3 simple things

I heard a phrase that I’ll never forget, one afternoon years ago between the hours of four and five o’clock on a weekday–the Oprah hour.

Oprah and Nate were talking about home (my favorite topic on the Oprah show!) specifically, the  front entry, and Nate casually said that when you walk inside “your home should rise up to greet you“.

I still don’t know exactly what that would sound like (I’m guessing Maya Angelo’s voice?) but I’m pretty sure my “front entry” is more laying on the sofa, binge watching Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt acknowledging me with barely a glance and uttering under its breath ‘her again?’.

***

My laundry room is my front entry.

It’s also my back porch, front porch, front door, pantry, catch-all, guest bathroom, recycling overflow holder place, cat scratching room, drop off for golf clubs, shoes and jackets, and anything else we don’t want to mess up the house with.

greetings

My Laundry Room doesn’t rise up and call me blessed.

Our poor laundry room is a Jack of all Trades, a Room of All Purposes, also known as a Big Mess.

It’s the hardest working room in our house, the one that gets all of the abuse and none of the attention.

Instead of being annoyed at the lack of storage, weird layout and why in the world is our house faced in a direction that everyone only comes to our back door/laundry room to enter our house…today I’m going to tell you why I’m okay with this room.

I’m okay with this room because it exists.

Some of you know exactly what I mean. As much as our laundry room could be so much prettier and efficient, I’m thrilled because we actually have a laundry room!

It’s so great! I’ve lived in enough houses to know better than to complain about this big area where my washer and dryer live.

The fact that it’s often a mess really means one thing–it saves the rest of the house from being just as messy.

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No matter the state of your laundry room, laundry closet, washer & dryer area, wing of your mansion where your servants do your laundry, there are three things I’ve noticed that can elevate your personal laundry experience (or your servant’s laundry experience).

windows

Light.

Dark laundry rooms just add to the depression of doing work.

Even in a basement laundry room with no windows, instead of relying on that one flashing overhead fluorescent light–give yourself the gift of a lamp, or a few lamps!

Shop the house, raid the attic, or splurge on the lamp of your dreams–it doesn’t matter, you at least deserve to do your chores in a well-lit area. If you are lucky enough to have windows, consider doing what I did and removing all of the blinds–I want every single drop of natural light to enter my room.

basket

Pretty Hiding Places

The laundry area is a workhorse, and some of the stuff we store there isn’t all that pretty. I’m always on the lookout for pretty baskets. We even keep the bottom half of a hutch in the laundry room to store extra kitchen stuff. It wasn’t my first choice, but we had it, it hides a bunch of randomness, and it’s pretty.

swing shelf

Moments of Delight

When I knew I wanted to make a rope swing shelf, there was only one place in my house that made sense for it to go–the laundry room. And that annoyed me because I don’t love our laundry room and it felt like I was wasting my most adorable DIY project in a room I didn’t love.

But, really, it was the perfect place for the shelf. Putting something special in an unfinished room actually made me like the room more. Even an undone room–especially one you use every day, deserves some love.

Other ways to add moments of delight: put down a pretty rug, bring in a plant or cut some branches and place them in a vase, light a good smelling candle, or treat yourself to the laundry soap that smells wonderful.

If we have to be in our laundry area, let’s make it more bearable!