The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

As we approach a new year, it is customary to reflect on the past year and to set goals for the new year. This week I will post a recap of my favorite projects and posts for the year. (well, last three months anyway) but  today I am setting some decorating goals for myself in the new year. I am writing this down and telling all of you so I will be held accountable and forced to do it.

Everyone has them. Rooms that we avoid at all costs. I have spent the last few months showing all of you the pretty rooms and the mostly completed projects. Now I am focusing on the not -so -fun rooms that we all have.  Today you can see the real life...

Room 1 ~The Laundry Room...yes, I'm lucky to have one but it seems to be the catch-all room and is always a mess. I have plenty of cabinets but can't seem to keep anything in them. To make matters worse, you have to walk through it from our garage so that is the first room that everyone sees when they come in to the house. It is embarrassing because guests want to park in the driveway because of all of the steps up to the front entry so everyone sees the constant mess.

The two ugliest things in the room would be the fluorescent light fixture and the washer and dryer. We'll see what I come up with for that...

I seem to have a lot of storage but it's never enough. I'll have to be creative and I'll have to figure out what HAS TO stay in there and what can be moved somewhere else.
Goals for the laundry room:
1. Paint the dirty walls!
2. Hardware for the cabinets
3. Address the ugly light fixture
4. Hide or minimize the washer and dryer
5. Organize storage to keep things off of counters and floor
6. find cute laundry baskets

Room 2 ~ The Pantry ~ another organizing nightmare. Do you see a trend here?

I have found that guests see my pantry a lot. I'm always going in there for something or they are looking for the trash so why not make it as pretty as the kitchen?


Goals for the pantry
1. Containers for keeping "like" things together
2. better looking trash cans (mark one for recycle)
3. use the door for storage too in some way
4. maybe hang baskets from ceiling?
5. paint/ wallpaper or both
6. address ugly light fixture....again

Why don't builders take shelves all the way up to the ceiling and insist on using the ugliest light fixtures? Oh, the poor bugs that have lost their lives in this thing. Ewww.

Last but not least ~ Room 3~ The Workout/ Dog room

This is the room where the door stays shut when people come over. It is practical but also a hot mess.

The good side of the room.

The bad side of the room. My lab likes to eat molding. YAY me.

The ugly side of the room. Yes, that is the stuffing pulled out of the cushion... again.

Goals for the room....GIVE UP! No, I'm just kidding.
1. new molding
2. rug
3. some way to camouflage dog beds
4. something on walls
5. rearrange?
6. new cushion for Spencer...again

So, that's it. This is like weight watchers for decorating. I need your help to hold me to my goals. What's funny is that I've had friends call me a stepford wife before because of my neatness. Now the truth is out. I know I can't be the only one with these problems. If you'd like to share similar situations in your house, please feel free to comment. Hopefully, I can come up with some creative and cheap solutions to all of these issues. I'll keep you posted!