A Lighter & Brighter Laundry Room

Hi friend!  I kind of took an unintentional blogging break (but intentional social media break so I guess it just kind of follows?) over the holidays and so now here we are toe-deep into 2019!  To backtrack, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you!  We stayed home this year (our usual has been to travel to family every year) and we just had a grand old time.  It was care-free, so very peaceful, and so good for us in preparing for the celebration of Jesus’ birth.  How was yours?  Did you travel?  It’s always a brave undertaking to travel during Christmas, right?  We did get a few things around the house done too – we painted our master bedroom and bathroom!  I’ll have more updates on them later but things are looking so much better!!

Today, I’m just going to jump right back into it and show youl what’s changed in our laundry room. 

Here’s what it looked like right before we moved in:

I took this picture in the afternoon, when the lighting is the darkest in here but even so, this room is bright for the first part of the morning and darker throughout the rest of the day.  We brought our own washer and dryer with us and the two that were left were pretty old and dirty so it was nice to get ours up and running again (our previous, temporary rental had a washer and dryer so we stored our beloved Frigidaires in the garage for that six months and I missed them dearly). 

With a fresh coat of white paint (Pure White by SW) and that morning light coming in bright, here’s what it looks like today:

We took down the shelves that were on that far wall, spray painted the brackets white, cut some new shelves (out of particle board we had bought to make the kids’ bunk beds that never happened), and hung them over the washer and dryer where they are a little more functional and accessible.  I chose not to paint them just because I was lazy but had I a smidge more motivation, they’d be white  me thinks.  Also out of that piece of particle board, Anthony measured and cut a piece to fit right over the top of the washer and dryer to give us a countertop.  So, shelves + countertop = about $30.  We’ll leave the shelves with the house when we say goodbye in the next year or so but the countertop will come with us.  (Note:  I painted the countertop with some semi-gloss Glidden paint we had leftover from painting something in our old house and it has NOT held up well to things being placed on it.  You can’t tell from the picture but there are several marks and scratches.  So, you might see this counter get a marble paint/contact paper treatment in the future.)

Next to the washer is stacked our drying rack, the hamper for dirty towels, and our recycling bin.  It’s not the most glamorous set-up and really, it kind of drives me crazy, but *breathe*, it’s temporary.  Other little details:  the baskets are a few years old but from JoAnn Fabrics (still available!), the vase on the window sill is an old thrift find (similar), and the hanging macrame on the wall is originally from Target that I found at Dirt Cheap for $6.

On the other side of the room is this shelf I painted and stenciled way back when, piled with lots of different things we kept in our old laundry room plus some overflow items that would’t fit into our small kitchen – tin foil, plastic wrap, etc…, our blender, glass baking dishes, bug spray, the shop vac… 

On the side of the shelf is an ironing board holder I bought and not-so-discreetly nailed to the side.  I had grand plans, when we first moved in, of finding a tall, narrow pantry cabinet to fit into this corner into which all of this stuff could go and be hidden behind closed doors but that pantry cabinet never showed up in any of my searches and so I’ve given up. 

The roman shade was one of the three I bought secondhand – the other two are in the living room and kitchen.

There’s really nothing glorious about this change besides the fact that things are a lot brighter in here than before, thanks to about $55 in cash.  If we owned this house, I’d spend even more effort finding a pantry and I’d paint it white to match the kitchen and add matching hardware.  I’d also swap out the open shelving for a closed cabinet system and put in a pretty chandelier (thrifted and updated, obviously. )  The floor would be different because I’d want to say goodbye to that big rust stain from the old water heater that used to take up residence here (the house was fitted with a tankless water heater a few years ago and we have really liked being able to experience having one – we’ll probably go tankless if we ever have the opportunity in the future!)

Right now we’ll keep on trucking on the master bedroom and bath and hopefully get some updates up in the coming weeks.  After that, we’ve officially made over every single room in this house and therefore, have successfully made it “home”.  2019 will probably see us buying and moving into our next fixer upper so THAT’S exciting, right?

Ok, ok, maybe only to us.  Humor me.  ;)

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Pssst, if you want to see another (better) laundry room transformation, check out our old one!