Laundry Room Makeover

I have been pretty unsatisfied with my laundry room for a while now. It is small, and has absolutely zero character. Besides the entry door, and the chalkboard door, it was pretty much lifeless. It has a white washer and dryer, white walls, white shelves and LOTS of junk filling those shelves. Most of the "junk" are things we use, almost on a daily basis. A few years ago, my husband, trying to overcome a major lack of storage space, added a second shelf above the original shelf in our laundry room. This shelf became a storage space for many of our rarely used, small kitchen appliances.

So, my friend, Betsy, has had a curtain hanging from the clothes bar in her laundry room for a while now. It hides all of the wall directly behind and above the washer and dryer. I have always thought it was cute, but it would never work for me because I use that clothes bar to air dry most of my clothes. I am 6' tall and have long feared highwaters! ha! So, rather than pay a lot of money for jeans or pants, only to have them shrink in length in the dryer, I have long been drying my pants elsewhere.

They say necessity is the motherhood of invention. And, while I'm sure I didn't invent this idea, it occurred to me that I can have a curtain in my laundry room and it can conceal my junk! So, I got a shower curtain tension rod, and a cute turquoise shower curtain at Target, and began. I had some extra red fabric that I cut up as if I were making a ragamuffin garland, and used it to tie the curtain to the rod. I hung it at the top of the wall, almost to the ceiling, concealing two rows of shelving, but not the clothing rod! Then, I found where Glidden was having a paint promotion and you could get a quart of paint in your choice of color for FREE!

Once my paint arrived, I got to work, and though it took a few days, I am pleased with the outcome. I re-hung several of the things I already had, to keep this makeover VERY low budget. I re-painted some of the little signs I had already in the room to make them match my red and turquoise theme.

Sorry for the blurry pic.This sign used to be green. While I do not think that I am a "desperate" housewife, I do love that show. When I found this sign, I had to have it, hanging it appropriately in the laundry room.
This sign used to be blue and it used to just say "laundry". I got a catalog in the mail the other day that had a sign with this saying on it, so I painted over the blue and made this.This calendar used to be hot pink. Again, sorry for the blurry pic.

I thought that my favorite thing about this laundry room would be this project:
My dad is known for his "salvaging skills". He "salvaged" this piece of iron gate (aka, pulled it from a trash pile) and I took it to my house. Jeremy cut the pretty part off of it to be hung in the back yard. I had this part left over and didn't know what to do with it. Then, I got the idea to make a drying rack for my delicate laundry. So, I spray-painted the iron, and went to Hobby Lobby to find a way to hang it. I had almost given up when I found the "Laundry" sign and it was 50% off of $12.99! My goal was to make it similar to this (which I have always wanted).

But, I would have to say my favorite part of this laundry room is now this:

I went to Target and Hobby Lobby looking for a cute rug, and couldn't find any in the style or price range that I liked. So, I decided to make my own. I took the blue chindi rug that was previously in the laundry room, painted it with the same paint as I used on the wall, cut smaller pieces of ragamuffin strips from the same fabric that I used to tie the curtain, and painted white polka dots on it to mimic the curtain.
I LOVE how it turned out, so whimsical!

My low cost laundry room makeover is now complete, and it only cost $43.47+ tax!

Now, if I could just convince hubby to get me these, the room would be complete! HA! :)