The Hall Closet

We have a good sized closet in our downstairs hallway located beneath our stairs.  It has been sheet rocked all the way to the landing and houses our hot water heater.  Behind the hot water heater you can tuck a lot of long term storage items and in front is a good space for things we used more often.

What lurks behind a seemingly innocent door
Ahhhhhhhhh!

We pulled everything out keeping like items together

Then I started by organizing our
collection of CDs & DVDs

When I first moved in to our home I added shelving and coat hooks so we could use the space better.  Since I had turned our coat closet into a pantry this space became our coat closet and a great place to store our vacuum cleaner.  During our most recent home improvement projects it also became our catch all to the point that I couldn't get our vacuum cleaner in there if I tried.  Let me just say, it was a complete disaster!

We only keep what we still watch or listen to

During project mode I was fine with it being a mess, but once those projects were completed and others put on hold for the time being the condition of that closet started to gnaw on me.  So a couple weeks ago on a Sunday morning the youngest and I pulled everything out and got to work purging, cleaning and reorganizing.

All of my craft supplies neat & organized

Stickers and works in progress

Stamps & adhesives

A lot of things needed to be put away somewhere else, surprise, surprise.  Other things needed to be tossed out or donated.  What remained are things we use, regularly.  We keep all of our CDs and DVDs in here, and in typical fashion, for me anyway, they are all in alphabetical order.

Papers & card stock

School supplies

I also keep a lot of my crafts supplies, especially for paper crafting and school supplies in these old plastic drawer sets.  I also keep a one of the drawers to hold all of my extra candles and wax melts.

Assorted felts, pom poms, pipe cleaners, etc.

A blurry shot of my candles & wax melts

Our Christmas wrap and supplies was kept in here but has grown in volume to the point it was messy and hard to keep neat.  I removed all of that and put it into a larger bin and it is now housed out in the garage.  I did leave some of the paper, bows and gift tags in the hall closet for convenience.  Once we are done wrapping gifts for Christmas the rest will go too.

And now the vacuums fit back inside

Laptop bags and my leather jacket hung up
and there is still floor space

Once everything was neatly put away there was plenty of room for our vacuum cleaner.  Now when I open the door I get a much better, more positive feel of this space.  No longer to I cringe as I try to dig for stuff I need.  Now it is like a breath of fresh air to open the door and see calm and order.  Plus, I now know where everything is and it is easily accessible.  This will make crafting so much nicer.  Vacuuming too for that matter.