Home Tour Tuesday - The Mudroom/Laundry Room Edition

Hey there!

As usual, I've taken a long hiatus from the blog so I could fully enjoy spending summer with the family.  It was a busy one, for sure!  We were out of town the majority of our summer break, so I just didn't feel like updating here.  Not that anyone is reading anyway, hahaha.  Now we're two weeks into the school year and our day-to-day routine is back in full swing, so I figured I'd pop back in and start blogging again.  We'll see how long I can keep up!  So let's dive right back into the swing of things with a little Home Tour Tuesday, shall we?!  You'll have to ignore the shoddy quality of these pics.  My CF card was damaged back at the beginning of the summer and I just haven't been motivated to replace it, so these crummy iPhone pics will have to do :)  

I've been dying to redo our laundry room since we moved in four years ago.  The space is SOOOO very tiny and narrow.  And it's pretty much the space where everyone enters the house. It was full of huge built in cabinets above the washing machine/dryer as well as cabinets and a countertop space to the side of the washing machine and dryer.  It really made the entire space feel so closed in.  I wish I had "before" pics to show you!  

My brother is AMAZINGLY gifted when it comes to building and carpentry, so I commissioned him to give the laundry room a makeover.  We left for our annual two week trip to Indiana & Michigan, so he moved in while we were away to house-sit and build the laundry room of my dreams.  He got to the house and texted me asking me what I wanted the built-ins to look like and I sent him a few pictures to try and explain my vision..."I like these lockers", "These are the hooks I have in mind", "Love the backing on this unit", "These cubbies are perfect", etc.  After a few back and forth texts, he sketched out my vision, sent it to me for approval, and got to work.  Here's what he came up with...

YES!!!!!  EXACTLY WHAT I HAD IN MIND!!!!!  And all designed through a series of texts, lol.

It helps that I really trust his vision and know he does amazing work, so I knew whatever he did would be perfect.  And I was right.  His craftsmanship opened up that room so much and makes the space feel so much bigger than it actually is.  See...it's pretty narrow....

While I know the most logical thing to do with all the cubbies above the lockers would be to fill them with laundry room type stuff, I opted to decorate them instead since this is such a high traffic area.  I wanted to cozy it up just a bit even though it technically doesn't make a lot of sense.  I could careless about all that.  I keep all of my laundry detergents, dryer sheets, etc. in the drawers beneath my washer and dryer as well as in a box inside the bottom cubby.  Works perfectly.

My brother decided to break up the continuity of the cubbies on top by adding a shelf to make it a little more visually appealing.  LOVED that idea and it's even better seeing it in person.  I'm pretty sure his vision was better than mine.

Since we enter the house through the laundry room, I asked for a little shelf where I could safely store all of our junk...a little basket for our sunglasses and keys works great and nothing gets lost anymore.  Can I get an AMEN?!

The little turquoise can holds the dog food. We'd keep it outside, but the possums and racoons always flip off the lid and leave a giant mess on our back porch.  GROSS.

We're going to add a trim piece to the bottom of the cubbies to polish it all off and I plan on buying some wire & burlap lined baskets to replace the gray & white.  Those are temporary until I can find something I really love.  The last cubby closest to the wall is currently holding shoes.  It looks super sloppy with them all thrown in the way they are right now, so I'm anxious to find baskets really SOON!! Ha!

The metal buckets are from Wal Mart and I keep those inside each locker to collect backpack "junk".  As you can see, only two weeks into the school year and the boys were loading up their backpacks with things they didn't need.  I remind them to check their backpacks in the morning and take out anything they don't need.  They place all of the "junk" inside the buckets and then empty the buckets in their rooms when they get home in the afternoons.

The other thing I really wanted for each locker were these hooks.  Mr. Spouse and I both agreed we wanted more than one per section, so we decided on three and we're so glad we did!  By the end of the day, each hook is full.  Backpacks, lunch kits, and hoodies (it gets cold in their classrooms).

I absolutely LOVE that everything finally has it's own space in that little room.

It's cleaner and (shockingly) bigger and I couldn't be happier!!!  Now I don't dread hearing the back door open when people come over to visit.  It's an inviting little room that I absolutely adore and am SO happy my brother was able to make my mudroom/laundry room dreams a reality!

If you want to take a little tour through some other rooms in the house, you can check out these posts from the past year.  After looking through them, I think they need updated.  SO much has changed in this short little year!!!

The Mystery Room

The Not-So-Formal Dining Room

The Kitchen

The Living Room

Halloween Home Tour