Simplifying our Home: That One Dreaded Space

Do you have that one dreaded space in your home? The room or closet or cupboard that you just dread looking at? That one place where you put all of the stuff that you don't know what to do with? That place where you close the door when company comes over? That place that drives you so crazy that you just have to keep the door shut and keep walking past acting like you don't have a dirty little secret hidden behind that door? That space that makes you feel like you should be on Hoarders? I have that space. As much as I hate admitting it our space is a whole room.

We have a third bedroom in our house that I have struggled with since the day we moved in. Nobody sleeps there and we don't own an extra bed so I really wasn't sure what to do with it. It started as the place to put stuff because I didn't know what to do with said stuff. Obviously that didn't work for long since that is a nice way of saying it was just a dumping space for stuff that we didn't want to look at. I then tried it as a sort of craft room/book and movie storage room and guess what? It ended up as a dumping ground again. Yep I had a stuff dump.

I kept the door to that room closed as much as I possibly could. I really could not stand looking in there because it made me want to pull out my hair. I seriously cannot stand a mess. OK let me clarify because I do have a 3 year old so our house does get messy. I cannot stand a mess that can't be cleaned up in 5-10 minutes. I don't mind forts in the living room or books strewn across Ashlyn's bed. What I can't stand is a bunch of stuff that is taking up valuable space just because it is so disorganized. This is what I was dealing with.

One day I had enough and just started pulling it apart. I first purged the room and closet again and was able to add to my garage sale pile. I then went through the remaining stuff and was trying to figure how to deal with it. Then a light bulb went off in my head, why not put one of my shelving units in the closet! It completely changed the way I looked at how to organize that room. By putting the shelves in the closet I was able to organize all of my craft supplies and free up the room. I then moved all of the books from those shelves onto the existing shelf on the wall in the room.

I was amazed at how much space I now had to work with. I moved Ashlyn's dresser into the room (it didn't really fit in her room to well anyway). I now had the beginnings of a bedroom. I put all of the movies into the dresser along with my sewing machine and the CD's that we have. Yep we do still have CD's. I cannot believe that before I only saw a dresser as clothes storage. I blew up the air mattress that we own and threw some bedding onto it that I already had. I actually had a functional room!

I learned a lot from this little transformation. I learned to be open to new ideas when it comes to arranging your existing furniture. I learned to use pieces of furniture that I already own to serve me even if it is not for the intended purpose. I also learned that I don't need to spend money to get satisfaction out of my house. Now I love to keep the door open and look at the simple space that I created in an afternoon without spending a dime.