Defending the garage—I mean STUDIO

My husband and I liked the house we ended up buying the minute we saw it. The garage clinched it for me. It's well built and newer than the house, built in 1920, and could hold two cars, IF they were allowed to park in it, which they're not. I immediately claimed it for my painting studio.

Since then I've insulated it, built shelves and installed a propane stove for heat. I left a narrow sliver by the door just wide enough to hold two bikes, a lawnmower and some yard tools. That was IT, my only concession to just how handy it is to store stuff in the garage—I mean STUDIO. Except for that chair that needs to be recovered, and the hose in the winter, but not the lawn chairs! They can either fit in the cellar, or freeze their butts off outside. Snow shovel in the summer? NO! Down cellar it goes. So it's a constant battle.


And it was going so well...I had just cleaned my studio, vowed to get that chair to the upholsterers, and was ready to revel in my space when—the house painter asked so nicely if there was a handy place to store his stuff while he worked on the house. Sure, I said, you can put in in my studio—I mean, the garage.