Day 10 - Laundry Room Closet - Mini Mudroom Area

It's Day 10 of the 31 Days to a Clutter Free Home Series. Thanks for sticking with me as we work our way thru the home busting clutter in every space! As mentioned on Day 5 when we were discussing laundry rooms, I said we have a place to put away bags and coats. Today I'm going to show that to you. I call it the "Mudroom".

Mudrooms are so cool. Who would not LOVE to have a super-functional mudroom like some of these images I found on Pinterest?

I just love the cheerful orangy paint color in this one.

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The beadboard and storage cubbies are so beautiful in this one.

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And oh wow...reclaimed wood!

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As usual, I'm inspired by Sarah Richardson!

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I would even settle for a mudroom in a closet like one of these!

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But we all must face reality, and work with what we have. And our laundry room is kind of a hallway. On the right side is a big empty wall. On the left side is a closet that contains the water softener, followed by our chest freezer and washer and dryer. There's only about 35" across in that walkway.

Now, granted, we could get rid of the chest freezer and build / buy some sort of bench or something for sitting down, taking shoes off, etc. But for our family, we'd rather have the freezer to store meat and save money at the grocery all year long.

Also, our breaker box is located on the side of the closet and you can't build cabinets within 3 ft in front of it, so wipes out building any shelves over the bench as shown in the first few photos above.

In the past, we had some hooks on the wall on the right (as you can see in the below photo taken during the remodel). But the problem was they were ALWAYS in the way. You would inevitably bump a purse or coat, knocking it down, on your way in the door. It was not a fun way to be welcomed home. Not to mention, it looked cluttery. And this is the entrance we use 99% of the time to our home.

So our solution was to use what little space is available inside the water softener closet for a little "mini mudroom".

I bought an over the door rack from Target for hanging our most frequently used coats and the diaper bag.

The top shelf is for the gym bag and a basket containing an umbrella, my purse, and a couple other bags (and hats and gloves in the winter).

The photo below gives you an idea of how tiny this closet is. But we are determined to make the most of it. There's enough room to hang 3-5 large coats to the right of the water softener.

And on the right wall we have an iron & ironing board stored in a rack that's mounted to the wall.

On the floor we keep our stepstool, 2 fire extinguishers and a trash can.

Even though our space is limited, we were able to fit in a "mini mudroom" in this utility closet to keep our laundry room looking clutter free. Does this give any of you ideas on how to declutter your main entryways?