Small Space Living: Maximizing closets

Small space living is the name of our game. I have been quite good at maximizing all areas of space I live in, if I do say so myself, but now I am doing it out of necessity and want...not just one or the other.  I did my first post on small space living about my mini washer and spinner, which I still adore!
As it gets closer to the time for baby to get here, I will be showing you lots of things we are doing to repurpose some of our furniture and maximize all of our space.

Today it is about closets. SMALL CLOSETS. We have exactly 4 closets. This is all the storage space we have.  I have learned that a want must also be a need...or have an exact place to go before it is purchased.
A lot of closets have two untapped space resources...The inside of the door and up high...a place for an additional shelf.

I don't actually have any before pics, but let me assure you that they were a hot mess. Here are some ways we have added space to our not so spacious closets; Be aware that we are real people and these closets are not staged...so that is all.

This is my closet. I added the shelf up top to get more storage and the shelf down low so that I can add a layer of boots and have a shelf to add anything I may need. Also, the shoe rack on the door saved all kinds of space. 

This is Andrew's closet. It is in our living room. Top shelf has things like our computer box, and our Christmas Decorations...Yes, all of my christmas decorations are in that blue laundry basket. The next shelf is hoodies and other things we may need...documents and such. There is a whole front part of that shelf that can hold lots of other goodies.
the shelf below the clothes holds mission trip clothes...then the the floor holds all our games and my screen printer and other art goods! Notice again, the shoes on the door...it is a great way to clear the space.

I know this isn't a closet, but it is Andrew's Dresser with the rest of his clothes. It is placed in our dining room/office. The place where the round table is will eventually be the place where our high chair will be stored. In the mean time, we have created a nice vignette. 

This is our linen and extra stuff closet. Again we used the back of the door to hold the awkward shaped things.

 I used a cardboard box on our tall top shelf to help sort/organize some of our blankets and our beach towels. They can stand taller and stack fairly easily. On the right, which looks sloppy is the stack of stored extra sheets and pillow cases. I have them organized by folding nicely the flat sheet, fitted sheet and one pillow case, then store those in the other pillow case (a little tip for keeping sheets nicely organized). That stack is all pillow cases holding the extra sheets .

 This is our laundry basket. (There is another one that usually sits on the floor there) and the vacuum.

This is the Kitchen closet. The kitchen closet has a top portion and a bottom portion (With two different doors) This is the top part: We have stored our larger serving dishes and plastic wear on the top the bottom is for some food and the tupperware...which must be organized, otherwise it is a messy nightmare in there! 

 This is the bottom part. It looks messy, but it isn't really that bad. On the left side is where we store the brooms and swifter, and the right side holds everything else.

 This is the door of that little closet. Those doors are not an inch thick, but this shelving system is awesome to help us stay organized.
 NOW, we understand that when the baby comes it is probably not a great idea to have the cleaning products available...so we did this!

And this is how we use all of our closet space!