Laundry Room - finished!

Well, a pretty dramatic update is finished! 

And I am sooooooooooooooo excited about it!

 

First I painted the garage and organized D's tool area as birthday surprise.  Then, the enthusiasm and momentum spread over to the workstation, and now the laundry room!

While the workstation is my functional haven, this place is now my pretty room that love being in.

 

Having been knee-deep in this project for so long I forgot how dramatic of an update it was until I looked back at my 'before pictures'.  In fact, I ran into the living room telling D how grateful I was that he let me do it because I just love it.  Then, I announced that I was going to spend the night sleeping in the laundry room so I could soak it all in : )  I didn't.  But, for emphasis sake, I must admit I was tempted.  I love the difference changing this space has made in our home.

 

Before

It was clean, but did not look sparkling clean.

The Plan

1) Paint the walls to add appeal to the space.

2) Improve the functionality and organization of the room.

3) Add a mudroom-ish vibe.

We decided to skip working on the floor since it'll be a whole big project on its own.  Precious owners did some funky painting and flooring on it that will require lots of research to fix.  I think we will leave it for another year to build up some energy to sand it down and figure out a new plan for it.

+++ My Hope +++
I've always wanted to hang Mary Engelbreit art in my home.  And, I loooove the idea of cork boards, dry erase boards and magnetic boards. So, I hoped to be able to add these things in this space.
 

Progress

After

---Details---

Cleaning Tools

The laundry room is not small but has minimal wall space.  My biggest challenge was finding a way to store things out of the walking path into the house and into the back yard.  I decided to maximize the wall space to hang the tools.

 First, I hung furring strips near the ceiling to hold the cleaning tools and ironing board. 

All the tools are hanging from nails on the furring strip.  The furring strip cost $2 and was cut to size for free, so this was a super economical update.  Since there were no studs in the middle of the short wall space I used hollow wall anchors/molly bolts to attach almost everything to the wall.

Below the cleaning tools I added a hook for the dust pan, a basket from Ikea to hold our reusable grocery bags, a shelf unit from the Container Store to hold gardening shoes, and the bucket is our homemade laundry detergent : )

 

Drying Racks

 

I purchased both racks off Amazon to give us some space to hang drying clothes or cloth napkins.  They are out of the way but also ready when needed!

 

 Magnetic Art Board

I really wanted a space in our home to hang art work and luckily one of the doors was metal so I added a fresh coat of paint and it was ready to shine!

Our first piece of art is already displayed!  My niece, J, drew it!!

I decoupaged scrapbook paper onto Popsicle sticks and added magnetic backs for the frames.  Next, I painted extra clothespins with acrylic paint.  Finally, I cut out some felt from scraps to make some Mary Engelbreit style flower magnets.

Little man has already found this space and claimed it as his own!

 

Near the Laundry Machines

I hung 2 more Ikea baskets ($1-2 each) on the wall to hold paper sacks and disposable plastic bags.  Next, I added a basket to the shelf above the washing machine to hold unmatched socks.  Finally, attached to the laundry machine are 2 magnetic cafe rods from Wal-mart that make the best drying racks for dish cloths that need to be laundered!

 

Hanging Mary Engelbreit Art

And, I got to hang my first Mary Engelbreit piece!!!  This is one of her newer illustrations but I have one for our kitchen that I have been holding onto for at least a decade... I hope to figure out a place for it soon!

 

Laundry Cabinet 

I organized this space a little better by adding sterilite baskets and added a small cork board (using mounting tape on the back of it) to conveniently holds the recipe for our laundry detergent and linen spray.

 

Here are links to project tutorials for things I used in this space:

Iron Cord Cuff tutorial

Linen Spray recipe (ours is a tangerine scent!)

Homemade Laundry Detergent recipe

 

Tomorrow, I will share the mud room space!