Unfortunately it doesn't really work with our bikes, but it's perfect for the ladder!

That plywood is going to be put up in our attic across the beams so we can get more storage and walking space up there. It was lovingly saved from our kitchen remodel :)

We searched long and hard for a bike rack solution that would work until I stumbled upon this pulley system at the Container Store. I bought them at two different occasions to make sure that we liked them, and they were about $20 each. They were a little pricier than what we wanted to spend, but they meet our needs perfectly and it was worth it to us to get those out of the way. They hang right over the hood of Mark's car when he pulls in so we never have to worry about ducking around them when walking around. 

Behind the bikes is a shelving unit that Mark just picked up from his dad last week and his peg board that he bought within weeks of moving in. OCD, much?

He and I both like how organized this makes the tools that we use on a regular basis. Plus it wouldn't be the same without the Arsenal flag. ;)

We also have this great work and storage bench plus the Elfa shelving that the previous owners left. I have no idea what we would have done without it when we moved in, it has solved SO many storage needs for us!

Lastly, we have our 'laundry area'. I would LOVE a designated laundry room, but the cards just weren't in our favor for this house. This solution has worked fine for us but I'd love to jazz up the area a little more to make it more functional, cleaner, and prettier. I've seen tons of ideas on Pinterest but most include installing a work surface on top of the W/D but those are for machines where the buttons are on the face of the unit instead of how ours are. Oh well, I'll figure out something down the line!

What does your garage look like? Do you prefer to park inside it or use it as storage?

Also, has anyone out there ever painted their garage floor? Ours was painted in the past and could use some touch up. Thanks for any advice!