Adventures in Homeownership: Closet Transformation

Compared to many girls, my shoe collection really isn't that bad. But, I rarely wear what I do have because they were stuck in boxes and not visible. My goal was to change that.

We have a small closet in our master bedroom that I really wanted to use as a shoe and purse display. So for the past few days, I have gotten to work on my closet transformation.  

This is what I started with... 

Wanting something to diplay my shoes, I decided to go with a closetmaid 15-cubby organizer. Okay, two. I bought mine at my local Target, but you can get it just about anywhere. They were pretty easy to put together, but it did go much faster with two people. 

Okay, fine 30 cubbies turned out to be... well, not quite enough. So while browsing in Home Depot, I bought two closetmaid 24-inch horizontal organizers. They are just baby book shelves. Since all of the closetmaid products are designed to fit together, I was able to stack all four products together into one tower of shoe fabulousness. (Cue angelic musical flourish.)

But I still needed to display my purse collection. Oh, my purse collection. Sigh. I do love them, and they are so pretty, I wanted to display them so I bask in their beauty every time I opened the closet door. At first I thought I would just buy a few 3M hooks -- that would totally work. But it wasn't pretty enough. Then I had an epiphany. Currently, I hang my purse from my dresser drawer knob*, just to keep it out of the way. What if I used drawer pulls as hangers!?!? I have seen them used on Pinterest to hang frames, why not purses! Or course, all of the pins I could find put the knob onto a wooden board, and put those on the wall. I wanted the knobs to go directly into the wall. So, with a little ingenuity, we went to work. For more on how I did that... go here! 

After a little hard work, we put up four drawer pulls/knobs and now my pretty little closet features four of my purses. 

And just for a little more pizazz, here is a before and after photo:

*Okay -- Time for a poll! You know the little thingys that are an drawers or cabinets, and you pull them to get the drawer or cabinet open? What do you call them? Drawer pulls? Knobs? Please tell me! (My husband and I disagree as to the proper terminology.) Your comment/vote will be greatly appreciated!

Adventures in Laziness

Let's be honest, here. Everyone has something they are lazy about, particularly when it comes to household chores. For some people, they will allow the dishes to pile up in the sink until they create an interesting expensive version of JENGA. For others, they let the lawn get so high small children could use it as their own personal corn maze. Still others let the trash sit until you can smell it from across the street. Then there is me... who kinda does all of those things, and more. BUT.... I have found a silver lining to one of my many lazinesses! 

I am awesome at getting the laundry done. I can switch that laundry from the washer to the dryer like a pro! But that is about as far as I get. My nice clean laundry has been known to sit in a ginormous pile, unfolded, for days. This last week I managed to even fold the laundry, less the stuff that I hang in the closet, which is about two-thirds of my wardrobe. (Note: The pile was preexisting, already containing the closet clothes from the previous week's laundry.) Unwilling to give up the overwhelming amount of energy to put the clothes on hangers and put them in the closet, I just kept/keep piling the closet-clothes on top of one another.

As my closet-clothes pile gets larger, my closet gets more and more empty. This allowed me to finally see everything I own! It's almost as awesome as shopping for new clothes. (Okay, yeah, no. Not really. But going through your closet is a whole lot cheaper than buying new clothes.) In the last two weeks, I was able to wear some clothes I forgot I owned. I was also able to realize that a few of those items were in the back of the closet for a reason, and thusly helped me to thin out the heard so to speak. Over the past few days. I have been able to fall back in love with many clothing pieces I forgot I had, and to eliminate some items I should have broken up with a long time ago. 

Basically, I am saying everyone should stop hanging up their clothes, and instead throw them in a pile. At least for a little while... take the day off and rediscover all of those items in the back of your closet. 

Okay, fine. This is not my closet.
I only wish it was.
This is my dream closet.
Only, in my dream, it has a little more color.