An Organized Sports Station & a Closetmaid GIVEAWAY!

One of my favorite job benefits, is meeting, collaborating and building relationships with other bloggers.  The blog world has such an overwhelming sense of togetherness and I have had the opportunity to meet so many amazing gals because of it.  One that I have gotten to know well over the past couple of months, is Steph, from Modern Parents Messy Kids.  She is an organizing guru and has a love for all things kids, so we instantly realized we have oodles in common.

We got to chatting awhile back and decided since our readers tend to love similar ideas and products, that it would be fun to partner up on a couple of organizing posts and giveaways!  Totally fantabulous right?!

We started off with our first one, which was the FLOR giveaway, and today, we are teaming up again to giveaway another set of fabulous prizes courtesy of Closetmaid!    I have used many, many Closetmaid products in the past, almost every closet of ours boasts some sort of Closetmaid storage and even our garage has benefited, so when the opportunity came up to work with them, I couldn't wait!  They offer so many versatile organizing designs, I personally love to customize items with their mix and match stackable pieces, since they are often inexpensive and provide a customized storage solution based on needs.  For today's project, I was able to play with items from their Cube Storage line to enhance our garage storage, and the best part is I get to give you the same goodies to use as well!

As I mentioned in my recent entryway blog post, I had been dreaming up locker/cubby storage for the garage.  I also mentioned that when it comes to kid's school and winter gear, it didn't make the most sense for us.  It gets cold here and I don't want the boys hats, mittens, coats and boots to freeze overnight just to have them try and use them again in the morning.  So, those items now live indoors for good.  However, we also have three active boys that love to play sports.  Where do those items go?  How should they be stored?  Given the limited storage space in our home, we decided sports gear has no other option than to be placed in our garage.  And since the kids don't play outdoor winter sports, there is no worry about items being frozen then used, the garage is the perfect solution.

We made plans this spring to tackle the garage this year.  We haven't gotten very far, and most likely won't be done until next year, however, it is nice to be able to cross the sport storage item off of the list!

I had a glorious vision of using the Closetmaid bench with a designated sports cubby for each kiddo, and the cubicals above for extra sports gear, while also adding in some hooks for hanging storage.  I decided to purchase some wire baskets from Target for the bench, since I didn't want to use the fabric bins in our garage due to dust and the inability to toss them in the washing machine.

The bench was easy peasy to put together and I love that the cushion velcros down, and also has a removable weather resistant cover.

When it came time to assemble the cube system to go above the bench, I read some not so magical words in the assembly booklet, "Do not hang this unit on the wall. The product structure is not designed for wall hanging."  Whomp whomp right?  Now what was I going to do?  This was the only place that I really wanted to use the cubbies since it was a great way to utilize our vertical wall space and save on precious garage floor space.

Being the avid resourceful DIYers we are, my Mr. said he would make it suitable for the wall.  Whew.  Have I mentioned how much I adore him?

Knowing that the original item wasn't intended for the wall, we optioned to make it much more structurally sound and fastened it to the wall in a few different ways.  That baby isn't going anywhere now.

We started by using a piece of wood and creating a triangle piece for each corner of the cube system, which we fastened with multiple nails on each side using our brad nailer.

Next we used more wood to create a ledge for the cube system to sit on and last but not least, we added four steel mounting brackets to the underside and top side of the unit to secure it above and below.

We both placed excessive force and weight on the shelves to be 100% sure that the unit was securely fastened to the wall, since we have a safety first motto.

After all the supports were added, we were left with an almost finished version of my original vision.  I was excited again and started to putty all of the screw holes!

The numbers on the baskets are house numbers dressed up with some spray paint and attached with a small piece of wire.

The lower baskets are assigned to each boy.  It holds their personal gear, such as their baseball gloves, cleats, extra playing balls, etc... 

I sprayed a couple of wire baskets with red, to add some fun color to the upper shelves.

I really loooove how they turned out!

The top cubbies are intended for the items we all use as a family.  Kid's items on the lower three shelves and grown up belongings on the upper cubbies.

When we travel for ball, my son uses his baseball bag to bring all of his belongings, and we bring our "ball bag".  That is where the hooks come in nice and handy.  They were installed right into the supporting ledge.

I keep the ball bag pre-packed with a few basics, so we can just grab it, toss in our water bottles and go when it is time to travel for a game.

The items that always live in the bag: first aid kit {band-aids, ointment, etc..}, bug spray, sunscreen, hand sanitizer, rain ponchos {which we luckily haven't needed yet}, and wipes for dirty hands and cheeks.

We also bring a "ball blanket", which we use for the bleachers.

When all was finished up, we now had the perfect sports gear storage system that we all are completely smitten with!

Now, if only the rest of the garage could look this good!

As I mentioned earlier, Closetmaid is hooking up one of you fine friends with the same storage pieces I was able to organize with!  Steph also used Closetmaid to organize, so you can also hop over to Modern Parents Messy Kids to check out her project and enter to win her products as well!  That is twice the chance to win super fantastic items!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thanks everyone and good luck!!

Pssst!  I wasn't paid or swayed to write this post, I was just offered a few Closetmaid items to provide an open and honest review and giveaway!