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Peggy Bruening isn’t the type of woman who likes a boring garage with snow shovels propped in the corner and end-of-season lawn chairs and picnic coolers stacked along the wall.

Instead the plain, white walls of Bruening’s garage are being turned into an art gallery with a little help from her artistic friend Jane Elliott.

Since the garage is the dominant feature of her Westwood patio home, Bruening said she was looking for a way to enhance it.

“The entrance to my house is around the side, so people always come in through the garage,” she said. “Most garages are ugly, so I needed to do something to beautify it.”

Elliott said she made a sketch for Bruening of what a mural might look like on the south wall of the garage.

“We started with a winter scene, and it turned into the four seasons as we kept adding stuff,” Elliott said. “It was a lot of fun, and we got a lot of laughs doing it.”

The only precarious part, 80-year-old Elliott said, was climbing up and down a ladder to paint the top of the mural.

“That was kind of scary,” she said.

When the 21-foot-long mural was finished, Bruening added a trellis along the bottom and a green rug on the floor. Bruening’s grandson, Blake Swetnam, painted a bumblebee. There are also ducks, skaters, colorful pumpkins and a pair of squabbling cardinals in the mix.

“Now when the garage door is open, people can see it, and the rug looks like grass,” Bruening said. “I don’t think there are too many other garages with a mural.”

Elliott said it took her about two months to paint the mural, using small cans of sample house paint. She said brown spray paint worked great for the bark on a tree.

But the women aren’t done, yet. Elliott also painted a big flower on the door that goes from the garage into the house, and Bruening has started hanging framed artwork, too.

Bruening said the next art project she plans to have Elliott paint is a field of sunflowers on the west wall.

“I’m really proud of the work she has done,” Bruening said. “It’s been so much fun. I’m her cheerleader. That’s my talent.”

Elliott said Bruening is being modest.

“She’s a very good artist herself,” Elliott said about her longtime friend and neighbor.

Liberty Editor Angie Anaya Borgedalen can be reached at 781-4941 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

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