The last week of November was a busy time in my household. It was Thanksgiving. It was Hanukkah. And it was also my birthday. Lots of food and festivities. Not a lot of downtime.
But, my hubby and I chose to carve out a small amount of time that weekend to make our home more organized. The colder weather was upon us and we had to come up with a solution to a recent organization problem.
We have a front door and an entry-way closet next to that door. Coats, shoes, umbrellas and accessories are kept in that closet.
Problem: My children and I enter and exit our home most days through the garage, not the front door. No mudroom or closet next to that garage entrance door. Instead, we have a tiny laundry room with an even tinier broom closet that we converted to a storage closet years ago. We installed a row of hooks across the top and at the bottom of the closet we store shopping and recycle bags of varying sizes.
This worked well for a while. My children were young and had little coats and my jacket fit just fine next to theirs. Now, my kids are bigger and so are their coats. They have more hats and mittens, too. With all three of our winter coats in there, the closet door no longer stayed closed. And the hooks were so high, I was the person in charge of hanging everyone’s coats.
What to do?
I had suggested a hall tree for the room adjacent to the garage which just so happens to be my home office. It wouldn’t thrill me to have coats and backpacks hanging in my work space but it was better than having them spill out of the storage closet–especially when I was doing the laundry.
My husband did not like the hall tree idea for two reasons:
1) He thought a hall tree would have looked messy. (I agree)
2) The hall tree would have to stand in the space currently occupied by his grandmother’s table which he loves and it would not fit in our attic.
So, for a while we thought about it, spent the summer leaving camp bags in the garage but then Autumn came and the problem was back. Backpacks and diaper bags were dropped as we entered the house and coats were dumped on a couch that sits opposite my desk in this room. (No picture is available–too embarrassing for this Professional Organizer to admit!)
Besides the fact that it looked terrible, it didn’t exactly instill the importance of being organized to our two young children.
Once again we asked ourselves, “What to do?”
Solution: One day, my husband looked at me and said, “What if we move the ironing board and vacuum cleaner out of the laundry room and use that space as a mudroom? I measured the space. It was 24” wide. I was skeptical but I grew up in a 5’x12′ bedroom. I knew I could make this work.
Challenge accepted!
I walked down the aisle and not only did I see what would work for me, it was on sale!
The Closetmaid 24″ Horizontal Stackable Organizer |
We charged our electric drill, connected with our inner Bob Villa, and made Mudroom Magic. Hubby and I put together the Closetmaid shelf in less than ten minutes. We measured and hung the hooks making sure they were straight with the iHandy level on my iPhone.
Measure twice, make hole once! |
Mini-mudroom dreams do come true!
Stacey, this is awesome! You really thought “outside of the closet” on this one 🙂 I loved reading this post -it was so engaging & I couldn’t wait to see what you guys came up with. Glad you’re enjoying your newly organized space! 🙂 Robin
Thanks for the compliment, Robin! This has been a troublesome organizing hot-spot in our home for a while. Sometimes it just takes a little time and a little bit of change to figure out a good solution!
You and your hubby are clearly a great team – good job!
Thanks, Janet. We’re married 14.5 years and still going strong. When we put our minds together, we come up with some great ideas!
I love this post Stacey, sometimes it takes negotiations to get to some common ground. Great outcome.
Thanks, Jill–I’m glad you enjoyed reading my post. Hubby and I merged our ideas and came up with a solution that works for all of us. We’re still using the two-foot mudroom. It’a a bit of a tight squeeze during the winter months but it works for us!