Our Submission to Lifehacker's Workspace Show-and-Tell

GIVE FULL CREDIT to Mrs. Newbie for finding a way to help our San Diego friends build a workable full-time quilting space from a garage packed to the roof with moving boxes. Here's what it took, from the stats we submitted for a future edition of Lifehacker's Featured Workspace:

The $1,200 Quilty-as-Charged Garage Makeover

• 3-day weekend
• 5 friends
• $975 worth of TROFAST storage from Ikea: 8 tall shelf units, 6 short shelf units, 51 small buckets (perfect for small fabric squares), 30 medium buckets, 8 large buckets
• $150 dumpster rental
• 4 levels of 6-foot Elfa shelves (already in the garage)
• 2 existing bookcases (for decades worth of quilting magazines and books)
• 36 squares of FLOR carpet, "bright stripes" and "bright solids," on wicked clearance sale, less than $15/6, found by scouring 5 different Target stores in Southern California
• 1 existing Koala sewing table

The resulting space was put together with blood, sweat, tears, sheer will and an electric drill an with Allen wrench (hex key) attachment. (This was Ikea shelving, after all.)

The completed room keeps 50+ years of quilting materials all in one place, with great indirect light from the garage door and spotlighting at the sewing table.

Privacy for the quilter in the garage. Safety for the pre-schoolers in the house. Sanity returned to the family. And Mrs. Newbie left thinking she should charge for the service.

See the whole Flickr photo set.