For a couple of weeks now, the charge of "P90X baby...bring it!" has rung out in out basement, as we both embark on the fitness craze that is the beachbody workout by Tony Horton.  The workouts consist of jump training, pull ups, and several other activities that call into question our commitment to a home gym in the basement.  Our biggest problem is height.

Take the pull up bar, for example.  Even though we have it installed (attached to the ceiling joists in the basement), when you factor in the headroom and the suspended ceiling, it hangs at about 6 feet or so.  It works, and you don't have to duck to get under it, but when you hang there for a pull up, you literally have to keep your knees at a 45 degree angle or better if you don't want to hit the floor.  Then there is the jump training, which I haven't gotten to yet, but with the low ceiling seems like a recipe for disaster.  Even overhand stretches are difficult because you can reach the ceiling.  

So, without the basement, nor a dedicated extra bedroom or office, we've started to think about the garage.  It has the space, it has the height.  But there are a few considerations to keep in mind.  First, we live in Wisconsin.  It gets cold here in the winter.  So we'll need to fully insulate the walls and the garage doors, as well as the storage area above the ceiling.  Even then, we'll have heating concerns.  We can look to space heaters or something like that, but we'll have to be careful about what we do and how we use them safely.  

After the space would be heated and insulated, the floor comes to mind.  Right now, it's a concrete slab.  We'll need something for warmth and comfort.  I mean, as you do crunches, overhand reverse curls, triceps lifts and oblique crunches, you need something  to lay on.  One novel idea I read about is to look into horse pads.  These are 4x6 or 6x8 pads designed for the bottom of a horse carrier or stable.  These will support the weight of any equipment you have, as well as provide some support, but they are not light and a little cumbersome to move around.

I'm not sure where we'll end up with this.  The idea has appeal, but so does being able to keep the van in the garage during the winter snows.  It would be a innovative idea to get used to, but if it keeps the fitness goals on track, we need to do whatever it takes.

Posted by Caeli at 01:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Found a great article online today about the different options for finishing or painting a garage floor.  A few years ago we dragged everything out of our garage and went to town using one of those discount garage floor painting kits you can get at your big box home improvement warehouse.  The picture looked amazing-- clean, smooth, it even had sparkles.  We don't have too many pictures from the project, but we thought it turned out pretty well.

It has held up until this year.  Living in Wisconsin, we happen to get a fair amount of the white stuff in winter.  After about three years of chaos in the garage, we were able to clean it out enough to park our van in there this year.  So, we're rediscovering how wet a garage gets in the winter.  Mud, ice, snow, grime, salt, etc., we have it all.  All melting into a sludge on our floor in the garage.  The floor is slowly deteriorating.  Admittedly, the painting job could have been better to start with, but honestly, I'm missing the clean lines of plain old concrete. 

Unless you have a showroom, you really don't need a painted floor.  Empty it out, clean it, and put a good concrete sealer down and you have a floor for the ages.  Go for the fancy paint and other products, especially in a wintry climate, and you can have a soggy mess.

Posted by Caeli at 12:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, the garage has graduated from disaster to simply a huge mess.  It's actually quite the accomplishment, given what it looked like when this all started.  Today's objective was to start from the back door and get as far as I could, dividing things into

• Garbage-- preferably, this is stuff actually in a garbage can by day's end
• Recycle-- Cans and bottles can go in the recycle bin, cardboard broken down
• Wood-- These are burnable courtesy of my sister-in-law, so we can add to the bonfire
• Donations

This then left the other "stuff".  The things that actually belong in the garage.  For now, the idea is to reduce what's there to what is supposed to actually be there.  Later on we can do things like organize tools and hang rakes and shovels.  

 

After about 3 hours of work, the mission was large accomplished.  Both trash bins are full and ready for the city to dump next week.  We then have one overflow can about 1/3 full.  The recycle bin is full and there's a loosely organized pile of cardboard on the floor.  Donations are gone-- having make a trip to Goodwill and only coming back with the baby gate and stroller that they did not accept.  A bunch of larger items to dump in the trash have been identified-- old car seats, strollers, a trashed crib mattress, etc.  There are about eight florescent bulbs, one computer monitor and one microwave oven to deliver to the city recycling plant tomorrow.

It was a good start and there is a noticable difference.  I'm still not able to park a car in here, but we are getting close.  After the trash and recycles are gone, the next step is to identify a home for the extra furniture that's out there-- two bookcases and two storage lockers.  If those can vacate the center of the garage, then we'll have at least some hope of getting the van out of the elements this winter. 

Meanwhile, I can ponder what to do with the tandem jogging stroller that doesn't fold up...

Posted by Jason at 11:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you'll know that my better half has been working on cleaning up and organizing the kids clothes and generally, everything inside the house.  I've been meaning to do something with our garage for some time now and thus it's been brought into the project.  The idea is to make one stall a workshop/tool area and have the other stall as a functional place to park our minivan.  On the surface, it sounds simple enough.

However, we have a couple of challenges.  First off, it's now December 28th and the daytime temperature is about 20 degrees.  The next time we'll see the north side of freezing is March.  After all, it is Wisconsin.  So, it's a cold, unforgiving environment.  However, it is something you can prepare for.  One thing that I've learned after living out here for five years is that gloves and a good hat can do wonders for your outdoor experience.  I'm still looking for a way to keep my ears warm, but with a good set of thinsulate gloves and a hat, you can function in winter.

So with that out of the way, the other problem is that the garage is an absolute disaster area.  There are at least two reasons for this that I can think of.  First, we generate a lot of trash.  We have three little ones in the house and with a household of five comes a lot of messes to clean up.  For the longest time, we didn't have the bins provided by the city for automated garbage pickup, so we end up with a pile of garbage and recycling boxes to deal with.  Frankly, we never really had a good system for that, and thus we had a lot of just junk out there.  

Secondly, we underwent a major, major, remodeling project that we've detailed in this blog over the last 2 years.  The garage became the staging area for everything.  At one point, we had boxes and boxes of kitchen cabinets filling up one stall.  Later, we had flooring components, furniture, you name it.  It was also the workshop, especially as the weather turned.  So, we have the miter saw, table saw, etc.. out ans scattered about.  Finally, the hand tools were all over the place and we just grabbed what we needed and were not good about putting tools back.  Add to that a baby born in the middle of the project and we have the seeds for a hellish garage.  

So, we'll see how things work out.  

Posted by Jason at 11:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)