Wednesday, May 27, 2009

WFMW: DIY Shelving

It's another edition of Works-For-Me-Wednesday! A day when I can brag about my accomplishments in life! I mean, umm...a day when I hope to give you some ideas for your life. It's all about you. Really, it is.

Last year I saw a great shelving system on the Better Homes and Gardens website. Last month I designed a similar shelving system for our laundry room. And last night we finally got it built and put up!

Considering how quickly our family keeps growing, I am always in search of new storage spaces and solutions. When I realized last year that our laundry room was just FULL of empty wall space, I set it on my heart to transform that empty space into storage space. I decided to design the system myself rather than purchasing a pre-made one for two reasons:

1. It would give me exactly what I wanted, and
2. I thought it would be cheaper.

I never did really do much pricing for shelving systems, so I don't know if we saved any money, but I don't think we spent any more than if we had bought one. The whole thing cost us around $65.

When I started designing, the first thing I did was measure EVERYTHING. I measured the wall space. I measured the folded towels. I measured the laundry detergents. I measured the trash can. You get the idea. After everything was measured, I drew up the plans with exact inches. Since I'm not the math genius in the family, I had my husband figure out exactly how to divide up the boards to get the best use of them.

We purchased 8 pieces of 6ft 1" x 12"s, measured them out, cut them, and pieced them together. (Okay, so most of that was my husband. But whatever. I totally helped.)

When we finally got it upstairs and installed, I was so pleased! But I was also wishing I had painted it. Oh well. I can always paint it later.

Here is the before, middle, and after of our brand spanking new USEFUL storage space in our laundry room:

BEFORE:

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See how pitiful? I know. And to think that our builder didn't put any shelving up. We had to do that sad job ourselves.

MIDDLE:

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Much better! Oh, and see my new ironing board?

AFTER:

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Oh how I love thee, beautiful storage space! And yes, all those bags at the top are diapers. (We have always liked to stock up before our little ones arrived.)

6 comments:

Melissa823 said...

I'm not usually a jealous person, but I think I'm in love. It looks totally awesome!!!

Melissa823 said...

ok, second comment of the day - I just emailed these pictures to my husband...We're gonna be debt free in a month and I NEEEEEEEEEEED this :) Thanks for posting. You rock!

Anonymous said...

This is definitely inspiring! I have room in this house to put any of my stockpile items (like diapers). Hubby isn't going to like it when he sees these pics, lol.

Thankfully I can get the wood for free. There is a place down the street from us that builds library furniture. They set their 'scraps' out for the taking at night. It's expensive wood and they aren't 'scraps' in most people's minds, they'd be perfect for this!!!

TY for posting this!

Anonymous said...

*PP here...I meant DO NOT have room in this house obviously. :)

Heidi Stone said...

I'm glad this post has been helpful to a few of you. Melissa, we waited until we were debt-free as well. :)

TheFiveDays said...

Beautiful! I love this! Thanks for sharing the pictures.