The early arrival of our frenimy Old Man Winter has wreaked havoc on our tiny living room. Ben, who as you know is a collector of hammers, is also a collector of outdoor gear. Over the last couple of weeks, our first floor has become littered with boots, coats, gloves, and hats. And I hit my limit. My OCD need for orderliness just couldn’t take any more. It can be a problem, I know, but a girl can only take so much clutter! We were in bad need of an organizational makeover!

This morning, I woke up thinking about a solution to our coats-on-every-surface and boots-galore issue. For years I’ve had a stainless steel baker’s rack. I remember that when I bought it, I was concerned about the $75 price tag. It was a big deal for my budget at the time. But now, probably 15 years later, I am so thankful that I made that purchase! The 55×35-inch rack has four adjustable shelves that can be placed at any point along the vertical posts, and over the years it has been a bookcase in my office, a pantry in my kitchen, and a closet space for folded clothes. And now, it will be a hall tree at the back door!

My idea was to install two shelves in the rack—one at highest setting and one at the lowest. The low shelf can be home to our “outdoor” shoes (which at this point are sporting some crazy-thick coatings of mud). The upper shelf can be outfitted with S-hooks to hold coats and  a couple of baskets and/or bags on top can be homes for gloves, scarves, and hats.

Personally, I think this is a brilliant idea! Of course, it took all day (I had to drive to town for S-hooks and in between this project I was baking bread, Ben was splitting wood, and I was finishing a work assignment), but here we are making it happen:

Note: We used pliers to bend the top curve of the S-hook so that the hooks won’t fall off the metal shelf when we remove our coats.

So there it is. Our coat rack. Hopefully, the one-two punch of its placement just inside the back door, and the easy-to-hang-up S-hooks (rather than high-maintenance hangers) will keep our amazing collection of outerwear off the sofa, desk, dog crate, kitchen counter, etc, etc, etc. And my hope is that this little baker’s rack makeover will satisfy my OCD and keep a meltdown at bay for at least a few more days.