Sorting out some neglected areas of our home

Sometimes when you spend most of your time at home there are certain areas which you pass by every day and don't really notice until you take the time to look at them with fresh eyes (perhaps when houseguests are expected!) and you realise that they are actually rather unsightly! Earlier this year I decided to spend a bit of time sorting out some parts of our home which we had been putting up with for a while.

The first was our hallway cupboard which is used mainly for storing coats and shoes. It was the huge jumbled pile of shoes on the floor in particular which was bothering me.

I sorted through the shoes and got rid of ones which were too small or falling apart. Then I got people to choose the three pairs of shoes that they wore most frequently and moved all the others to their rooms. I found a nice little shoe rack on Amazon which fitted the space perfectly and holds twelve pairs, cleaned out the cupboard thoroughly and arranged the shoes neatly. It needs a little bit of keeping on top of as not everyone can manage to put their shoes away properly, but at least they all have a space now so I can keep it looking good. 

Then I turned to the small landing on our top floor which was full of junk. I don't go up to the top floor very often, especially as we don't heat it during the winter, and I can't see it from the floor below because I'm too short! So it was definitely out of sight, out of mind. 

I don't have a before picture, but imagine if you will this area filled with an old Dyson hoover (and by 'old' I mean over twenty years old and too heavy and clogged up to use), a massive pile of small empty device boxes, a big heap of things which needed to be taken down to the charity shop and various bits and pieces that needed to be returned to family members. I cleared it all out a bit at a time and gave the whole area a good clean and a dust.

One of the rooms on our top floor is a guest bedroom which we don't use very often. I spent quite some time up there recently sorting out the Lego and Playmobil and boxing up the old toys and it is looking so much better! There is still some work to do, and perhaps moving some things up into the loft, but for now I'm very pleased with it.

Finally we are lucky enough to have a small utility room off the kitchen with the washing machine and a sink, but the sink had become unusable because the draining board was being used to store a huge cardboard box of things that might or might not be needed for the hot tub. I cleared out the cupboard underneath and moved everything down there, then I reorganised the other cupboards which we use for storing extra food so that everything was together and I could see what we had. 

Now I can easily keep it clean when I'm cleaning the kitchen, and I can use the sink for washing dirty shoes and other things that I don't want in the main kitchen sink.

I still have a few more areas on my hit list - for example I've always wanted shelves put up in the airing cupboard so that I can store spare bedding and towels in there instead of stuffing them under our bed - but each of these nice and tidy areas now makes me smile when I go past!