Cleanin' Out My Closet - Part 2

I last left off where I had cleared out the badly overstuffed closet of tons of junk, which caused things like stains, dents, holes, and general pathetic-ness of the closet to stand out (like the nails that were the only thing supporting one of the shelves).

So of course I decided that the simple clearing out of the closet was not enough, and decided to get painting!

I went to town caulking in all the cracks, filling the wood holes with wood putty, and slapping some filler in the wall dents/holes. Have I ever mentioned how satisfying it is for me to fill gaps and cracks? Once I get going, I can't help myself and find things all over the house to fill. I guess the excitement just gets to me.

Barley wanted to help, too...

Anyways, after that I just whipped out some leftover paint we had from our hallway remodel and went to town.

And let it be said that it's EXTREMELY difficult to paint in such a tiny space when you're 1) 7 months pregnant 2) wearing a huge gas-mask and 3) the stool you're standing on doesn't fit into the closet. Yep, I had to twist into some pretty interesting positions to get a coat of paint onto the ceiling and back of the closet. And Tom may or may not have about died in fits of laughter.

Anyways, once the closet had a fresh coat of paint (and those awful stains disappeared) I decided that those old ratty shelves had to go, and swung by Lowe's to get some new shelves. For $14 I picked up a new already-white-so-I-don't-have-to-paint-it-too melamine (spelling?) shelf, and had it cut down into the measurements I needed. Easy, cheap, and best of all? Those new shelves are easily wipe-able. Score.

All the junk that was in my "keep" piles then got sorted into new stackable white plastic containers from Target. Much better, right?

But I decided to take things one step further, since it was a little difficult to tell the contents of the containers that were stacked on the bottom. I whipped out these labels (you can download your own right here), popped some text into them, printed and cut em out.

And simply stuck them on the containers using some double-sided tape. Ahhhh, organized bliss!

Now we're able to store things like bed sheets, which previously were stored in the red sofa residing in the future nursery space. And even better - we can actually FIND things we're looking for easily without feeling like we're digging for gold, and knocking random stuff to the ground in the process. I tell ya, this closet now makes my very-pregnant-and-nesting heart sing!

Best of all? The whole closet remodel cost us about $30 total, half which was spent on the new shelves, and the other half on new storage containers. Yep, we're happy and our wallets can't complain, either.

And now for a little before and after action:

 

What do you think? Have you tackled any organizing in your own casa lately? Anyone else have odd closets (like ours which was filled with stains and had nails supporting some shelves)?

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Cleanin' Out My Closet - Part 1

This past weekend I finally decided it was high time I got around to tackling some serious clutter issues. Specifically in our hallway linen closet:

Yikes.

As we clear out the future nursery, we have to find new ways to store things that used to reside in there. More specifically, since we're getting rid of our red sofa (which has uber-amazing storage underneath), we had to find new homes for the pillows, blankets and bedsheets that used to live in the storage area in the sofa.

The logical place? The hallway linen closet.

It was time to do some serious cleaning!

I emptied out the entire closet's contents and slowly sorted everything into 3 piles - keep, donate, trash.

Eventually, the closet was looking pretty good... sorta. Once the closet was empty, it was very difficult not to notice the gouges, scratches, stains, warped shelves, and, um... interesting way some of the shelves were being supported.

Why yes, those ARE nails supporting the right side of the top shelf - and isn't the stain on the ceiling lovely?

And since everything was cleared out of the closet, why not take things one step further? So I did.

Stay tuned for part 2!

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"Freeasy" Kitchen Update

Yep, I totally just combined "free" and "easy" to make a new word.  And it's going down on my "Favorite Made-Up Words" list, too.

Don't you love it when you get hit with some inspiration and update something easily in your house for free? Whether it's swapping out throw pillows between rooms or re-purposing an item from one function to another, I get all excited and giddy when I'm able to make a change without spending any change. Oh yeah.

What can I say? Sometimes it's the little things that get me all worked up.

Like our kitchen. Oh how we love it. We still stare at it in amazement sometimes at how different it is now than it was 2 years ago when we bought it (shudder).

Obviously it's much improved, however it's still lacking a few of the finer details. Like baseboard and quarter round, and some trim around the tops of the cabinets. We'll get to those things all in good time.

But there was one particular area that stuck out like a sore thumb.

See that big empty space above the microwave?

The big plan for this space was to create a DIY wine rack (since we're such big wine enthusiasts), so we would have a nice space that looked pretty to store our wine stash in. So for the past year I just stashed a few bottles up there willy-nilly until we found the time to create our custom wine rack.

And one day I just got sick of looking at that big empty, sad and wasted space. Or rather, one day while nesting and clearing out the studio/future nursery, I had a hit of inspiration: what if I switched out the three woven storage bins that used to reside in the side table, and put them above the microwave? I'd prefer to have something softer for Baby M's storage besides the rough woven baskets, anyways.

Imagine my surprise and yes, utter disbelief when they fit the empty space perfectly! (seriously, things are NEVER that easy around here!).

They just happened to be the perfect size and slide into that cubby snuggly (but not too snug!), and they look just like we made the space intentionally just for them.

I love happy accidents - don't you?

I filled the middle one with all of our coffee travel mugs (for some reason we have accumulated quite a few), and the other two are amazingly empty! "Empty" is such a beautiful word when there's a baby on the way. I have a feeling we'll be needing every square inch of space we can get our hands on!

And here's a little before-and-after action of the quick switcharoo:

We just love the texture and storage that those simple woven baskets add to our white kitchen. It's such a small and simple thing, but it's really made a huge difference! And I, for one, am very happy that I don't have to look at the electrical socket anymore while I cook. Score.

Anyone else loving the bit of texture it adds to our row of kitchen cabinets? Have you made any easy or free updates around your own home lately? Do you love those "free updates" as much as we do?

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Closet Upgrade

So, it was a well known fact that our house was a fixer upper when we bought it.

Among the many other offbeat things we've encountered in our never-ending adventure of fixing up this ole' fossil, the guest bedroom closet had no sort of closet system whatsoever. No shelf. No rod. Which didn't come as a surprise to us, really, considering the state the house was in when we were handed the keys.

So, this past weekend, we decided to rectify that little situation, especially since storage space will be a premium now that we've got a little one on the way (and we've got to clear out a whole entire room for the future nursery - more on that later).

Obviously, a closet without any sort of closet system doesn't really amount to much. As you can see, up until this point we had just thrown stored random stuff on the floor. Classy, right? (it does have doors, they were just removed before I snapped this pic)

To make every inch of space count in this closet (the largest closet in the house, by the way), we needed to add storage space to the walls.

So, once trip to Lowe's and $60 later, we came home and got to work.

We decided to go with wire shelving because 1) It's decently cheap 2) It's a rod + shelf system in one 3) The shelf won't collect dust and 4) It's pretty easy to install (and no painting required!).

First we decided where we wanted the shelf/rod to go...

Then Tom checked for studs (we were actually pretty worried we wouldn't find any, haha! But we did - thank goodness!).

After marking where the studs were, we took the back hooks (that attach the back of the shelf to the wall), and Tom drilled each one in halfway on just the bottoms, so we could then slide and then snap the shelf in coming from the top, and Tom could finish securing the hooks into the wall (and since we were securing them into the studs, no anchors were necessary - score!).

Then we realized that we bought the wrong shelf support rods, and frantically ran back to Lowe's to buy the right ones (which were cheaper anyways!). We decided that we wanted this shelf to be super-sturdy (since it was so long and would be holding lots of stuff), so instead of putting support rods every 3 feet like the instructions said, we decided to just go ahead and stick one into every single stud. So instead of using 3 (like the instructions told us), we ended up using 7.

It was a simple process of drilling in the 7 support rods, and we were done!

Boy, are we glad we used 7 support rods! The shelf is sturdy, and now I won't have nightmares of it crashing to the ground in the middle of the night (and taking the whole wall with it!).

And as soon as that baby was in there, you can bet your bottom dollar I was filling her up with all sorts of stuff (namely our winter clothes - our master closet is so tiny we have to rotate our clothes every season). And there is still a bit of space for our guests to hang up some of their clothes (and even stash away their suitcases in the space on the floor).

All-in-all, we love it. It was a super easy system to install, and we couldn't beat the price and functionality of it. While it may not be the prettiest closet system in the world, it definitely gets the job done (and on the cheap, too!). Now we can really start cleaning out the future nursery!

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Our Office: Closet Makeover for Under $20

That post title sure got your attention, didn't it?

A couple weeks months ago (yup, it's been awhile!), while painting the office, we decided that we needed to do something with this... uh... closet. If you could call it that. Amidst all the junk, however, was a pretty decently-sized little niche carved into the wall that we thought we could use.

And inspiration struck.

We needed more storage space, but didn't want to spend much money on it. We also wanted someplace to store all our files, our laundry hampers (hey, the laundry room is downstairs and our master bedroom is tiny, so this is very important to us!), random other office supplies, and Barley's k-double-hockey-sticks (otherwise known as his "kennel", or crate).

What better place than the closet?

We took down the doors and assessed our options.

We got to work figuring out a plan. Whatever we did had to be removable, since our attic door is in the closet ceiling (is that unusual?). So - we decided to basically just duplicate the existing shelf for more storage space, and to remove the clothing rod (since we wouldn't be storing our clothes in there anymore - well, unless they're dirty, that is!). We measured the existing shelf and the support beams, and decided to add one more along the back wall of the closet for extra stability.

We took our measurements to our favorite place - Lowe's, and had them cut the boards down to size. I have to say, thank goodness for home improvement stores that will make cuts for you, because it was snowing and about 3 degrees outside at the time!

$12 in wood later and Tom attached supports on the back of the closet, along with a support on both sides, mimicking the original closet shelf. We took out the wooden closet rod since we wouldn't be using it, but decided to leave the indents in the wood that supports the rod. We wanted to leave the closet versatile in the event that, down the road, us or even the next homeowners wanted to convert it back to a regular ole' closet again, all that would need to be done is to slip a rod into the supports and take out the bottom shelf, and bam! You've got an instant closet. Gotta love a quick switcharoo like that.

Anyways, while Tom was busy with the supports, I was gettin' down in the laundry room with painting the wood shelves. We had company coming over for dinner, so I was racing through the painting process - and these little yellow triangle things totally saved me lots of time and backache - literally.

They're called Painter's Pyramids, and I originally bought them for painting our kitchen cabinets, and have used them over and over again, and in times like they're total lifesavers. You just paint one side, carefully flip it over onto the little pointy things, and paint the other side - no time wasted waiting for one side to dry so you can paint the other side. I love them!

Anyways, some wood filling, sanding, and then one coat of oil-based primer and two coats of Valspar's Ultra White paint (our trim color) later, and they were looking like the new wood and old wood were meant to be together, mostly because they looked the same and you can't tell the difference between them anymore - which was totally the goal.

In between coats of paint on the shelves, I tackled spackling, sanding, and priming the wooden support beams.

Then it was time to paint the closet while I had a little free time before our dinner guests arrived. I decided on a $5 Lowe's Ooops battleship gray paint color for the inside of the closet, which would make the white really pop and would also be dark enough to hide any scratches or dings that might occur later down the road.

I finished painting it just in time for our dinner guests' arrival. Score! Nothing like being on a timeline to really get those home improvement projects done fast!

And a few days later, we put up the shelves.


And we sat and stared at our awesome new storage space.

And we were so "wowed" by it, that I completely forgot to take a photo. Oops.

Want to see it now? Currently it houses everything we wanted it to, with ample room to spare.

To say we're loving it would be an understatement. It's awesome! It's functional, simple, easy, we know exactly where everything is if we need it, and it keeps our desks clutter-free.

Oh, and can still access the attic easily by just removing the items and shelves, and Barley's kennel is stored upright most of the time (so it doesn't poke too much out of the opening), since he doesn't really need it much anymore.

Best of all? The whole transformation only ran us the $12 for new wood, plus the $5 can of oops paint that we already had on hand (and we still have tons of paint leftover for another project), so the bottom line was only $17 buckaroos for the makeover (not counting the $$ spent on cheapo Ikea storage boxes). Let's just say that our wallets couldn't be happier!

Next up on the list is figuring out some sort of door or covering for the "niche", because as nice as it is now, we still don't like to see our dirty laundry hanging out for all to see!

Anyone else tackling a trouble spot in their own house? Or catching a bit of that organizing-spring-fever-frenzy that's going around?

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