The Great Clean Out Project

2nd load for 1-800 Got Junk

 Some of you may remember that Grandpa (David Cates Jr)
was a big "saver" (read that as "never discarded anything because I might need that some day.)  This is the 3rd Garage I have cleaned out of stuff that he thought he might need some day.  The other two were commercial storage sheds and I called the Re-Store by Habitat for Humanity and a salvager to come and clean them out in April of 2010


This place is right behind his house, a double unattached garage that he hoped to use as a work shop and a place to park his truck.  It became a dumping ground.  You couldn't even walk without moving something out of your way.

from the side door after the 2nd load 

Anna had kindly agreed to let us store our "stuff" there while we are on our mission. So it became necessary to clean it out.  My Brother had been working on it occasionally for about a year but there was so much it didn't look as though anything had been removed so I took it in hand.

On March 24th we had family groups come and choose what they wanted.  There was a really nice new table saw and several other larger tool items and they removed those in a pickup truck a fairly large trailer and several car trunks and vans.

Back of the wall on Pat's right

Then I had the Re-Store (Habitat for Humanity) people come and they took what they thought they could use.  I noticed after they left that they two bathroom sinks with the faucets attached were gone.  They took some lumber and other construction and small hand tools.  They filled a truck load!

Then on April 20th I finally had the 1-800-Got Junk people come and the real clean out started.  They worked from 2 pm to 5 pm and removed 2 loads.  Filling the truck completely up to the top on both.  Then they came back on Saturday morning and removed the last of the outside stuff and the trash you see in these two photos.

Oh my goodness this is hard to believe!

It is hard to believe but 2 truck loads from the family, 1 truck load from Habitat for Humanity and 2 1/2 loads of Got Junk made things look like this.  Anna is delighted.

This is the same place that Pat was standing

We brought the 1st load from the office clean out because it was in our garage and you could hardly get in and out of the car, on April 21st
Then on Monday, April 23, we cleaned off the shelves in our garage discarded much of what was there,  got the rest of the holiday stuff to the basement to be packed.  Took the camping gear to Anna's to be stored on these wonderful shelves. If you look close you can see the yellow tent and on the top shelf to the right and the teal water storage tanks above and to the left. The coolers and the Colman stove can also be seen.

We moved another load yesterday, April 28th, of the Christmas and Fall holiday totes.  Boxes of books and a few other items and now at least one corner of the basement is cleaned out and so it will go until by June 1 everything we own will be here in its home for the next two years.

And so a new faze of our lives has begun!