Makeover Monday – Kids Storage Cubby

Sorry for the hiatus – I guess after NaBloPoMo, I needed a break.

As I mentioned before, I have a real child-made-mess in my house every afternoon.  I’m far from being a neat freak, but this could get overwhelming and I needed a fix.

I’ve long admired cute kids’ cubbies, but I’ve never been fond of the accompanying price tags.

$340.90

Enter my fabulous father, and a bunch of scrap wood that he and I both had leftover from various other projects. 

Unfortunately we don’t have a mud room in this house – the garage door opens into the kitchen – so I needed a cubby that would stay in the garage.  And because the garage is one space in our house that is super organized, I also needed a custom cabinet made to fit in a specific area. 

The end result:

I wanted 3 storage sections for each of the girls (adult coats have a separate set of hooks on the wall).  The cubbies are 16 inches deep, allowing plenty of room for wide backpacks and heavy winter coats to be fully contained within.  The overall unit is 48 inches square, allowing me to have nice large spaces for the girls, and making it very easy to use a half sheet of plywood for the back of the cabinet.

The small shelves at the top are perfect for lunch boxes for the older girls.  Since Lilly isn’t in school yet, I bought this perfectly sized basket (at Wal-Mart, natch) and it’s holding the kids’ mittens and scarves.

I installed 2 hooks in each cubby, one for a coat and one for a backpack.  One could easily go on the back of the cabinet as well, if you need another place to hang gear.  I’m still deciding whether or not to add them to store our soccer bags.  The girls have also been leaving their school shoes in the bottom of each, which has been especially nice.  No more last minute searching for one missing shoe!

Because our cabinet is in the garage, I also purchased a carpet runner to go in front, so they wouldn’t be walking through in the socks.  It’s exactly 48 inches long, too! 

Bought that perfection at Wal-Mart as well.

And it sits directly beside the door to the house, so while their things are completely hidden and out of the way, they are still very conveniently located.  A win-win!  This is a storage solution that literally transformed my kitchen, and it happened immediately.  The clutter vanished - how often can you say that?

This cabinet was constructed in one day, and cost about $60 including paint.  Yours could possibly be done for less if you don’t put legs on the bottom – the legs added about $15 to the total.  It is a fairly straightforward and easy DIY project, and if you have a saw and a drill, you can make this happen.  In fact, you could have the boards cut at the store and not even need the saw!

Have a makeover project?  I’d love to hear about it!  Have questions about how to build your own?  I’d be happy to help! 

Answer the questions, that is - not build your cubby.  I’ll be too busy with my next project!