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It rained most of the weekend, which thwarted all of our project plans around here except the one I was looking forward to the least: organizing Milo and Gus’ closet. Sigh.
We’re doing a mini revamp of Milo and Gus’ room (more on that later), and, as a part of that, I wanted to rethink how we’ve been organizing their clothes. Because the “system” we’ve had in place for awhile now was not so much working:
We opted a long time ago to store all their clothes in the closets instead of in dressers to free up space for playing in the room. That part’s been working just swell, but it turns out that my eight and ten year old boys are just not up for the task of folding all of their clothes and putting them neatly on the shelves. Who could have guessed?
Until the other day, I had elaborate plans to move all their clothes to under the bed storage boxes (that we would construct and that would look beautiful. Perhaps there would be wheels involved).
Then I was talking to my mom on the phone and she asked, “what about some of those cubby shelves with the squares for their closets?”
“That’s what we have,” I said.
“Oh. Well, maybe if you had baskets for them….”
Huh. That actually sounded both way easier and just as good as my construct-elaborate-storage-boxes plan.
As you can see in the before picture up there, we already had a few baskets for stuff like underwear and socks, and everything stayed pretty well contained in those.
The shelves (and baskets), by the way, are from Target’s Closetmaid Cubeicals line. We’ve bought a ton of these over the years (we mostly used them in our homeschool/playroom at the old house), and we’ve been pleased with them. They’re more utilitarian-looking than Ikea’s Expedit’s, but are cheaper (especially as they tend to go on sale pretty frequently) and Target’s closer than Ikea. We’ve paired down our collection of these over time, but we still have a few hanging around.
I made the trip to Target and was pleased to find the fabric drawers for the shelves on clearance–marked down from $6 to just over $4. Not sure if this means Cubeicals days are numbered; they’re still the regular price on the website. I picked up eight kiwi green and eight mocha drawers. So a little more than $60 all told (our old drawers, in addition to not being the right colors for forest themed room ;), are pretty beat up from years of kid abuse and cat scratches).
Then I made some labels with card stock to make it absolutely as easy as possible for the kids to put their clothes away. And then I spent a rainy Sunday going through all their clothes and getting things organized. And now it is beautiful! (on that side of the room. I’m not showing you the other side yet. IN PROGRESS!)
I have no delusions that the clothes are going to stay nice and neat inside those drawers. But, with a little luck, they’ll at least stay inside them, and I won’t have to even think about how they look when you open them up most of the time.
And then, even better, I can close the closet doors for a double layer of protection from the messiness:
More later in the week about our other plans in here, complete with terrifying pictures of the current state of the other half of the room.
Let’s review. Before and after:
Linking with:
oooooh they look sooooo good! can you come help me?
lol–I still have a few more closets to tackle here and then I’ll be right over 😉
Sooooo much better! I have been pushing mine off and I know that I won’t tackle it now until the fall 😉
I tried leaving a comment and something weird happened.
This makes me so happy. It actually seems like a fun project. Until the kids ruin it. Then I’d wig. This is why I stick with dogs. 😛
There’s something freaky going on with this post….I can’t get it to pin, either. Grr. Kid ruin everything! Well, not really. but they ruin closets pretty fast.
Good solution! Closet organization drives me crazy.
The sad part is the before picture here is still way better than my own closet right now!
BRILLIANT!!!! I am telling you right now that one of my hardest areas in my home are their bedrooms and dealing with all of the clothes! I love this idea! Organized and concealed all at once! Perfect!!! Happy week to you! Nicole xo
I hope cubical boxes aren’t on the way out. How else can we be expected to organize anything!!
Right?! Maybe they’re just changing the color choices or something and that’s why they’re clearing out the old ones?
This is smart, Gretchen! I’m interested to see more of the play area now 🙂 I’ve been of the mindset of putting my son’s clothes in furniture & the toys in the closet… but this might make more sense. Of course getting toys out of the moving boxes still sitting in his room would help too, haha!
Nice easy update! We seriously need a closet revamp but the basement and the kitchen are much higher up on the to do list for now!
That looks like a great update. I love a good newly organized closet like nobody’s business 🙂
Solid. And, you have my favorite ever sense of humor. I’m glad you can still see your kids 🙂
Yes, so am I….most of the time 😉
I’m so jealous of how organized the closets are now! I may have to get some of these cubes for my boys’ closet too.
We’ve used them all over the house over the years for a million different things; they really come in handy!
Looks great! I hope that the boys can keep them somewhat organized for you 🙂
Thanks, jenny–so do I! 🙂
Looks fantastic! I would love it if you joined and contribute your awesome posts at my link party at City of Creative Dreams starts on Fridays 😀 Hope to see you there at City of Creative Dreams Link Party.
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This closet makes me happy! Those fabric cubes are so useful…I have them all over my house.
Thanks, Nikki! We love those cubes…only issue is the cats love (to scratch) them, too!
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