Shelf for closet organization

Searching shelf for closet organization?  We have finally organized our kitchen closet and shelves for closet organization and ready to share the mess it was!  

If you are visiting from 5th Sparrow No More, welcome!  We are so excited to have you here!  We enjoy vintage finds, sharing projects, recipes, and as you can see we have been working on our organization skills around here.  I am not too shy to share our home with you...  the good, the bad, and the ugly... so pull up a seat, and enjoy your stay.  We would love to see more of you here at VSG.  Did you know you can follow along with us on social media, or email?  Sign up, and we will come straight to your inbox when we have new posts.  Thank you, we appreciate each and every one of you visiting.

I turned Mt. Everest into a mole hill... whatcha talkin' about Willis, I mean Cara?  You did what?  How is this even possible?  What did you do?  Please tell...

Ok, I am only too happy to share how I conquered one of the embarrassments that we have, or should I say had in this home.  So... we're amongst friends here, right?  I mean, I share our home, pluses and minuses with you all of the time... the pretty places, and the not so pretty places.  

Now, raise your hand if you have that closet, or drawer, or room for that matter that is the place you just shut the door and walk away?  It's ok, we can't see you raise your hand, you can admit it, no one else will know.  It will be our little secret.   

  

It's the place in your home that you think, gosh, I hope no visitors will ever open the door and look in there.  Oh, I will work on it later... you know, when I get around to it.  I have some extra time on my hands these days and I decided well, later will come today for me.

Remember when I said I was ready to organize the world a few weeks ago when I worked on organizing the pantry?  I graduated to closet organization in the kitchen today, and what a task it was.  

I would open this closet door every time I needed a trash bag and then I would close the door and think, uh... the dreaded closet no one ever wants to organize!  Maybe I can hire someone to do it for me?  I mean, when you see this closet, you will think the same thing, or at least I am hoping you will side with me?

See?  So bad, sad, makes me mad... ugh.  I mean, I think we would just jam as much as we could in there because this kitchen lacks storage and this was the catch all, the place where we were not sure where something should go would be stuffed inside and never to surface again!  I think the closet monsters even decided this closet was not worthy to lurk inside of.

Now are you thinking I have it all together?  Probably not so much, but hey, I am working on getting this home in tip top shape!  I am a work in progress, okay?  Are you thinking you and I have a few things in common now?  Do you have a closet like this?  Hey, I said I would share the good, the bad, and the ugly.  This would be one of those ugly parts, no judgement here... please.

Life gets in the way, and you tend to try to only keep up with the important things, at least that is the way it has been for me for so many years.  I would let things slide, and think I will get to it when I get to it.  It is so easy to see how this can happen in our homes.  

I have decided I am not letting the clutter monsters continue to invade my life.  I am kicking them to the curb to never be seen again in our home, one closet, drawer, and room at a time.  

If you are like me and think how overwhelming this closet looks and just want to make like an ostrich and continue to stick your head in the sand, I completely understand. I just decided today was the day I was not going to continue to open that closet door and groan, and want to run, and cry, and hide under the covers.

I removed everything from the closet and began putting things back in slowly on our wire shelves.  Do you know each shelf will hold up to 125 pounds?  Lucky me, or maybe lucky shelves, not sure which!

  

I made a few modifications as I went.  It did not make sense to have the appetizer plate on the first shelf so it was moved later on.  I kept changing things up as I went.  I treated this closet like a puzzle and tried the pieces to see how they fit.  There is no right or wrong answer here, do what works best for you.

As you can see, we have a lot of kitchen "stuff".  Food processors, crock pots, Kitchen Aide attachments to our mixer, lock & locks, pizza stone, there is just a lot packed into this little ole closet.  

Once I finally decided I was going to take this closet on, I recalled I had these drawers in our spare bedroom.  They used to be in my closet with clothes in them, but that was changed in the fall of last year.  They were hanging out in the spare bedroom, and I said oh, come with me little drawers, I have a new purpose for you.  They were only too eager to get back to work.

The drawers are great at storing the smalls, all of the smalls, and some big things too.  You can easily pull the drawer out and you can even see inside the drawers, they are stackable as well.  I plan to label mine when I get the Cricut back up and running, but my goodness, they hold a lot of items.  

I decided to make a puppy drawer and house his extra leashes, Mr. Bill, treats, and his saddle working bag he carries on his back to give him a job when we walk.  He is pretty high strung so when we go on walks, this bag has helped channel some of that extra energy he needs to get rid of.  I just put a bottle of water on each side and he carries them.  Not too heavy, but enough that he feels like he is working.  Shepherds have a need to work... and so this is his job.  Oh, and alerting me to every snap, crackle, pop that happens in or around this home at all hours, day or night.  Nothing gets by this pup.

The next drawer has lightbulbs, trash bags, and dusters inside it.  Now I know where everything is instead of having lightbulbs in 3 different places.  Who needs that added stress?  Not me.  I am trying to make life as easy as I can around here when organizing so everyone knows where everything is and we do not need to run around like chickens with our heads cut off when we need to locate something quickly.  

I have to say, I have gotten the organizing bug from my mother.  We have discussed this before, she is a "General" when it comes to organizing.  If she would have opened that closet door, well, I do not want to say what might have happened.  I can guess we may have had to pick her up off the floor, since she may have just passed out, so a trip to the ER may have been in order as well to treat the bump she may have gotten on her head.

Thank goodness, we can alleviate all of that nonsense since she will not fall over if/when she opens this closet door in search of a trash bag, or a ziploc baggie, or whatever else that may come up.  Don't worry, I will let her know we saved her from having to relay the story to the ER doctors and nurses when I see her next.  I am sure she will appreciate us helping her out.

Minus Bentley's doggie puzzle (he decided to run off with and hide it under the dining room table), would you believe me if I told you all of the items that were in this closet are still in this closet?  Doesn't even look like the same closet, does it?  It just proves you can hoard have a lot of things and still stay organized.  

The shoes we wear most are in our kitchen since we do not wear shoes in our home.  Cutting back on germ exposure was necessary for me, once my immune system hit an all time low.  I decided to stack them in a storage tote, I promise it is organized and the shoes are not thrown in haphazardly.  

We plan to make this closet a pantry one of these days, but for now, the wire shelves work for our needs.  I am just glad this closet got the attention it much deserved.  No one was hurt in the making of this closet organization episode, ha!  Well, Bentley was startled when he decided to be nibby and see what I was doing.  I had removed everything and he wanted to see what was his in the closet, the mop fell over and he RAN!  He took off with his puzzle and decided to watch from afar what mommy was up to.

The remainder of my time organizing, he laid in the dining room and watched my every move.  Of course, I asked for his input to see what he thought when it was all organized, but all he wanted was Mr. Bill and could have cared less if the closet looked any better or not.  

We have had some questions about him lately, he is, of course still ornery, but is staying out of trouble for the most part.  I will have to update you all on his shenanigans soon.  It's been too long since he has had a say here lately.

We hope you enjoyed this organization share.  Honestly, I think it took me about an hour to tear out and put back together.  I thought it would be more like the better part of my day, but once I began working that puzzle, it really flew by and before I knew it, I was finished.  

Who knew this closet would have taken such little time?  If I would have known, I may have attacked it sooner.  Now, let's look at at closet one more time...

  

Ahhh... do you not feel so much better?  I know I do!  Everything has a place and I no longer need to feel like the whole closet will fall down on me when I open the door.  We will not need to worry about anyone fainting from shock, or getting clobbered if something were to fall out on them.  Of course, I love thinking up unique circumstances that may have happened had I not cleaned up this closet, that is part of the fun afterall.   

Below are some items that can be helpful in your organization journey.  We will keep posting our progress.  Thank you for following along with us, it makes our day when we hear your feedback.  We will be starting the series of what we repurpose around our home soon.  We have several ideas and are excited to get started!