My Everest: The Upstairs Storage Closet

We have a large walk in closet upstairs. It has shelves and a lot of storage space. In the year that we've lived in this house it has turned into a catch all for EVERYTHING! Don't know where to put it? Put it in the upstairs closet!! My four year old refers to it as the upstairs basement. LOL Not exactly sure why but it's funny. Cleaning this closet out has been on my 'to do' list for oh... A YEAR! Pretty much since we moved in. The state of this closet really is embarrassing. I'm sure once my Mom sees these pictures she'll hang her head in shame and say "I didn't raise her to live this way." So.... here are the pictures.

BEFORE

So full of stuff that you can't even open the door all the way!! Eek!!

DVDs and board games. I would LOVE to put all these DVDs in on of those binders that only holds the disk. However, my husband refuses to let that happen. He's SO proud of his DVD collection that putting it in a binder just wouldn't do it justice. You know what I say to that? "Whatever!" ((eye roll)) haha

More games, arts and craft supplies, and photo frames.

This closet is also an extension of my linen closet. Our actual linen closet is very small. There is only enough room for bed sheets and towels. I keep our blankets here.

AFTER 

LOOK! The door can open ALL THE WAY!! We basically pulled everything out and went through it all. My husband gather all his Army gear and put it in his duffels. He also pulled out all his old college text books to either resell or donate. A lot of stuff ended up in yard sale/donation boxes but even more got thrown out!

I organized the art supplies into separate bins.

Markers and Crayons

Play Doh

Paints and Brushes

Stickers and Coloring Books

Extra School Supplies

Hot Glue Gun

I also put all of our photos and photo CDs in bins. Organizing photos is another task on my to do list. But that will be another day.

All of our board games and puzzles organized neatly. Now we can actually see what we have!

I meant to take a picture of the DVDs organized all neatly but my camera battery died! So you'll just have to take my word for it- they're nice and neat!! Promise ;)

This was a HUGE organizing project for my husband and I. So much so that we actually arranged for childcare for our two oldest children while we did this. We couldn't risk any distractions! haha The baby wasn't much of a distraction. I only had to feed and change him once during the cleaning.