Yes, Your Laundry Room Can Be Your Favorite Place in the House

Though many people have a messy laundry room, it doesn’t have to be that way. It can be everyone’s favorite room in the house. With a little decorating and organization, your laundry roon can become a little jewel box in your home. With these steps and tips, you can start enjoying your hard-working laundry room.

Step 1: Engage the Clutter

Yep, that’s right. Before organizing anything, you need to take care of the clutter first. For many households, the laundry room is full of clutter and useless messes. You may be surprised how much of that is clutter. Clutter includes broken objects, any trash, and things that just don’t belong in the laundry room.

To start, identify the trash. Then, properly dispose of it all (remember to recycle).

Once that’s done, find anything that is broken. Is it unnecessary to keep? Is it practically trash? You should probably throw it away. Now, identify anything you don’t use or want anymore. Consider throwing it away, or donating it.

Once all of the clutter is gone, you should be just left with the essentials, so it’s time to move to step 2.

Step 2: Pull it all Together

To make way for thorough cleaning and future storage, you should get all laundry room objects together. Everything except for large furniture and your washer and dryer should be taken out and put into your hallway. Try to keep everything as organized as possible (in preparation for step 4). Once you have all of the small things out, your laundry room should already look cleaner. Even if it already looks clean, you should proceed to step 3.

Step 3: Clean the Laundry Room

You guessed it. With everything out of the way, a thorough initial cleaning should be much easier. When you clean your laundry room after this, it doesn’t have to be so thorough, but you’ll want a clean foundation the first time.

To start, you’ll want to sweep the floors. Get all of the corners. Don’t be afraid to pull out the washer and dryer. You may even want to move some furniture. Once done with sweeping, mop before you put the washer, dryer, and furniture back in place.

Once done with the floors, wipe down furniture, shelving, and your washer and dryer. Pay some extra attention to your dryer. Make sure the lint collector is clean – you don’t want the risk of fire. If there are any black marks or streaks in the dryer, you can use a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser or a regular pencil eraser.

If your laundry room has a window, keep the blinds open and pull the curtains away. You may even want to open the window for a fresh breeze. Having sunlight lets the room feel fresher, and it’s more inviting. It will also make dust more noticeable.

By thoroughly cleaning the floors, and by wiping down surfaces and furniture, you should notice a much cleaner laundry room. Now you can move to step 4.

Step 4: Sort and Organize

When, sorting and organizing things you’re going to store in your laundry room, you should have a few different groups. These groupings might include:

• linens (towels, sheets, pillow cases, wash clothes, duvets, duvet covers, quilts, etc.)
• laundry products (detergent, fabric softener, color catchers, lint roller, clothes pins, clothes line, etc.)
• ironing supplies (iron, ironing board, starch, wrinkle remover)
• pet supplies (grooming supplies, trimmer, scissors, nail clippers, pet towels, etc.)
• cleaning products (mop, broom, cleaning gloves, bucket, floor cleaner, kitchen/bath cleaner, window cleaner, furniture cleaner, dusting supplies, toilet scrub brush, toilet cleaner, magic eraser, sponges, etc.)
• everything else (mostly, things that go elsewhere like clothes, loose change, etc.; put those things up now)

Wash all of your linens and then sort them.

For laundry products, sort them by purpose. If you have detergents, put them together. Sort them by who uses them, if any family members have allergies to a particular detergent. Then look at fabric softeners and other products. Keep them in their own pile – you’ll store them in the next step.

For pet supplies, you’ll want to have a designated area. Keep medicine and food together, and store grooming products separately. Keep in mind that some supplies, foods and medicines should not be stored in a hot and potentially damp area like a laundry room.

Finally, if you have anything else, sort it into piles by purpose.

Now you have everything organized and sorted. It’s time to move to the final step!

Step 5: Make it Pretty & Add Storage

This is where your creative senses come into place. Depending on the size of your laundry room, space for storage may be limited. Assess your situation, and decide which storage options are best for you. But, here are some ideas, just so you can get the ball rolling:

• Hang your ironing board behind the door.
• Hang your mop, broom and dustpan.
• Have a pretty jar for small things that you pulled from pockets.
• Use shelving to store extra linens, towels, beach towels and laundry supplies.
• Use bins for towels and laundry.
• Have drawers for laundry products.
• Hang a pretty picture or two on the wall.
• Or, print out some of your favorite family or travel photos and tack them to the wall (in an area where they won’t get damp).
• Add some cute curtains with fun tie-backs (buttons, silk flowers, ribbons, etc.).
• Place a mat by your sink or washer with a fun saying on it.
• Paint one wall your favorite color … or if you feel extra-motivated, paint it stripes of several cheery colors. Try to keep the other walls a light color (white can be pretty).
• Put a tiny folding chair and folding table in there for folding (or for hiding and having a cup of coffee!)
• Replace any cracked or damaged flooring.
• Switch out your overhead fluorescent light with a pretty chandelier if possible.
• Designate a spot to hang clothes to dry.
• If you have the space, add white PAX cabinetry from IKEA to add a linen closet or broom closet without the expensive of hiring a contractor.
• If you wash your dog in the laundry sink, corral all the dog grooming supplies in a pretty basket, easy-to-clean box or drawer.
• Make your laundry room do double duty by adding some mud room features (storage for shoes, backpacks and jackets).
• Or, if you have a small home, your laundry room can double as an office if you add a wall-mount, fold-down desk so you can get a little paperwork done.
• Hide the bottom of an exposed laundry sink with some pretty fabric.
• Hang a calendar and chore chart on one wall for your family.
• Add one or more green potted plants near the sink or window to keep the air fresh (think: aloe). Don’t forget to water them.
• Store your cleaning supplies and other toxic materials/liquids up high and away from children and pets.

Once you’ve found creative and adequate storage for everything in your laundry room, you can consider the job done! Of course, you’ll want weekly or monthly maintenance of your laundry room, such as basic cleaning. But, with thoughtful care, you hopefully won’t have to go through this process again!

Keeping a clean and organized laundry room is essential for keeping it functional and minimizing stress.

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Sources:

https://morningchores.com/laundry-room-ideas/

https://housewifehowtos.com/get-organized/organizing-the-laundry-room/

https://www.cleanandscentsible.com/how-to-organize-the-laundry-room-june-hod/

https://organized31.com/laundry-room-organization/

https://www.wikihow.com/Organize-a-Laundry-Room