Ikea Hacking Update - Expedit and Drona make my closet happy!

As previously noted my Pooky Bear and I did a lot of work a while ago in adding furniture and accessories to my room and making it look pretty.  I didn't really have time to fix my closet then, because I knew how much work it would really be, so I waited until this weekend to dive in. 

This wound up being a great project.  It was nice to have Pooky Bear's guidance in the inital steps of the craft project (as well as her manual labor in assembling Ikea furniture) but I got to do enough of it myself that I gained a lot of confidence.  I now have faith in my ability to touch fabric without catastrophe.  Reorganizing the closet, and most of the rest of my house was also a confidence booster.  It was nice to feel like I have power over my surroundings, environment, life.  I spent so much of the end of last year feeling out of control on so many different levels that it was a move in the right direction to be thinking and acting like, "I have enough money to do this; I have enough time to do this; I have enough space for the things I want; I have enough to be generous as well".

How did I do it and what did it look like?  First up, some before photos of the empty bins waiting for new clothes and the closet just waiting to oblige.  (Yes, you've seen these before.)

I started by emptying the bins out of those stupid hanging shelves, them emptying the top shelves of the close and the stuff off the floor of the closet as well.  Lots and lots and lots went to good will.  See that plastic box on the top shelf?  That was filled with clothes, plus two or three more bags of clothes, plus some household goods that needed to go too.

Filling up the Good Will bin.  There's tons of race shirts in there.

  
I had fourteen boxes to fill, two are staying empty for reasons best left to another post entirely.  In the course of everything, I realized the drawers from the abonimable hanging things could be used on the lower of the two shelves, which gave me some extra storage to play with as well.  It's not that I filled up all of the boxes, it's that I didn't want more than one category of "stuff" in any one box.  Running pants do not go with running shorts.  Running tanks do not go with long sleeve gear.  Etc. 

As predicted one closet reorganization led to another.  I actually took one of the god awful hanging shelf things and moved it to the front hall closet.  I got a bunch of cardboard to reinforce the 'shelves' which tend to sag, and then used duct tape to hold each 'shelf' in place. I used some of the little Ikea draw organizers on each shelf and used duct tape to hold them in place.  See, this is okay in the closet with the coats and boots.  It's only stupid in the part of the house where civilized people live.  I thought I took pictures of that closet but didn't.  That reorganization was followed by addressing some serious deficiencies in my filing organization system, as well as culling out several pounds of paperwork for shredding.  (Probably not needing bank statements from 2004 for an account that's closed anyways.) I didn't take pictures of that because what can you tell from the outside of a file box.

For those of you curious, my next project is figuring out where the hell I put everything.  It only took me 30 minutes to get dressed and locate my keys and shoes today so I guess that's a good start.