A Closet Obsession with Order

My closet was a wreck and since I hardly ever manage to close the doors on that thing, I decided it was time to get to work. And so after a variety of trips to Lowe’s and a few other places I settled on the Rubbermaid closet system and bought a closet kit plus a few additional items to trip out my closet. I managed to find other places for my clothing for a while, removed the shelf and bar and got started.
The Rubbermaid system goes in relatively easily, my worst problems were fighting with the stud finder that seemed to give some pretty inconsistent readings. I finally got a screw into each stud and hung the top horizontal bar, the long vertical bars hang from that. Each one went in pretty quickly and easily with a screw at the bottom to hold them in place. The brackets have a little plastic do-hicky that snaps in place once the shelf is installed and that keeps the shelves securely in place. All in all I was pretty impressed at how easily the system went together and how secure it felt when it was in. It was far better than I thought wire shelving would be.

I started adding clothing and realizing that the new system gave me more rod space, but it was still going to be a tight fit to get all my stuff in that little closet. We’ve had some pretty nice closets over the years, I’ve been a little spoiled. But I knew I could make this one work. It took a while to go through the clothing, trying things on and making assessments about what still worked and what didn’t, but totally worth it.

I made another shopping trip, this one dedicated completely to shopping for hangers. I was in one store where there were some great looking hangers in the display, but some were broken. I considered that a bad sign and kept on walking. I love the look of a closet where all the hangers are consistent and while it took me a few tries to find a store that had enough of the right kind of hangers in stock. I did finally come home with three bags of hangers. Hanging everything and getting it organized was fun. I had no idea I had so many long sleeve shirts of the same color. It’s funny what you realize about your shopping patterns when you get a good look at what you actually have. Apparently I purchase tops in pink/fuchsia, lime and turquoise. Now that I know that, I can fix it. Today I bought purple! =)
I have more shoes than I thought. And getting them all organized in the shoe cubby (thanks to my hubby who put that piece together for me) was fun. Now I can reach for a pair of shoes in no time and I’m now free of the dozens of shoe boxes piled in the floor of my closet. I haven’t worn many of those shoes in a long time just because I didn’t even remember what all I had. And at 25 pairs of shoes (boots stored elsewhere) it is reasonable to think that if I purchase a new pair, removing an old pair shouldn’t be that big of a deal. I already parted with some and that’s great. Notice that I only have one pair of dress shoes that have a back on them, all the rest are either strappy or open back styles. I’m not a big fan of having shoes on the heel of my foot. I think I will keep an eye out for a pair of tennys though. I haven’t had sports related shoes in ages and since I’ve done some jogging lately, it might be good to have the right shoes for that. I suppose I’m a pretty good consumer, huh?!
Some of my favorite features of the makeover include having my jackets and blazers in the same closet with everything else and my tops organized by sleeve length and then color. I now have a tie rack that I use for hanging belts, scarves and tank tops. Love that!

And of course bins for clothing that just wasn’t made for hangers. All in all I’m pretty pleased with how it looks. And as I make my way through the weekend’s laundry, maybe most of it will fit and the rest can go to Goodwill. I do like having a place for everything and everything in its place.