Home Reset 2020- Laundry Room

My laundry room is where all the odds and ends of my life end up.  The laundry room houses our donation boxes, clothes that our daughters have outgrown, our old baby equipment, tools, craft supplies, deep freezer, and extra bedding.  When I go through the house, the laundry room is the landing place for items that I need to deal with.   It can quickly become a disaster.

I was able to tackle my whole basement over the long weekend while my husband and children were sick.  We were confined at home and the kids were content to just hang out and play.  It was a lot of work but it only took a few hours to sort everything.

Before:

See?  I really meant that this room is my landing zone.  This room felt overwhelming, but it just took some dedicated time and it all came together rather quickly.  I think that this room could have been much less overwhelming if I had made an effort to donate as I went through rooms and if I sorted through the girls' clothes as they outgrew it.  We don't have a donation center where I live, so I often just pile it up until we make a trip into the city.  Sorting through my children's clothes is often easier when I have had a bit of time and space to evaluate what I really want to keep.  This room has only looked this terrible for the 8 weeks it has taken me to go through my entire house.  I can live with that.

After:

Ahhhh.... It is so much better.  You can still see our donations piled in the right side of the photo.  Those have since been taken to the city.  We came up with 8 boxes for donation.  I also had a full bag of garbage come out of this room.  

I sorted through my kids' clothes.  I kept clothes for my youngest daughter, though I limited the number of items that I kept.  The items are sorted into diaper boxes according to size.  I know that there are 'prettier' ways of storing this, but I like to use items that I already own.  I labelled each box with the size and stashed them on the top shelf.  Items in poor repair were made into rags or thrown away.  I donated anything that I didn't think we would use.

I went through our craft supplies, games and puzzles.  I only kept what we use.  I did the same with the baby items and clothes, as we are open to having another child.  I tried to keep anything we might need for another baby.  We still had much more than we needed so I donated some of the items.  I went through our actual laundry supplies.  I recycled a few empty containers and organized what was left.

This room seems so open and functional now.  I am so happy that I was able to have the time to tackle this project.

Checklist:

• Go through items.  Get rid of anything that is broken or in disrepair.  Removed items that don't belong in the room.  
• Wipe shelves.
• Put items that belong back into place
• Vacuum floors.
• Clean appliances.