Reduce,Reuse,Recycle and Organization

As a Mom, one of the constant challenges seems to be organization!! If we do not set up easy to follow systems for organization, how can we expect our children to follow along?  Organizational systems have to change as your family's needs change.  Children grow older, have more or less small toys to store, join sports and now have a plethora of sports equipment,etc... We seem to have an overabundance of shoes around here too! We need an organizational overhaul around here and I am in search of simple solutions that are easy to stick with and follows one of our favorite family mottos: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.  We are trying to minimize the amount of stuff coming in and reuse what we already have and perhaps shift those things around to work better for us at this point in time.

The first area that needed a makeover is our garage entryway. This is a small space that used to be a closet with bifold doors. (we removed those beauties a few years ago) When you are coming in from the garage, you walk right past this area and through another door leading to the hall and kitchen.  The basement stairs are open to this small area and are in front of the closet area.  Here is a view from the hall doorway:

And another pretty shot standing on the basement stairs looking forward:

Yikes! So, I took the casters off of a white one of these:

Placed it on top of the current shoe rack, added a coat rack and a sign with one of our favorite mottos on it and voila:

Used what we had and streamlined our systems.  This is where muddy boots can go and winter hats,gloves,scarfs, sports equipment/spare lunch bags in the bins.  Easy to see so no one can tell me "I don't know where it goes!" :)

By the way, did anyone try the Cream Wafer Cookie recipe I posted? If you did, be sure to let me know what you thought!