Easy garage mud room

Do you have little things in your house that just make you smile every single time you see them?

I have a few. The first is my gray and white striped hallway. I can see it from my bed and I love waking up and seeing it every morning! It's been quite a while since I did it, but it still makes me so happy.

With kids going to and from school in my near future, I have been wanting a mud room in the worst way. In Utah, kids walk to elementary school in all kinds of weather--rain, snow, slush, mud. I don't want all that coming in my house!

We don't have a back entryway in our house--the garage opens right into our nice family room--so I decided to create a little mud room in the garage itself.

I started by turning a tall, narrow shelving unit on it's side to create a bench with cubbies. Half of the cubbies are for storing our outdoor toys. I hung a wire shelving unit on the wall for even more storage. The other three cubbies are for my girls to keep their shoes and hats, mittens, scarves, blah blah blah, in. The yellow fabric bins are from Wal-Mart.

Now, I could have just thrown some hooks up on the wall behind the bench, but you know me. I always go overboard. Plus the wall was dented, scratched, covered in holes, and just in all-around bad shape. I still had a couple feet of fence left from when my neighbor's fence blew over last December, so I decided to use that instead. I propped it up behind the bench and then the girls and I went knob shopping at Hobby Lobby.

We bought six knobs to use as hooks. My personal favorite is the light blue one at the far left, although I really love the one right next to it, too. 
So to recap, when the girls come home from school all winter, they can sit on their bench and put their snow boots and snow clothes in their yellow bins and hang their coats and umbrellas on the hooks. And my house can stay clean.

Now going back to things in your house that make you smile every time you see them. While I was rearranging the garage, I found a can of light blue paint that I used when I painted my kids' little playroom--I thought it would be perfect for the garage door. I know it's something that no one will ever really see but me, but it was worth it. I love it so much!