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Hi pals!  As I type this, I am heading home after seven long but extremely fantastic days of travel.  Last week I had the opportunity to head to NYC to check out some amazing holiday inspiration thanks to my friends at Lowes Home Improvement {and hang with my blonde besties Courtney, Cassie and Megan}.  From there, my main man and I hopped a plane down to Florida for a few days to help out some family with a little project.  I fully intended to work while I was away, but between all of the travel and getting my hands dirty with some paint, I just had to take an itty bitty bloggy and Etsy shop break.  But as always, it feels good to be back!  And boy do I have a novel of a post for you today.  I apologize for turning into a Chatty Cathy, but let's finally get you caught up with this super mega storage room project we have been working on.

This storage room initiative of mine sure has taught me a lot as I have taken on my biggest organizing project to date.  Although I haven't had daily/weekly updates, I am getting into the nitty gritty today.  Organizing projects of this nature are not like a room makeover.  The process is completely different.  And this is not a two hour sort and make pretty storage type of project.  This is an empty three stash-and-dash rooms, sort them down to the bare essentials, donate donate donate, create a storage plan, put things back where they make sense, label label label type of project.  With room makeovers, you can blog and share along the way, things like, "Today I spray painted this side table which I distressed and embellished with nailheads."  With huge organizing projects each post would be, "Last night I sorted, and felt like I got nowhere."  There are no before and afters, because you just sort and sort and sort some more.  I have spent endless hours sifting through photos, family home videos, home accessories and thrift store items, craft supplies, childhood memories, holiday decor, tools, paint and painting supplies, fabrics, electronics, hardware and more photos.  And there are no afters because the before started out as one giant pile, and as I sorted through that pile, I just created more new piles.  So although I haven't been blogging about the process so far, just know that behind the scenes I have been spending endless woman hours making great progress and drumming up a lot of fun things to share during the final phases.

The Plan:

We started this project by making the choice to address and problem solve our storage areas.  For us, these areas consist of our utility room, the space under our stairs and our garage.  These areas are either rarely seen or are used to work on our DIY projects.  They have never been set up to succeed, and therefore, they have failed us in a major way.  They have become the places where everything that doesn't have a home, goes to die.  Half finished projects, projects to work on later, tool piles from finished projects... all of these items get stashed within these spaces.  And all of these spaces were already filled with massive amounts of bins and baskets overflowing with twelve plus years of memories and holiday decor.  Not a pretty picture.

Our utility room was our main dumping ground for anything that we didn't know what to do with.  The under stairs area already had our memories in large bins, however, they were arranged in a way in which they were not easily accessible which equals to not easily maintained.  And then home decor/accessories and things to donate/sell started getting tossed in there to be "dealt with later".  Our garage was the holding ground for larger items to sell on Craigslist, items to be donated to the Habitat ReStore, our main area to use for working on projects which include spray painting and using our table saw {which also leads to dusty messes} and also was a holding cell for purchased furniture waiting to be made over.  All of those items within the garage ultimately took over, and didn't allow us to enjoy or utilize the garage for the main purpose of storing outdoor supplies and our vehicles. 

My initial plan was simple.  Remove everything from each space.  Sort it.  Purge it.  Donate and sell it.  Organize the rest.  Be done and get back to enjoying our home.

The Actual:

Removing the items from the utility room and under the stairs was easy.  However, the after effect was one of the most challenging parts of the entire process.  Living with this mess:


And this one:


Yikes right?  Can you imagine?  I couldn't.  That photo above is the mess I was left with after emptying the area under our stairs.... bye bye workspace!

How in the world did we fit SO much into such small spaces?  I still can't wrap my brain around it.  It is off the charts on the amazing level.

My personal organizing process is one of needing to start from scratch and to sort everything at once.  This isn't such an overwhelming way of doing things when working on a junk drawer, but when working on three full junk rooms, that is a different story.

The other problem I faced is that I had nowhere to put the sorted items, except back into new piles still around the family room/studio.  The utility room got a quick face-lift, however, I still had to determine the bins, the shelving setup, placement, etc.... Although we decided that it is not cost effective or necessary to finish the walls and ceiling in the utility room, the opposite is true for the space under the stairs.  I ultimately hope to utilize that space as an extension of my studio, and would like for it to be finished with oodles of awesomesauce storage.  Knowing that we need to do the drywall, nothing could be placed back under the stairs once sorted and paired down.

When it came time to start working on the garage, it has been so cold and rainy in Wisconsin, that we couldn't just empty it all out into the driveway/yard and leave it until the entire garage is outfitted with appropriate storage.  Everything has to stay within the garage and be worked around.

Here are a few more details regarding how everything has played out up until this point:

• Happy dancing commenced for quite awhile after the utility room was given a little attention with shelving and painted floors.  
• Sorting started and I focused on picking through the piles for all of my paint supplies.  Hours and hours later of transferring paint to jars and sorting down bins and baskets, the paint was given a new home on the shelves within our utility room.
• Before placing our paint supplies within the utility room, I had done some research and looked at a few sites online for guidelines around paint storage.  We were under the impression that it just needed to be a specific distance from our furnace to be deemed safe, so we proceeded to store our items back where they had lived for the previous twelve years.  After thinking about it further and even stressing about it a little {thanks to writing an entire post about it and even after a few questions from you super sweet readers}, I contacted our HVAC professional for a second opinion and to learn more about the dangers involved.  Although stains and certain paints may appear to be sealed, they still may off-gas dangerous and flammable fumes.  So although we were "probably" OK given the fact they were quite a good distance from our furnace, I was not OK with "probably" safe as far as my family is concerned.  Therefore, late one night I actually got out of bed and moved all of the paints back out of the utility room, and onto shelves within our laundry room instead.  Anything with potentially dangerous fumes were placed within cabinets, the pretty jars got to stay out on the shelves.  Live, learn, share.

• One night we ran into HomeGoods to grab something, and I stumbled into the most incredible wrapping paper.  It was lust at first sight.  I purchased three rolls and once all of the paints were moved to the laundry room, we removed the foam board backing we had previously lined with shelf liner, and lined the opposite side with the new pretty gift wrap.  SO much better.  I loved that all of the backings were the same and that the pattern was more fresh and simple and even complimented the floor.  Sure, I am cray cray, but for me, it is always those special little details that make these projects more exciting.

• Once paint was sorted, my next goal was to go through family photographs.  I had organized a lot of our photos previously, however, in the process of emptying the contents of the storage rooms, I found SO many more.  Bins of photos.  Bins of scrapbooks.  Bins of photo albums.  Just to warn you, organizing photos will never be a quick process.  I sat down with the intentions of just getting them all placed inside of a single bin within an hour.  Six hours later, I was sucked into years of memories, endless feelings of gratitude for this beautiful life I have been given and emotions ranging from laughter and grins to tears of sadness for those that I have loved and lost along the way.  I spent time looking at years and years of events ranging from weddings and the birth of my children to simple moments of picking apples and playing card games with the kids.  The goal of the night was to get all of the photos out of albums and every random box and bin, and into one container to be focused on later on.  Ultimately, we hope to have all of the photos organized by event/type and scanned and stored both online and on CD's.  For now, just getting them into a one bin is good enough as photos are only a small piece of this very large project.

• Then I found our home movies.  Some on mini-VHS tapes and others on DVD's.  We sat down with the boys and watched them all in their entirety.  Some of them twice.  This was my favorite part of the entire organizing process.  Although watching school concerts and Christmas programs that the kids had put on through school was sweet, the videos of the boys searching for their Easter baskets, opening gifts on Christmas morning, counting with their fingers, singing the ABC song and missing 25% of the letters, crawling and walking for the first time, playing sports, swimming in their inflatable pool on the deck and just hanging out on a typical afternoon doing everyday things were my most favorite moments to watch.
• Back in the day I had done a really good job keeping the really, really important stuff for each family member organized within storage bins under our stairs.  We are talking important milestone items, home from the hospital outfits, publications, etc... However, as the area under the stairs worsened, so did my ability to easily store the items we cherish most.  Wanting to ensure that each member of the family had a proper "memory" bin, we measured an area in our storage room and went on the hunt for the perfect solution.  We searched for weeks until we came across something that fit all of our criteria: it had to fit the shelving space we had available, be sturdy/durable with handles, attractive and ready to stick with us for the long haul of life.  Once we found them {we selected these}, I spent more hours heading back down memory lane, and packaged everything nice and neat within the boxes {more on those within an upcoming post}.

• Once the main categories were organized down {paint supplies, photos and videos, home accessories, etc...}, I found myself with a new mess.  Because we emptied the contents of our storage areas into giant piles within my studio, I was no longer able to work or craft there.  Instead, I took up residence at the kitchen table.

• Working at the kitchen table posed a whole new set of problems.  I had my work piles everywhere in our main living area, which we had to eat and live around.  Every few days I would do a "clean up" and take those items/piles back down to the studio.  Only, I couldn't get to my containers and baskets easily, so I just made new piles to deal with after the rest of the stuff was dealt with {sounds pretty silly right?}.  There was this giant trickle effect not being able to use certain areas of our home for their primary purposes, because they were taken over by this other project.
• Once the storage room items were taken care of and sorted, then I had to focus on my studio storage.  We have really exciting plans for the area under the stairs, which includes finishing it, installing a wrapping station and storing every last electronic, craft supply, printer cartridge and shop material.  The storage for this area will be a combination of items we already had, along with a few of these storage carts from IKEA.  We assembled them, I spray painted the frames, and we set them all up in our playroom so that I could finish sorting down the remainder of my studio piles.  Now the playroom is gonzo as well.  Poor kids.  Lucky for us, the weather has allowed them to play outside while mama sorts her stuff.  I didn't want to put anything back under the stairs if I could help it, because I didn't need any reason to not finish it with drywall and paint right away.  

• All of this sorting also meant oodles of purging.  We had three new piles forming.  One was for items to donate which went right into the back of our SUV, another was items to sell which went straight to our guest room and the final pile was items to toss which went straight into a trash bag.  We used all of the typical checkpoints when making a decision for each and every item we touched: "Will we ever need/use it again?", "Is it in good condition?", "Is it worth my time to sell this item?", etc...  We even began listing and selling items on Craigslist.
• For now, "good enough" is enough.  Everything was placed into a bin that fit the storage space we had available.  It didn't matter if the bin "matched" or was "pretty".  It just needed to be purged and sorted.  Once a bin was dedicated for a specific type of item, I slapped a simple post-it label to the front.  Once the entire sort and toss process is done in all three spaces, then I can focus my time on making fancy pants labels.

• So now the storage spaces have been emptied, piled, sorted, purged and it felt INCREDIBLE.  Wait.  There are no words for the feelings I felt.  Let me thesaurus some for you: amazing, awesome, fascinating, marvelous, shocking, stunning, surprising, unbelievable and wonderful!  And then I walked out to the garage....

• I promised lots of messy pictures, so I felt the need to follow through on those promises.  Let's just pretend that is why I let my garage turn into a DIY war zone.  
• We followed the same process with our garage as we did the other two problem areas.  Sort, sort, sort, purge, purge, purge.  We found a weekend day in which our kids were away with Grandma, and knew we had to get as much done while they were away as we could.  We blasted the tunes and sorted until only items we needed/wanted remained.  
• We were RUTHLESS during this process.  I forced my hubby to say farewell to things he has been holding onto for 20 years!  I did the same.  We found so many things that made us raise our eyebrows, and once we started letting go, it become this freeing and contagious feeling that brought us back to do it more and more.
• Not only did this project have a negative impact on many other areas around our home, but it also had a huge positive impact as well.   We haven't done a full house purge in about two years, and I found myself also cleaning out my closet, the sideboard in our dining area, kitchen drawers and other small and often times forgotten areas of our home.  I just couldn't stop.
• So far, we have made three trips to our local donation center, two to the Habitat ReStore, one to my brother's apartment and one to the local recycling center.  Finding a family member who was in need of some items for their home really helped us keep many of the items we purged, within the family.  To us, that felt like a huge win.
• Total man hours invested thus far has been a minimum of forty hours!  That includes emptying storage rooms, painting floors, assembling storage, sorting every last item, cleaning, running to donation centers, taking photos and creating listings for Craigslist, etc...

The Thoughts & Emotions:

Between looking at the photos and watching the videos, I came to a HUGE realization.  Our life used to be full of simple pleasures such as lazy days on the couch watching football, an afternoon of swinging in the backyard or a competitive game of cards after dinner.  We hosted more gatherings and truly enjoyed our home, vs. always working on our home.  Life was slower.  Life was sweeter.  There was very little social media or technology 10 years ago.  Can you imagine not having a device growing out of your hand?   Not sharing every moment on Instagram or telling the world what you are doing right this moment on Facebook and Twitter?  Just nuts right?!  Now we spend our mornings packing lunches, rushing the kids off to school, working all day, homework, sports, dinner and baths every night.  Once the kids are in bed, we work on house projects, emails or my shop.  Most nights I fall asleep on my laptop and wake up to do it all over again.  Weekends are when we typically catch up on everything that didn't get done throughout the week, work on bigger projects and get our grocery shopping done.  With the boys growing and playing every sport imaginable, my business expanding and technology being front and center of our lives on a daily basis, those simple pleasures are shamefully less frequent.  I know that this is what naturally happens as you have busy work commitments {especially ones you are overly passionate about} and growing kids.  However, this project quickly turned from not just organizing our storage room, but to also evaluating our schedules and habits to get back to our roots as well.  It has opened my eyes to evaluate what matters most.  It made me want to focus on our family blog again, to take more photos and family videos of everyday moments, to spend more Saturday evenings snuggled in watching family movies and eating homemade popcorn, to go on long family bike rides and to dedicate weekends to less work and more play.  

Aside from the major memory lane "Ah Ha" moment, there were also an endless range of emotions encountered during this process:

• Excited!  The deep excitement we had in the pit of our stomachs is what got the ball rolling to do this project, and is what kept it rolling through the not so easy moments.  Having a set goal of bettering our home and daily lives was always that driving factor.
• Overwhelmed.  The moment that everything was removed from our storage areas and in the wide open to be seen, that really gross feeling rushed over me and I wondered, "What have we gotten ourselves into?"
• Invested.  Many of the items we stumbled into were just things.  But many other items were much more than that.  They were forgotten photos and videos and boy scout badges and high school medals.  They were yearbooks and diplomas and love letters.  I felt very invested in making sure I gave each of those items a proper home so they would never get lost in the shuffle again.
• Confused.  Where did all of this stuff come from?  How did it get so bad?  Of course, deep down I knew the answer boiled down to being too busy or maybe even lazy and just stuffing and stashing into places that were never properly outfitted with good storage solutions.  Saying, "we will get to it later" and then it was later, and later and later....
• Embarrassed.  Our piles took over our home during this process.  We had to apologize to endless people while entertaining or even those that just happened to pop on over.  "Look away" and "We are in the middle of a huge project" and "We promise this is not normal" along with "We have heard rumors our basement is filled with boogie piles, we advise you to run for your life" were all things we spouted out with bright red faces.  
• Tired.  I stayed up numerous hours and nights after the kiddos went to bed, to work on this project.  I had to take breaks for a few days at a time to catch up on work, sleep and other projects for sanity purposes.  
• Frustrated.  Piles everywhere is enough to drive anyone loopy.  I wanted to check into a hotel or just ship everything away and start from scratch.  Too bad there is something called the real world.  I had to face these piles head on.  Who knew that two plus years of neglecting spaces could create such a huge downstream impact?  Every day that went by, I just wanted our home back.  
• Overwhelmed {again}.  It is really hard to look at piles and know where to start.  I found that I ultimately just needed to pick a spot and go to town.  It was slow going and most days I felt like after hours of picking away at it, I still hadn't gotten anywhere and had no post to share.  The only photos I could post would still all look like the "befores".  This was completely a different ball game from what I am familiar with.  Finding a balance of time management between sorting and working on something that would provide me a post, and spending time on quick projects that didn't "have" to be done, but would give me a post, proved to be very challenging.
• Grateful.  Although there is nothing easy about giant projects like this, my hubby and I spent many hours reminiscing and chatting and singing and laughing.  We realized how lucky we are for this crazy, beautiful life we are living and found this to be a tremendous learning experience for us both.
• Smart.  Seriously.  Problem solving makes you feel smart!  We had to think about every item that we shed ourselves of, and question the reason for that.  We had to think about every item that didn't get put back and ended up lost in one of these rooms, and think up better solutions for those items.  We had to think about what category each item fit within, to be sure we could easily find it down the line.  By the end of it all we were self proclaimed geniuses. 
• Relieved.  Once we left the last donation center with an empty trunk, and had every last item sorted and given a home, I was overcome with a whole new set of those AMAZING feelings and emotions.  Tears may have rolled down my face.  #dontjudge  There was a lot of high fiving, smiling, celebrating and singing going on.  A lot.
• Excited again!  We finally have our spaces back!

The Current State:

My studio is CLEAN!  Can you hear me screaming it from the rooftops?  I can now be a productive human being again and work in my office.  Who knew I loved it in there so much?  And I can also successfully walk to my laundry room without tripping on something or fearing that my leg will be impaled by a random sharp object.  Shucks, that means I actually have to start doing laundry again....


Wait, that is the first glimpse I have given into the current state of the studio!  Now do you see why I haven't revealed it yet?  For some reason even after priming and painting three coats of white on the built in storage, my drawer fronts and other areas of the cabinets are yellowing.  So strange.  And I have plans to make some changes to the focal wall, finish that sweet little blue desk chair and add a new rug.  More on that when the time finally comes....


Under our stairs is completely cleaned and cleared out, waiting for some lovin'.  All that remains in there is my frame collection, which clearly needs to be used on a gallery wall.   

The rest of the house is back in order as well.  We can get back to those roots I chatted about earlier, and begin living in the home we love so much... Enjoying family dinners without a computer monitor in the way, snuggling on the couch without a pile of tools below our feet and playing games in our family room without tripping over paint cans and being eaten by piles of home accessories.  Life is good.

The playroom has been taken over by my organized office supplies, which will ultimately be stored under our stairs.  I am bribing my kids to drive their daddy crazy so he has a little fire in him to get my storage area finished and the boys can have their play space back in time for the cold weather to hit.  The items are all sorted down to the very last little paperclip, and ready to be moved as soon as the drywall and painting are done.  Crazy excited for that!


The utility/storage room still needs to have the light installed and all of the bins need to be labeled and tidied up a bit.   The tools need to be organized and we also hope to create a shelf dedicated to holding emergency preparation supplies.


Our guest room is packed to the gills with items to sell on Craigslist.  Wish us luck.  We want to start hosting guests again in the near future.

The garage is purged, but far from done as we still have some really fun storage plans up our sleeves.  We have two cars to get in before snow starts falling so time is limited.  Not to mention, I am pretty sure those doors are asking to get painted....


You all know that it is always my primary goal to keep this blog and organizing nothing but light hearted fun, so I apologize if this post comes across as whiny.  That said, you are going to get honesty from me and at the end of the day, there were times when I thought this project, well, stunk.  There, I said it.  I was mad at myself for letting areas get like they did, ashamed, embarrassed and frustrated.  I can't pretend that living with my entire house torn apart for a month and tripping through piles every day was blissful and butterflies.  But there were lessons learned and piles conquered and spaces smiling so big at us that I can now sleep at night.  And that my friends is what it is all about.  Simplifying, learning and bettering our lives.

Now for the fun, happy, sun-shiny parts of this huge project.  You know, the light at the end of the tunnel that has kept me excited and motivated since the beginning.  It is time to get out the paint brushes and tools, create tons of labels, make pretty storage and install a few different systems to ensure that our spaces can stay streamlined and simplified going forward.  We are in the home stretch now, here's hopin' we knock this project out of the park!

I have been so overwhelmed with the excitement and encouragement you all are throwing my way, as I tackle our storage areas.  You are the best readers a gal could ask for, and knowing that you are supporting me as I take on our biggest problem areas yet, keeps me inspired and motivated to keep at it with a giant smile on my face.

It's been over a week since we shared our last update on the space, and a week later, I can honestly say we haven't made a lot of progress, although, that doesn't mean that time hasn't been invested and that we still aren't happy dancing about what we have gotten done.  Our lower level living area still looks similar to the last update, mountains of miscellaneous items everywhere we turn, however, we have done two really impactful things:

1. Took an impulse trip to Goodwill!  We dug through the utility room piles that were dumped into our family room and adjoining studio, and loaded up the back of our SUV with items that were worthy of a donation.  Things we haven't seen or touched in ages, things we no longer needed and some of those thrift store find blog projects, that would never be completed.  Just removing all of those items on a whim gave us a good look at what we are working with, made less visual clutter and gave us a feeling of warmth.  I am excited to do it again as we continue to dig through our mess.
2. We organized our paint and supplies.  I couldn't believe how many gallons of paint we pulled out of the room.  With so much piled up, we couldn't see the shelves and floor which were lined with paint.  We also had bins of spray paint, spray paint on the shelves and even more in the garage.  It was everywhere.  Knowing that we will forever be peeps that play with paint, whether for a small crafty project or for an entire room makeover, we needed to address paint and supply storage asap.  

So that is where we are at today.  Last week I traveled to NYC for four days for a Better Homes & Gardens Workshop, so that pulled me away from the project for awhile {and left my family to live around my giant mess}, and I came home with big and inspired intentions.  However, this blog is all about being real, and as much as I wish I could knock out this entire space in a week, and give you a reveal today, that ain't happenin'.  In fact, I will be happy if I can get all of our three spaces done within the next month.  These areas are TWO years in the making, and it will take a long while to undo the mess.  And when you throw in two full time jobs and three boys with schoolwork and sporting events, well, life gets in the way of the hours of time it will take to just sort through things. 

I really, really want to get these spaces done right.  It is important to address each function of each space, and ensure we are making it simple to maintain those areas once we are finished.  I never want to have to do this again, so planning and massive efforts will be going into all we do within these zones.

We had a narrow, long wall behind the door of the utility room, in which we installed the IKEA Gorm shelving.  It was the perfect way to maximize the space, and to ensure we can't just create mounds and piles, which we had prior.


The shelves were the perfect candidates for our paint and supply storage.  As I mentioned, painting supplies were living in three areas.  Some in the garage, some here in the utility room, and the remainder on shelves in our laundry room.  They all need to be in one spot, so we hunted and gathered all of the items to be relocated here, to their new home.

First, I wanted to address the visual clutter that was just typical wiring, plumbing and open studs.  We decided not to finish the walls within the utility room, as all walls have so many components and wires, that we just didn't feel comfortable permanently covering them up.  We would have had to hire in a professional and we think our money is best spent updating the more visual and important areas of our home {cough, cough - kitchen}.  So, I had to come up with a different, much less expensive plan.  It really is just for aesthetics after all.

I initially was going to paint some drop cloths and hang them from the ceiling, but again SO many pipes jetting out past the studs, and the time and effort to paint some drop cloths, sheets or curtains just wasn't practical given the scope of the project.  Plus, with the items we were planning on storing on the shelves, we needed something with a little reinforcement on the backside.  So for now, I thought the next best way to get things done quickly and on a budget, would be to use foam poster board.  We purchased twelve sheets at $1 per sheet from the dollar store, to line the three shelving unites on the back wall of the utility room.  The foam style is much sturdier and thicker than your typical poster sheets.

To add some pattern and color, we used duct tape connect the foam sheets together.  Then, using pretty contact paper we already had, we covered the faces of the panels.


I didn't have nearly as much contact paper as I thought I did initially, so we had to use a three different patterns on the three individual panels, but I was all about using what we had on hand, and I sort of the love pops of color that it ultimately added.

The panels were just stapled to the back side of the wooden shelving units, with our staple gun.


The covered foam sheets now hide some of that visual clutter, and also act as a stopper, so the items placed on the shelves do not fall behind.


You may notice those black dots going down the center post of the shelving unit.  Those were just inexpensive magnets purchased from the home improvement store, and attached with construction adhesive.


More on those in a moment....

Let's talk about the paint.  I was completely overwhelmed with the amount of paint and cans and spray paints that we had.  Twelve years of shrinking our home, one layer of paint at a time, creates a lot of old paint.  And let's face it, those cans are bulky and could take up this entire wall of shelves alone.  

Last year, I created touch-up paint jars, and organized the colors on a cute little printable.  So far, the jars have been super useful when we need to touch up a ding here and there.  I lovity love the setup and the paint has stayed fresh within the mason jars.  We saved the small amounts of paint that were left after creating those jars, and not once in a year, have we needed to touch those cans.  I decided they need to go, for good.

It really made me think, why keep all of that extra paint?  Would we ever need to repaint an entire room with a same color?  And if so, we wouldn't have enough anyway.  So, I went through every single can, and transferred the paint into either a half-pint or quart sized jar.  If we had initially used a quart of paint, that paint was transferred into the smaller jar size, if we used a gallon of paint, that paint was transferred to the quart size.  This worked out really well, because 98% of the time, that is about how much paint we had left in either can {often times even less, I just swirled the front jars in the photos to appear full since they photograph nicer that way #bloggerissues}.  For the cans where we had more than what would fit within a jar, I just used two jars.  So now, instead of just using the jars for touch-ups and keeping the larger can for... I don't know what... we now just have ALL of our paint in jars {with the exception of four, which were almost completely full or specialty paints}, and have begun the dry-out process of all of the cans, within our garage.  We did a lot of researching to ensure we are following the correct methods of paint can disposal, you can find more details all over the web, but we relied on a few articles similar to this one.  We also found we had a few cans that weren't even opened, and duplicates of spray paint colors {which goes to show why it is important to organize.  Hello!  Over purchase alert!}, which we were able to add to our Habitat Re-Store donation pile.


I realized a few things weren't working with my little paint organization project from last year and it was time to address my organizing fails head on.  One, the labels were nicely printed and cut with my Silhouette, which was so darn cute.  However, that would mean that I would need to print and cut labels with each can of paint that I purchase, to maintain that cuteness.  And two, I never used that reference sheet one time in the entire year since I created it {the initial plan was to create a home improvement binder, just haven't gotten to that point yet}, so, I needed a quicker and different method.  Bottom line, if the system is not super simple to maintain, I will not maintain it. 

So, I created a label template on some Avery round sticker labels, and printed out a few extra sheets to keep stored on the shelves.  They have lines, so I can just hand-write the information on the top of the jar, no more need to head to the computer and print and cut something each time I add to my paint collection.


The other thing I wanted to do is create paint swatches of our colors.  I could have gone back to all of the stores I initially purchased each paint color from, and collected the swatches {and cross my fingers they still made them}, but instead I opted to take the DIY route.  I just used some super inexpensive marking tags {from Staples}, and painted each one with our paint colors.


On the back side of each tag, I then added the brand, color and sheen; even the room or piece of furniture that the color correlates to.  Again, just by hand, so I could quickly add to it in the future.


I strung all of the swatches on a piece of twine, and they now hang in the utility room, right next to the paints.


Other than those few projects {which let me tell you, were a bit more time consuming than I would have imagined}, I just dumped the rest of our paint supplies on the floor and sorted through them.


When placing everything on the shelves, I really thought about what I would putting where.  For example, I placed the spray paint {all pretty in color order}, on three different shelves, before settling.  I had them on a shelf they fit perfectly, but I couldn't see or easily access the colors in the back, so they were moved to a taller shelf to accommodate my extreme spray paint addiction.

Say hello to our newly organized paint shelves!


Now you know the "why" behind most of this setup, so the rest is just visual happiness.

Those magnets on the front the shelves now hold my paint swatches, paint can opener and paint brushes.




The top shelf is holding 18 half-pint colors and 12 quart sized jars!  Imagine all of the space those full sized cans would have taken up!  Crazy town.



I didn't transfer the specialty paints, as they were all pretty full and the containers were in great condition.


As I mentioned, I can now see my rainbow of spray paint colors, and reach the ones in the back.  However, I have been suspended from purchasing spray paint indefinitely.


The bottom shelf holds all of our empty paint buckets and trays.  I placed all of my mini-rollers within a clear, sealed container.  Now I can quickly see the rollers I have before I start a project, and they stay dust free.


All of the containers used throughout the update, were ones that we already had {and a few I found buried in this room!}.

The other shelf holds many of our supplies and tools for painting.  We already had the three painting baskets on shelves in our laundry room, but they made more sense in here.  They got re-organized and paired down.  I used some inexpensive plate stands to maximize the vertical space in-between the shelves.  You can purchase additional shelves for this system from IKEA, and even great slide on baskets, however, we don't live incredibly close to IKEA so we made use of what we had.



Drop cloths and rags are stored inside the clear blue bin.



Extra jars and a cup of tags now ensure that my paint maintaining accessories are all within one spot.


Caulks, adhesives and the caulking guns, were all tossed into a basket and labeled.


So now everything has a place, and we even have room to grow.  Those baskets on the top shelf were taken from the guest room and guess what?  They are empty!}  I can't even begin to type out the emotions I feel when I stand in the room now, and gaze at everything so tidy and beautiful.




Doing this part of the room took another six to eight hours, which included lining the shelves, going through all of the paint and transferring it, DIYing our own swatches and sorting everything down and planning out placement.  But it was SO worth it in the end, and I can't wait to continue on with project "Storage Space Takeover"!

We still have a lot on our list, like going through each bin and labeling the contents and even creating a tool station.  Just like our paint, we have tools coming out of every crack and crevice of our garage and utility room, so it will be another sit-sort-and-pair-down session.

And for those wondering if I am still motivated?  Absolutely!  Seeing that mess at the bottom of the stairs and begging our guests to turn their heads, keeps me driven to get it done as quickly as we can!  And with each project we finished, a new flame is lit under me to keep hustling!

Thank you again to those cheering us on out there!  And high fives to those taking on similar spaces right along with us!


For those just tuning in, you can catch up with Part One and Part Two of our Storage Spaces overhaul.

This has been one of those projects that seems to drag on FOREVER.  I was looking up old posts and we started finishing our walls back in August of 2012 when we installed our sports station!  That is almost two years now that we have had a stack of beadboard paneling waiting to be installed on our walls and trimmed out.  Well, one wall is finally done!  I guess waiting two years makes the celebration process that much sweeter.


You can catch up on our garage story and progress here.  Long story short, the entire space is getting brand-spankin' new storage so that it is simple to maintain.  We built in boatloads of overhead storage which I will share when I finish painting it up.  That will get a lot of the larger items up and off the floor and tucked away out of sight.  All we want left out on the walls is the items we use daily, such as lawn toys / games, sports equipment and bikes.

As soon as hubby finished caulking up the last hole in the beadboard, I couldn't wait to get to work on the newly empty corner of our garage.  The corner previously held our gardening supplies, but we actually put our garden shed to use, and that left this corner as the ideal location for outdoor toys.  In fact, it is right near the opening of the garage, making it super simple for the boy's and their pals to access everything they need for a day of outdoor play.

After we had ripped out our previous walk-in closet a few years ago, we saved a few pieces of the track shelving system (which I believe was purchased at Menards back in the day).  It was the perfect solution for this nook, as it is durable and the open shelves prevent too much dust build up.  I also love that they are adjustable to allow us to customize each shelf to our needs.


Installation is simple and only requires locating the studs in the wall using a level to make sure the top rail is installed correctly.  It went up in a jif!

You may recall that in the chaos of the garage, I had dumped their items onto the front porch.  Then we cleaned that up and moved them to the backyard until storage day.  


Before filling up the shelves with all of the boy's belongings, I took inventory of everything and gathered bins and baskets from around the garage and home.  I began sorting everything down by type, and made a list of the labels that I needed to create.

For any bin or basket with a flat surface, I cut word labels with my Silhouette die cutting machine.  For everything else, I painted up some unfinished wooden tags, and affixed the vinyl lettering to those.  In typical Jen fashion, I went a little label crazy. 


My entire thought process was sticking with what has worked well for us in the past.  I break the toys down by type and put everything into portable bins.  This allows the boys to grab a bin to take out to the yard and easily return the bins and contents to the shelf when they are done. 


For outdoor storage, I always select finishes which are weather friendly.  Galvanized steel, plastic and outdoor rattan were all used for this project.  That way if anything is left in the rain, no worries.  These finishes also make for easy dusting and cleaning.


The teal and green plastic totes were purchased at the dollar store and are lightweight and portable, which is perfect for quick trips to the park.


The green metal pails are my favorite.  They are from IKEA and remind me of the adorable versions from PB Kids. 



For all of the random sized balls that are used for impromptu neighborhood dodge ball matches and kickball games, I found an oversized wire basket from Target.


Bike gear remained in a bin we were using previously in another area of the garage.  It just received a sweet new label.


Squirt guns, life jackets and other water gear is in a portable plastic tote which is ideal for day trips to the beach.  Didn't those labels turn out darling?  Happy sigh....


There is a step stool nearby for the boys should they need anything higher, and for the items we didn't want little hands to reach, they we placed in bins on the top shelf.




Sometimes it is the quick and easy projects that really motivate us to continue on with the less fun items; like installing the rest of the beadboard and trim and finishing up the painting of the overhead cabinets.  But oh the difference the beadboard walls are making to the entire garage.  It is like ten windows were installed with how open, clean and bright it feels.  And we also have plans to update the lighting, build a new step and paint the doors.  One day at a time my friends, one day at a time...

I couldn't even finish getting everything in bins and on the shelves before half the neighborhood kiddos were down grabbing things and playing in the yard with the boys.  I love that leaving everything out and easy to access really promotes instant play.  A total summer saver for sure!


Sandbox toys are stored in our outdoor bench in the backyard, you can check that out here.