2014 Deep Cleaning/Decluttering/ Organizing/Redecorating - Laundry Room

I mentioned in my final post for 2013 that I was planning to deep clean, declutter, organize and (in some cases) redecorate each room/space in our home. I made a list of each area (because I like to check things off) and came up with 26 rooms/spaces/areas to work on. My goal is to work through them all by June 30.

I decided to start with the laundry room because I knew it would be the easiest. :>) Some of you will recall that we completely remodeled the laundry room two years ago, so it was clean and organized and decluttered at that time. The room is only 5 1/2' x 10', so I figured it would be a quick job.

DEEP CLEANING: This room stays fairly clean, but it was time for some deep cleaning, so I started at the ceiling (took the vent cover off & cleaned it, took the light globe off & cleaned it, etc) and worked my way down to the floor (wiping down all the baseboards and vacuuming behind the appliances). Our extra refrigerator is in this room. It's getting old now and needs to be defrosted a couple of times a year because the drain pipe freezes up and water from the freezer goes into the refrigerator part instead of down into the drip pan underneath. It takes some work to empty it out and get it all cleaned and working properly again, but it's a labor of love for me because this is a special refrigerator. 

DECLUTTERING: What really surprised me was how much I was able to declutter from this room - items that I put on the shelves two years ago and we haven't used since. Here's a look at the bags I took to donate at our local community outreach center.

There were 4 chair cushions, 3 throw pillows, 1 Hoover vacuum belt (new in the package - we don't even own a Hoover anymore!), 6 insulated koozies, 2 old towels, 3 old tablecloths, a waiter's corkscrew (new in the package), a few small plastic clothes hangers, shelf paper remnants, and about 100 cookie cutters plus a package of 6 animal cookie cutters that were still new in the package.  (There's a funny story about those cookie cutters that I'll be sharing in a future post.)

I also threw away or recycled quite a few shopping bags and moved some of the cleaning rags out to the garage.

ORGANIZING: Once I removed the unused items, I was able to reorganize the shelves and drawers and bins so everything is once again easy to get to. There's even some extra space on the top shelf now!

REDECORATING: There were two things I didn't do during the remodel that I had wanted to do. The first was to add a clothes drying rack in the room. For years I've been putting a temporary hook over the door to hang clothes that need to dry. While this works perfectly, there's no way to shut the door all the way (and the clothes are hanging on the outside of the door anyway), so it's hard to hide the laundry if company comes by unexpectedly on laundry day! I found the perfect solution at the Container Store.

This rack will hold quite a few items, but the best thing is that it all folds up when not in use.

Did you notice the blue ironing board cover in that first photo? That was the second thing I wanted to change. We found a new cover at Target that matches the room much better.

Wow, I'm glad I started with this small room so I could get one item checked off my list. I think I'll work on the smallest closet next. Do you have any plans to declutter or deep clean or organize or redecorate this year?