Hello Storage Boxes

Dear Ikea, 

You have really outdone yourself on this one.

Oh, and they come in Navy too.

I am a person who loves the finer things in life (although most I cannot afford) so I truly appreciate Ikea and other stores that tend to offer great items at an equally great price.  The problem here is that they usually tend to lack a whole lot of charm - but Ikea has really turned that around with these storage boxes.  Not only the grasscloth look on these guys but adorable labels as well.  I haven't seen them in person yet but I'm thinking I need to head to my nearest Ikea asap and get my hands on some of these. 

Check 'em out. 

Hello Pantry

I've been dreaming of a pantry as of recently. I think it is all still a part of my organization kick that started back in November. I got off to a good start but if you saw my house now, you would not know it.

We will be redoing our second bathroom this spring (the first one is 95% finished and I refuse to do a post on it until it is completely done and being used daily - which I hope, pray, and wish will be soon!). Moving on to the point of all of this - the bathroom is unnecessarily large for a second bathroom - there is plenty of space for a bath tub, vanity, and toilet with plenty of room to spare. This bathroom just so happens to back up to our kitchen.

Because there is a kitchen reno in the distant but hopefully not too distant future - I came up with a plan to close up the back portion of the bathroom so that when we do reno the kitchen we can open up a doorway into that space and have a nice little pantry. I made a lovely slideshow with images for my husband to present the idea to him. I think he's in - and if not he will be when it's actually time (crossing fingers). I apologize for the length of the explanation, but hopefully you can start to see how manic my brain really is. If you read through all that I am totally impressed and your reward is my favorite pantry inspiration photos.

I definitely want to be able to squeeze in a small desk space like the on pictured above. I'm thinking this will be pretty close to the actual amount of space that we will have. I hope. My major goal is for it to be a functional space - help keep kitchen items organized - maybe a nice little space to make coffee - and a small, cramped place to sit by myself and pay bills, blog, and dream about what part of the house I'll work on next.

I would love to add a pretty chandelier like this one.

I love the little pass through in the one above - we won't be getting that fancy nor will we have anywhere near this much space but the cabinetry and backsplash in this one is perfect.

I'm hoping it will be the epitome of organized like this one from Emerson Made

Lots of white dishes - perfection!

And I will definitely need a place for my cookbooks.

And a place for an amazing espresso machine like in the one above or below would not be too shabby either.

What would you include in your dream pantry? And if you already have one I'd love to hear how you use it - is it truly a functional space or just somewhere you throw canned goods and things you don't want anybody to see?

I believe that I borrowed all of the images from Houzz and I know the last one is Martha - if you have any more det's on sources please do share and I will add them.

Hello Linen Closet (Part 2)

So here is how our linen closet started, kind of. Really we had a whole closet with only two little wooden shelves - which couldn't hold much. My husband ripped those out and then spackled the areas of the walls that were ripped up from the shelves. This is what we were left with.

So we went ahead and repainted the area and then went to the Container Store last week during the 25% off Elfa sale and picked up just the bare bones - metal wire shelves and the brackets needed to hang them. Next stop was Homegoods to pick up some baskets to help organize some of our smaller and our mismatched items. Here are the after photos.

This large basket on the bottom was only $30 at Homegoods. It now stores our air mattress, steamer/iron, and vacuum attachments.

Now as you can see from my close up I don't have the same sheet folding talents as Martha, but it gets the job done. I also watched a youtube tutorial on how to fold a fitted sheet - this had always alluded me.

One basket is dedicated to table linens, the other large basket stores random blankets, the medium basket has hand towels and washcloths, and the smallest basket on the bottom stores our pillow cases and shams.

We also did put the door back on but I forgot to get photos of that.

So there you have it. Not quite as pretty as my inspiration photos but surely much more organized than our prior space and it will definitely be much more functional for us now.