The Laundry Room.
You’d think it’d be a clean room, given that the primary function of the room is cleaning. Yet, it seems to be “Most Likely to Succeed” in the contest for clutter.
I know many houses don’t have a laundry room. They might have a hall closet. In Tennessee we see washers and dryers on the front porch sometimes. I can’t decide if it makes a small laundry room to have it on the porch or a huge one, since you’ve got the whole great outdoors.
Anyway, whatever your laundry space is, it needs to be orderly if you are going to get in there to do laundry.
In our current house, we have a decent sized laundry room/half bath. If you don’t mind your knees hitting the dryer while you sit, it’s really not a problem. And what is more entertaining if you are going to be there a while, than watching clothes tumbling around in front of you?
I’m just kidding. There is enough room to sit comfortably without hitting your knees on the dryer. But you really cannot open the dryer door, so don’t even think about using the closed potty as a seat while you fold clothes. 🙂
Our laundry room is in the finished basement. The walls are cinderblock and theres’ just a tiny window near the ceiling, which made it feel a little dungeon-ish at first. Once I got over my Cinderella complex, I spent a little time trying to make our laundry room fun.
I let my littlest two (at the time I was painting) smack paint-covered hands on the wall for this one:
And over the potty, Mike thinks I got a little carried away…
By the way, the walls are more of a spring green than they look in the pictures. Here it looks like we peed on the walls.
We didn’t. Really.
The bright color and fun images, along with white cabinets and adding an Ikea desktop for a folding counter, work together to make the laundry room feel less dungeon-ish and more like a room I’d like to spend time in. I’m sure I would really enjoy it if I liked doing laundry.
I don’t.
But laundry happens, so I thought it was a good idea to make the best of it.
One thing that helps me is to have what I need handy and accessible.
- We have a rod with hangers for clothes which need to hang straight from the washer or dryer.
- I have hooks to hold mesh bags for delicates. We also use these for socks. It keeps the whole lot together which makes them easy to fold, keeps them from disappearing by halves, and helps me know to whom they belong.
- A shelf over the washer and dryer holds laundry soap, baking soda, oxy clean, spot cleaner, and dryer sheets. (Oh – here’s a nifty trick! Cut your dryer sheets in halves or thirds or quarters. They keep the static away and last 2-4 times longer. We have a large capacity washer/dryer, so halves work well for our LARGE loads. But I used to use quarters in more traditionally sized machines.)
- The ironing board lives at the end of the washer/dryer area. Since I really only use it for sewing and crafts, I’m about to move it to the sewing area, though. But if you actually iron clothes, it’s nice to have it nearby.
- And empty laundry baskets sit on top of a low cabinet near the washer and dryer.
That’s it. A simple, organized, easy-to-use, fun-ish laundry room!
Oh – and extra laundry supplies live with all my other cleaning supplies. I just refill as necessary.