Organizing your garden shed might be the best thing you can do for your garden this summer. If you are met with a jam packed, cob-web filled pile of rusty tools and cracked pots every time you go out to find the rake, perhaps your garden shed is not living up to it’s full potential.

If you can’t find your tools, and have to dig through half empty bags of potting soil and broken garden ornaments, this may lead to your gardens’ worst enemy – gardening procrastination. If you think about your shed like a big closet, and the only way a closet can be useful is if it’s organized, then maybe you’ll finally decide to get a handle on your shed clutter.

But how do you go about organizing your gardening stuff? Well, it may be hard to do, but the first thing you need to do to get things orderly and organized is to totally unpack your shed. Take out the rolls of wire would only be useful for fencing in a horse and a few cows (unless you have livestock, then it’s alright), remove the 12 cans of designer stain that have long ago separated because you left them in the shed all winter and they froze. Throw out everything that can’t be used, give away anything that you haven’t used in a year.

Once the shed is empty give it a good cleaning. This is also a good chance to do some annual maintenance on some the shed contents. Sand off some rust spots on your garden tools and apply a new coat of anti-rust paint. Oil any parts that need oiling and generally give everything a good wash. Do not return any item to the shed unless it is cleaned and in working order.

One more job that you can do now that the garden shed is totally cleaned and still empty of tools, is to figure out if you need to add some more shelving or hooks to make storing your tools and supplies easier. And I’m not talking about banging in a couple more nails to hang the double wide rake you bought last year. There are great vinyl covered hooks that come in all shapes and sizes that hold tools securely, so you don’t start an avalanche every time you try to get the shovel, but didn’t properly place the garden shears and electric trimmer on their slanted spikes.

The last step, and for me the most fun, is putting back the deemed essential garden shed items each in their own spot, with room to find and access everything required for effective gardening. Now that everything has a spot, and your garden shed is the picture of organization, you will be more likely to approach your gardening with less dread. Garden shed organization is definitely worth the effort.