If you've decided to include a storage shed into your home's landscape to hold yard tools, lawn mowers and so on, you'll quickly discover without a good organizational system, the shed can become a disaster. Just like a garage that's packed to the brim with extras, a storage shed can quickly become filled with household debris. To prevent this, or solve the problem if it's already started, a good organizational system can really help.

If you already own a shed and it's a disaster, there are things you can do to improve the situation. Try doing these things:

* Take a look at what you have in the shed. Is it a mish-mash of items? Are there things that should have been discarded long ago clogging up space? Is the shed supposed to serve a specific purpose? Set a purpose if you haven't. The shed is for holding lawn items and tools. It's for holding art supplies and a workbench. It's meant to be the tool and chemical storage area for the home. Or, so on.

* Now, remove everything from the shed and sort it out. Put items you need to keep in a specific pile for each set type. Lawn tools in one area, tools in another, maybe art supplies or whatever you have. As you do this, consider items you may not really need or those that may be broken. Sort these into a different pile to go through again with more careful inspection.

* Inside the storage shed, add some shelving, storage bins and so on if you haven't already. Designate specific areas for things. A spot for the lawn tools, a shelf for hand items and so on.

* Once you've figured out where you'd like things to go, start bringing them back into the shed. Go through that "maybe" pile and throw out anything that's broken or isn't used on a regular basis. If you've been storing a waffle iron outside for the last two years and haven't used it, get rid of it!

* Take care when you're restocking the shed to make the organizational system one that works for you. If, for example, you use your small lawn tools on a weekly basis, don't put them in a hard to reach spot.

If you are just buying a shed now to help ease the congestion in your garage, it will be important for you to set up an organizational system before you start. Designate the specific purposes for the shed in advance and with only a few exceptions be unyielding in this notion. You don't want your shed to simply become an extension of a messy garage. Use shelving, bins, drawer systems and so on to help make the job of organizing easier.

A storage shed is a great way to free up space in a home and garage. Whether you're using the shed to simply store tools and lawn equipment or it's meant to become a workshop or studio, you'll thank yourself later if you organize it on the front end.