No-Clutter-November: Bathroom, Part 1

Okay, today is the first official day of No-Clutter-November.  I'm so excited!  I was off work a little early today so that meant extra time for a trip to Walmart and Sutherlands to pick up some de-clutterizing supplies.  I decided my first project to tackle was the hall bathroom because it was honestly the easiest and I knew it wouldn't take long.  So, let's get to the before picture.  Oh yes, I am being totally honest and showing you my horrifying bathroom cabinet.

Okay, let's talk about this bad boy.  There are shelves built in that are not super useful.  I tried to rip them out, but I'm going to need a bigger hammer I think.  So, for now they stayed.  On the shelves on the right, a set of shampoo and conditioner, Windex, a make-up bag, and a trimmer.  On the shelves on the left, Nair, another make up bag, hair color developer, and sunscreen.  On the bottom we have a bottle of homemade shower cleaner, a big bin full of tampons and the like, another set of shampoo and conditioner, my big travel bathroom bag, some empty shopping bags for trashcan liners, blow dryer, and Cottonelle wipes.  Talk about a disorganized mess!  Every time I had to get anything out, I had to dig through a bunch of stuff to find what I needed/wanted.  That big blue bin ended up being a catchall.  If I didn't know what to do with something, it got chucked in there.  Ug.  

So, I pulled everything out.  I couldn't really take a picture of everything pulled out because our bathroom is tiny and I was sitting in my massive pile of junk.  But, everything came out so I could start with a nice empty cabinet.

I know, this looks really gross.  I need to get the shop vac after it.  And have my husband get rid of the (empty) mouse trap.  And then I need to paint it.  But, today was not the day for painting.  This was just a basic get organized day.  Maybe I'll get it painted when we replace the sink.  It would definitely be easier to paint the inside without the sink, the light would be much better.  Okay, even though it's ugly we have a clean slate.  Yippee!

I worked with what I had and I bought a couple of things.  Like I said, I left the existing shelves because I couldn't really figure out how to rip them out.  I have dreams of them being gone though.  Anyway.  I reused a white plastic drawer I already had.  I bought a plastic coated metal shelf, a plastic basket for toilet paper, and a metal basket to hang on one of the cabinet drawers to put my blow dryer and flat iron in.

Oh, it's so much better.  I may have to just go hang out and stare.  So, let's see what we have now.  On the left shelf we have all of the bottles together: shampoo, conditioner, sunscreen, hair color developer, body wash, and Cottonelle wipes.  On the right shelf we have cleaning supplies:  homemade shower cleaner, Mr. Clean Magic Erasers, and Windex.  Tampons and all that sort of thing go in the plastic drawer with the trimmer and a Ped Egg stacked on top.  A bin of toilet paper goes under the white shelf.  And on top, my travel bathroom bag and flat iron case.  All the little make up bags are stored inside the bigger bag.

And here's a view of the whole thing.  The metal bin holds my flat iron and blow dryer perfectly.  I may need to add something for the bottom so the cords don't fall through.  And my hand mirror (gotta check the back of the hair to make sure it's not crazy looking) hangs on the back of the other door.

Oh boy!  I am seriously so excited about this cabinet being organized.   I have been fighting bathroom cabinets since my first apartment.  The storage is never quite right.  In our house, we also have the battle of no drawers.  Not one of our three bathrooms has a drawer.  It's so frustrating.  We end up with lots of stuff on the counter.  

Someday I'll be back with an update once I've painted the inside.  What color do you think?  My upper cabinet is grey inside to match the walls.  I'm thinking white since it's so dark down there.  Anything's got to be better than the nasty wood.