Organizing an Out of Control Storage Closet

I have this great closet, right off my boys’ toy room.   It’s just a long, narrow closet and I use it as a storage closet.  It’s kind of my “attic” or “basement” storage, as I don’t have either.

I have YET to show you the rest of my upstairs toy room, because I have yet to finish it. I plan to (hopefully) soon!! and I promise, when I do finish it, I will show you.  If you missed it you can see how I’ve organized the toys in the upstairs playroom HERE, HERE and HERE.

See that door off my half finished toy room? It leads to the disaster closet. The door has a lock on it, because it’s my storage closet and I don’t want the little ones digging through the bins inside.

However, my little guys are getting bigger and they keep finding the key to get inside.  BUT now that I’ve cleaned it out, I hid the key, where ONLY I can find it. So if they need something from inside, they need to talk to mama. ;)

I’ve said before that if you are building a new home and have the option to plan for plenty of storage, do so.  That’s what I did and I am SO glad that I did.  Anywhere and everywhere that I could find extra space, I would add a niche or a closet.

NOW what you probably shouldn’t do with that extra storage space is let it get the way that I’ve let mine get these past few months.

Be prepared, because what I’m about to show you is real life here in this Delightful Order house. It’s certainly has become quite un-delightful and I MUST show you because there are way too many of you who think that my home is never out-of-order and that it’s this perfect place, always clean and orderly.  For real, we do live here and it’s NOT always perfect.  Messes are made, un-organization is here, OFTEN… trust me!!

GASP!! … this is really how it looked when I opened the door.  I couldn’t walk to the back of the closet if I wanted to. BUT allow me to explain…

… most everything on the floor is garage sale stuff (the garage sale happened this past weekend and I plan on sharing that with you later.)  If you’ve ever planned and hosted a garage sale then you know how crazy busy the weeks ahead can get.

I had gone through  just about every stitch of every square inch of my home and the garage sale bins that I keep in the garage were completely filled, the little closet in the garage that I also stash garage sale stuff was overflowing, so the rest ended up in this closet…

… and that’s my reason for this dis-order. 

The other week, I spent some time taking the closet over.

First thing I did was clear the entire closet out and vacuumed it.

Next, I hung up the bags and small suitcases.

With simple hooks that I had screwed on the wall.

I put the empty suitcases and backpacks on the wire shelves.

I’ll show you more details on how I’ve organized the bins in another post.

and now, I can walk to the back of the closet…

… without a problem.

Now take a peek at the before and after’s together:

So much better!! That’s it, this closet has gotten a little Delightful Order and it feels great to have it done. :)

Tell me, do you have a closet that you feel is out of control and you need to "take it over" or have you "taken over" a closet lately?  Do share, I'd love to hear from you.

May you be a little inspired!

Until next time,

DaNita

Organizing My Mom’s Knitting/Crocheting Room

Back at the end of January, while visiting my family, I tackled quite a few different spaces in my mom’s home and organized them for her.

Just about every time she comes to visit me, I put her to work.  Sometimes I have sewing projects for her, other times it’s painting.  She’s ALWAYS busy doing something for me, while on her vacation (she doesn’t mind, cuz she’s told me so.)  SO… I decided it was time to help her out, while on my vacation.

I ended up organizing her knitting/crocheting storage room, her sewing room, hall closet, bathroom and her medicine cabinet.

This post is all about her newly organized knitting/crocheting storage room and closet.

My mom is a work/craft-a-holic. (I’ve inherited that from her.  Although my dad is a high energy, work-a-holic too, so.. guess I get it from the both of them. :)

What we figured out while organizing spaces in my mom’s home is that she could never find anything, because it didn’t have a “home” so she would end up buying more of something she already had plenty of...

Resulting in too much stuff with no order ...  So I dove in and changed that.
Check out all the before photo’s:

This one is a “during” photo.   See the empty closet?  That’s the first thing to do.  Empty the space and then make your plan.

Believe it or not, I do have some order in this photo.  Like all the bins and such piled on the bed (yes, that’s a bed underneath the window there.) Everything on there has to do with knitting/crocheting.

While emptying a space, group like items together until you determine a definite spot for it.

NOW… checkout all the AFTER photo’s:

Ready for all the before and after’s together?

The closet NOW houses all of my mom's yarn. The top bin is her "work-in-progress" bin.  It holds all the projects that are half finished.  I organized the yarn by color in separate bins, making it so much easier to find.

and…

and…

All of the material that was in the closet and on the floor has been moved into bins in my mom's basement, organized by fabric type. I'll give you a little peek at that in the sewing room post.

Pretty awesome huh?   My mom is thrilled with the order in her home now. WHICH clears her mind and gives her more energy for creating.  Wait until you see her sewing room, she spends a TON of time in there! (She just whipped up a wedding dress, from scratch, in 2 days! no lie, she is amazing!) and  her room has NOW been brought to Delightful Order ;) 

I’ll show you her sewing room next and also her hall closet turned into a craft storage closet and under her bathroom sink too.

Now that she can find everything she needs, I gave her strict rules that she wasn’t allowed to buy one more piece of yarn or material, until she uses up the stuff that she has.

How about you? Do you keep buying the same thing over and over, only to find out you had plenty of that item, BUT just couldn’t find it?  If so, maybe it’s time to make a “home” for everything, that way you know what you have and what you don’t have.

Just a quick reminder... only 2 more weeks until the Spring into Organization Blogger Home Tour! 

I'm so excited!  I can't wait to peek into other organized woman's homes and check out some of there  most organized spaces!  Make sure to join us March 26th-30th!  It should be loads of fun!  Today, I'm off to put some finishing touches on the room that I'll be sharing...

Want to know what room I'll be posting on? ... Come back later this week to get a sneak peek into the room that I'll be sharing with you during the tour! ;)

May you be a little inspired!

Until next time,

DaNita
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Back Entrance Storage Cubbies

In June I showed you what my back entrance looked like after my boys came home on the last day of school.  I also shared my future plans  to finish the area, if you missed that post, you can view it here.

Well I’ve finally finished it all and today I’m sharing my coat, hat & shoe storage.

(That mail organizer hanging on the side of the cubbies was shown HERE.)

When we were building our home, I designed this area and had my cabinet guys make this piece. It’s all one big built-in unit.

There are four cubbies, one for each of my boys. The Mr. and I keep most of our shoes and jackets in our master closet. Our work shoes and jackets are stored in the garage.

Inside each cubicle area are hooks for coats and caps… 

… and a hook that holds each of my boys chore charts.  I just added the red and black chore chart to my Etsy Shop, find it HERE.  If you missed it, you can view my post on the chore charts HERE.

These large bins are from Wal-Mart.  In the winter, hats, gloves and scarfs are stored in them.  In the summer you’ll often find swim goggles and other summer stuff in them.

I labeled the bins using red vinyl cut out with my Cricut and the opposites attract cartridge.

The bottom drawers are for shoes.

This is what it looks like after I clean out the drawers. I promise you this, it only stays this way for a short amount of time and with keeping it real…

This is the way the inside of the drawers look most of the time.  Yes, that’s dirt and grass and everything else that shoes bring in :) To vacuum them out and reorganize them, I probably don’t do that often enough . . .

. . . but, that’s why I like the fact that the drawers close. That way, you can’t see the mess. It’s all hidden. :)

Stinky shoes (like soccer shoes and muddy boots) are stored in the garage.  I’ll show you my garage in another post.

There are so many great entry way storage solutions out there.  I shared a storage bench and wall shelf unit with you a while back (which reminds me, I still need to show you how my clients entry way turned out and her entire home for that matter.  One of these days I'll show you her home.)

That is my storage for coats, hats, shoes and such in our home.  Make sure to come back soon to see the the reveal of my back entrance completely finished.

Wishing you a blessed day!

Schools Out - Organize the Backpacks

My boys have been out of school for about a week now.  When three boys with backpacks and bags FULL of paper, books, school supplies and such come home it can be a LOT.

A LOT of mess, that is!! 

My boys literally dumped it all into their back entrance cubbies.  Some of it ending up on the floor. 

I'm thankful for the cubbies, at least it's not ALL on the floor,
BUT ummm, yeah, I can only handle this for about a day, at the MOST.

 See what I mean?  These bins are large too, so that means there is a LOT of stuff in them.
I had some work to do...

So I dumped it all onto my kitchen counter.  By doing this, I'm forced to go through it, because there is NO way I can leave my counter like this ;)  To get organized and clean up a space, often times it becomes quite dis-orderly, BEFORE it becomes orderly.

 See the two garbage containers? I threw out a BUNCH!  you just can NOT keep it all.

I created piles of "like items" and then decided what to do with it all.
Memories worth keeping got filed into each of my boys school paper file boxes.

I previously showed you how I've organized their school papers...

 

 ... if you missed that post (VIEW it HERE)  

Having these file boxes finished, made the job of organizing their paperwork SO much EASIER!  I simply slid the papers behind the grade and closed them up.  Simple as that, which is what I LOVE - Quick and EASY organization.

AND...

To my wonderful surprise, there was quite a bit of un-used items, which got me thinking...

I decided to create a school supplies bin:

and I decided that when I'm out and about this summer, I'm going to pick up things that I know will be on their list for next year and add it to the bin.   I'm excited about this, because, come August/September I hope to have a bunch of their supplies already on hand, thus creating a smaller school shopping bill.

Here is my back entrance all cleaned up:

Do you spy those Chores Charts?  I sell the printable charts in my Etsy shop.  They've been one of my most popular sellers!  My boys have been using the charts for a number of months and I'm telling you - It has been SO awesome!!  View my original Chores Chart post (HERE) OR find them in my ETSY shop (HERE.)  If your curious about those bins they are Awesome too!  I got them from Walmart. 

These are my future plans for the back entrance:

I do have a LOT of future plans in a LOT of rooms in my home.  Hopefully I can get this one finished soon.  

How about you - have your children finished school yet?  Did they bring you oodles of papers and such?  If so, what have you done with all of it? OR if not, what do you plan on doing with it all?  

*Part of this area in my back entrance has been updated.  VIEW the NEW Homework Message Boards HERE.*

Have a beautiful day!!

:)

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