an organized art/craft supply closet for kids

so if you read my last blog post then you know that i am preggie with baby #3 (!) and after i started feeling less like throwing up every moment of the day and started getting more energy back, hubby and i were spurred into working on organizing some stuff around the house, purging stuff we don't need or that doesn't serve our family well and figuring out what we do need.

one of the issues that i wanted to work on was where to put all the kids art supplies and crafty supplies.  they were located in a few different spots in the house, a drawer here and a cabinet there.  and they were disorganized and not easy to get to and see.  another thing we had to figure out was cleaning out the guest room closet.  it's the guest room for now and will have to be a nursery/guest room in the future so we have to empty out the closet and put a closet system in it so that we have a place for this new baby's clothes and all that stuff and still have space for guests to put their clothes.  but we had a lot of random stuff in that closet; frames, artwork and pictures, party supplies, art and craft supplies, a sewing machine, coats and my wedding dress among other stuff.  that was a big undertaking in itself, but that's for another post.

i was chatting with a couple of my girls about where to put all the art supplies; i wanted one spot for all of it, i wanted it to be organized, accessible to the kids but also with the ability to lock it all up when needed.  i was trying to figure out a good space for this.  my friend said she would use a closet if she had an extra one.  i thought about it for a moment and then remembered i have a broom closet that had a broom, our steam mop, a bucket and some random stuff.  we never really got around to organizing it well for all the cleaning supplies. i figured i could move all the stuff in the closet to the laundry room since that's where we have all the cleaning supplies anyway, and the i could convert the broom closet into the art supply closet.

i ran this all by hubby and he agreed it was a good idea.  that was a thursday or friday i think.  by tuesday it was done, haha.  hubby went to lowe's to get some lumber so that we could build shelves.  since the closet isn't very deep we decided to use 1x2's to build supports for the shelves instead of trying to find brackets that were the right size and shape.  also, it was way less expensive than buying 5 sets of brackets.  so hubby cut, sanded and stained the shelves while i cleaned and painted the inside of the closet.  then hubby installed the shelves and i started gathering everything that i needed to organize, all the supplies and then the bins and containers i would need to organize it all.  i made a trip to the dollar store and got some clear bins and a few baskets to add to the stuff i already had.  then it was just a matter of going through alllll the stuff.  i went through every pen and marker, crayon and colored pencil.  anything that was broken or didn't work i got rid of.  same with glue, glue tickets, paints, play-doh, etc.  the kids' stuff was relatively easy to organize.  it was my craft stuff that was trickier.

i wanted all the crafty and art supplies to be in the same place.  but i had a huge cart with drawers of supplies.  i went through all of it.  in the cart and in the closet and in another closet.  i got rid of stuff and consolidated and put some of the things in other places (like the frames and things that i want to keep in another bin somewhere else).  and i was actually able to consolidate everything into the top shelf and then the shelf under that we were able to put our board games.

and this system has worked well!  the kids are able to open the doors and grab some paper and markers or whatever they want that's at their level.  and we have this child proofing lock for the top of bi-fold doors, so we are able to lock the doors so that the kids can't get into it all the time, especially when we don't want them to.  it has been working pretty well so far and i'm really happy with how everything turned out.  and it did not cost us very much, maybe under $40 or so.  wooohoooo!

i don't really have a good before photo of the closet, it's a really awkward space to try to photograph because it's in the hallway so there just isn't much space, but it's a closet, you know?  here it is while i was in the middle of painting it.  for the before picture just imagine a steam mop and a couple of brooms, and there you go

here's the after

kids' games and stuff like that

markers, crayons, coloring books/etc, play-doh, paint, stamps

activities, then little jars of colored pencils, brushes, and then on the right are scissors, tape/glue, and other smaller items

more detailed shot; large markers, chalks, scissors, etc

there's another shelf with beads, pipe cleaners, pom-pom and clothes pin activities, stuff like that

these top two shelves have the adult board games and then all my craft supplies