Mud room / shoe closet Organization

Today, I'm going to be showing you how to organize your shoe closet to be more functional and more easy to clean and access. If you want a cleaner house, but don't know where to start, this project is great for you! It's really easy and when you are done, you will love going in there just to look at it. For me, that's what I do ;). So, what are you waiting for?? Get in there and start organizing!

To start, remove every thing from the closet. EVERY SINGLE THING. Once you've done that, step back and look at EVERY SINGLE THING you have in your shoe closet. I know, right. The pile is so BIG. You may be asking yourselves, why do we need to look at everything. Well, it will give you a realization that THIS is the reason you need to organize it. For me, seeing a pile of jackets, mittens, scarves and shoes really shook me awake, if you know what I mean :) Also, grab a plastic bag or two for trash.

Now sort the pile into smaller piles:

Jackets and outerwear like sweaters and coats

Scarves

Hats to wear when its cold

Hats and caps to wear when its warm (baseball caps, sun hats etc.)

Shoes

Mittens/ Gloves 

Shoe care

Umbrellas

Accessories                                                                                                                             

Donate

Like I said before, any trash you find goes in the trash bag. Any thing that doesn't fit you goes into the donation pile. Don't feel guilty if you don't like a coat or a pair of mittens. Instead of not using them, you are going to be giving them to people that will actually use them. It's a win win. You get a clean shoe closet, and people that need mittens or such will be getting them! Goodwill or the Salvation Army are good places to donate these items. Also, don't keep broken items. Even if they are kind of meaningful to you, think to yourself, do you REALLY need it?

Okay, that lessons over, lets get back to organizing. Now we are going to grab the materials.

A shoe rack, preferably an extendable one. Here's one like I have: 

IRIS USA 2-Tier Shoe Rack for Entryway

The good thing about this one is that it will fit any sized closet and is stackable.

You will also need a large basket, mines is wicker.

You will need multiple baskets. I got plastic ones along time ago, but they are not that eco-friendly so I suggest using some other material.

Also, some drawstring bags will be useful to hold small things.

A tie hanger but there are a lot out there. You'll want something like this:  Whitmore Swivel Tie Hanger with Belt Loops Chrome / Black

That's all the materials you'll need to complete this project. Also, give your closet a good deep cleaning at this point

So, lets start putting things back in to the closet. We'll start with the shoes. Put the shoe rack in, but put it in backwards. Putting it in backwards means that no shoes will slide off, and when you go to place them back, they'll slide straight on in! I can't believe no one thought of this sooner. Anyway, place your shoes in with the heels facing out. Like this:

 Put your shoes in based on the order that you wear them in. For example, if you go to work/school, you'll need those shoes a lot more often than your basketball shoes. Also, organize your shoes based on the season. For example, if you live in, lets say, South Dakota, you don't need your flip flops in the middle of the winter. Put those in a shoe box and store them on a shelf. Also store your dress shoes and rarely used shoes in a shoe box with the lid cut off. It will look like this :

Then, you can rotate your shoes every 6 months or so. You can also do that with dress shoes and keep them on the top shelves. And, if you have a lot of dress shoes, get an over the door shoe organizer and use that in your closet/laundry room. Don't keep them in your shoe closet because it is meant for your DAILY shoes, not ones that you wear annually.

Now, we go one to the coats and jackets. First, take off all the hangers and put them back one. Make sure to keep the same hangers cohesive through the closet. And, make sure all the hangers are hanging the same way. Like I said, it gives your closet a more professional look and that's what we all want, am I right?

Once you've done that, get out your tie hanger and your baseball caps and your bike helmets. Hook them onto the hanger like this. Then hook it next to your other hangers.

Now lets go onto the sunhats. We all remember the large basket that I talked about, right? Well if you don't, just scroll up a bit :) Anyway, we are going to be storing the sunhats in the basket. Place one hat in one another. One stack should have three piles. Once you do that to all the hats, place them in the basket and place the basket on the shelves.

Onto the mittens/gloves. First, find the pairs of mittens(or gloves) and lay them out. Then, place the pair less mittens in a small box. Then place all the mittens that all have pairs inside one another, like this:

This way, when you grab one mitten, you'll also grab the other one. Do that to all the mittens and then place them into a small box. I had to use two of the boxes for this.

Now, get your drawstring bags. These will be used to hold your shoe care and your accessories such as sunglasses and earmuffs. Put them into the bag and tie them to the rod by fowling these steps.

Drape the drawstring over the rod. You should see a loop. Then bring the bag through the loop to make a knot. It should look like this 

And, last but not least, cut the top off an old shoe box. Lay the umbrella's in there. My shoe box fits three umbrella's but the number will vary based on the size of the box and the brand.

That's it! Finish by putting any more like items in containers and put them on the shelves.

Note: Make sure you end up donating the items you want to donate. Try to donate them in a week or you might end up never doing it.

That's all! Be sure to check back on Shades of Lavender. Comment down below if you enjoyed or have any questions. Thanks for reading!