Laundry room re-vamp

As we've been clearing out the house, it feels like one room is always the dumping ground for the little things that have no permanent "home."  It used to be our office, but we've cleared out every room except two... our bedroom (total DISASTER! It will improve soon), and the laundry room.  Since our garage entry is through the laundry room, I found myself getting annoyed every time I came in.  Does anyone else ever feel antsy or annoyed when things are dirty or cluttered?  I hope I'm not alone in my neurosis!

My laundry room started out looking like this...

You can see it's basically a dumping ground where things go to die be forgotten until they're covered in dust.  It was actually even worse a few moments before this, because part of our improvement was to hang those shelves.  Imagine everything on the shelves piled onto the floor.  Blech.  

(Did you catch the glimpse of my Lazy Susan as it was drying?  I guess my laundry room is good for something...)

We were obviously going to need a storage solution, and I wanted something that would match and be inexpensive. *Cue Jeopardy music* And... Enter IKEA.  I have a love/hate relationship with IKEA.  It makes so many of my projects possible, but it's also the cause for many of my projects.  I can afford the IKEA price point but I don't love how generic everything looks.  I end up doing projects to fix the things I buy from IKEA to make them look more custom, most recently my Lazy Susan (I feel like you should be playing a drinking game here and taking a shot every time I mention IKEA - that's five, people!)

I came home with this (post assembly, obviously)...

Let me tell you - those large boxes are a pain in the TUSH to assemble.  Ugh.  But don't they look nicer than random bags and bins?  Of course, Ted helped assemble in his own special way, as he always does...

(Anyone want to buy that couch - despite the fact that the picture makes it look terrible since the slip cover is untucked?  PLEASE get it out of my house, I'm begging you!)

After several arrangements of boxes on shelves, a few decisions as to what should go where, and a SERIOUS lint wipe down (how does that stuff get out of control so quickly?!  It's like a tiny army of lint soldiers!), we had this...

 

Not bad, eh?  I mean I'm not going to win any design awards here, but it looks a heck of a lot better than it did before!  I'm using the boxes on the lower unit to store laundry supplies...

...since my husband's tools have taken over what used to be my laundry cabinets (can't complain though, it means he does a lot more handy things around the house!)  Do you love the cinder block on the floor?  Me neither, but it's weighing down a piece of our old cafeteria style tile that's being glued back onto the floor.  Don't you just LOVE 1970's homes?  The flooring will hopefully change someday.  Anyway, my old magazines are being stored in the black holders on the top row of the shelving, along with spare bits of hardware and smaller household tools.   And things that need easy and regular access are in the buckets.  Things like...

I made (read: I got to color and stamp for a real project! wahoo!) that little sign - I think it's fun and a little whimsical.  If only I could find all of my patterned scissors to give the edges a bit of spice.

I know the room is not complete. I want to paint the walls something fun, maybe do a stencil like Elizabeth over at The Mustard Ceiling? But it's MUCH more functional for now.  So, instead of showing you a "before and after," I'll show you a...

We're not done, but we've made progress.  It still feels good!  How about you all - do you pile all your junk into one secret holding place?  Does it make you antsy to see it lying about?  Do you feel the same way I do about IKEA (that's 6 shots, people! Maybe you should wait to comment until you can produce coherent thoughts)?  Happy Wednesday, friends!