The Utility Room

At The Point
17 Comments

As we make a slow tour around our house, I guess I should show you the less glamorous spaces.  I mean, it’s not all monograms and white pitchers.

There’s a door in the kitchen that leads to a room about10′ x 10′  serving as the laundry room/pantry.  We call it the utility room.

When we bought the house this little room housed a washer and dryer, water heater, water softener and that was it.  We rearranged and added a wall with shelves to make a pantry also.

Next to the door we keep things like bbq needs, work gloves, reusable grocery bags, etc.  Below that is the clothes hamper. I took the frame from one that was intended to hold three sections and made one big bag for it.  We put colors in there, or things that get washed in cold.  The black hamper next to it is for things that go in hot (whites, towels, underwear, etc).  This is the only place the kids put their dirty clothes.  I make sure they are both empty (or less than a load) every night before I go to bed.  That way we never lose control of the laundry.

On top of the washer we keep plastic laundry baskets.  The larger, rectangular ones are for general laundry.  The smaller, round ones are for individual laundry.  Everyone has a small one with their name on it.  Those get filled with clean clothes and sent to their rooms.  The little convection oven on the dryer is for the summer.  In the hottest part of the year the kitchen heats up too much, so we use this little oven in the utility room for the kids to make their lunches.

We also keep an extra trash can in this room…it’s for kitchen overflow.

On the two opposite walls we have the  pantry.

Because we eat a lot of fresh foods, these are things that we just consider staples.  Canned goods, spices, snacks.  I can always pull out something from here if we get in a pinch for dinner.

You’ll see a lot of cake mixes….I buy them when they are on sale.  It makes it easy to whip up something when we have unexpected guests, which happens often.

I love the openness of the pantry.  I can see everything without digging.

We keep our farm shoes under this shelf.  The kids only wear these when they are out attending to the animals.  That way these shoes never get worn around in the house.  Several of them were out with the animals when I took this picture.  There are usually a bunch of Crocks here.

So that’s how this family of 11 manages food storage and laundry.  It may seem simple, but it works for us.

Check out 4 Mom Open House to see other large family laundry rooms.

17 Comments

  2. “it’s not all monograms and white pitchers”
    BEST.LINE.EVER.
    i may change my blog name to just that.
    seriously.
    :o)
    love seeing how big families do it! i have shelving with a basket for each person too! i fold right out of the dryer and right into their basket–which everyone age 5 and up is responsible for putting away on their own! since we did that, for the first time i feel like i’m {maybe} getting a handle on the laundry thing!
    of course, i can dream of a laundry/pantry/utility room as big as yours!
    .-= shannon/googiemomma´s last blog ..beeeeee our guest be our guest put our service to the test! =-.

  3. I love seeing your home, and have a request…..can we see the animals? 🙂 I always wanted to live on a farm!

  4. That is good use of your space. I buy cake mixes when they are inexpensive too. We always have a lot of people here at our home (we just have 7 of us at home now) and it is great to have staple items to rely on!

    I also loved the line “it’s not all monograms and white pitchers!” 🙂
    .-= Deanna´s last blog ..A Thoughtful Gift =-.

  5. So fun and organized. I know, I know, not one of the pretty rooms, but still!

    I also make the boys responsible for putting away their own laundry; helps so much. And I like your pantry. We have a decent sized one in this house, and I love it. Had not thought to have cake mixes and the like on hand just in case – what a great idea! What hospitality looks like, that. You are such a Godly person, at least, the you that comes across in the blog. I love that I come here and get decorating ideas, family encouragement, and pointed right on back to Christ all in one. Thanks for your openness on the blog.
    .-= The Reader´s last blog ..School Room Redo is Done! =-.

  7. This is the first I have seen of your blog. What a beautiful home you have! Compared to mine, your utility area is monograms and white pitchers 🙂 I can’t wait to dig in and nose around the other rooms. Thanks for sharing!!

  11. I am glad you all are enjoying seeing the nitty gritty places in our house. Cindy, yes, curtains do make a difference. I hung those several years ago when I got tired of the room being so plain. They are made from fabric I had leftover from sewing dresses for the girls. I gathered the fabric onto pencils (instead of rods) and stapled them up there. LOL! Deepsrate times call for desperate measures. Lisa~

  12. I agree that the first thing I noticed were the curtains!

    I discovered your blog last week and am enjoying looking through it. You have a simple but elegant taste in everything from home decor to clothing. It’s been a blessing to stop by and I will do so more often.

  13. Hello. This is my first time visiting you ~ thanks for sharing what works for your family of 11…God bless you…and your methods of keeping laundry under control. Loved your idea of names on laundry baskets for each child’s clean clothes. I try to nab them when I have a couple loads done and folded, then we do a mass “put laundry away” session. This happens daily. 🙂

    Blessings ~
    .-= Jarnette @ Seasons of Life´s last blog ..Laundry Systemfor Our Large Family =-.

  14. Love the order to your pantry shelves; I think we are sisters seperated at birth.
    I love the cream/beige/white that you use so much of in the rest of the house. A very expensive mail order catalog I get, just had almost the whole catalog in beige and white, and each room had a few accents of just one other color…you’re so ahead of them! I would love to make some “simpler” decorating choices if this house ever sells.
    .-= Janet´s last blog ..Tb or not Tb-that is the question =-.

  16. I love the front loaders. I’d buy them again in a heartbeat. They hold more clothes which cuts down on the number of loads per day.

    I wouldn’t get them without the drawers underneath. It was a splurge, but we didn’t ave them at first and it was a pain to reach in and out of them. Lisa~

  17. I need to get on the ball and put more curtains up. My mom made some valances for the dining room, when we first got here, and then we have curtains on the back of the house as we didn’t have any blinds to cover it.
    .-= Sherry´s last blog ..Oh- my! Not for the Diet Pie =-.

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