Kids Coat Room and Charging Station

About 5 years ago my 13 year old son decided that he wanted to build a play restaurant for his brothers for Christmas.  He designed and built this simple structure in our back yard.

Before

Lots of pizza's ready to serve

Taking an order

The drive up window

Sandwiches and desserts

This little play restaurant was well loved at our house, but time marches on.  I'm a little too sentimental and possibly 1/2 a hoarder when it comes to stuff my kids made, I needed to find a way to give this restaurant new life.  The littles (my 2 younger boys) don't really need a play structure and I had another problem that I needed to solve!

Kid clutter

 We don't have a mudroom and so coats and backpacks usually end up piled a disorganized mess in the living room.  That's when I decided to transform the play restaurant into a kids coat room - and charging station!

Transformation!

With this transformation I could solve 2 problems.  The kids charge their electronics all over the house leaving cords draped EVERY WHERE!

Kids charging station

First the coats! I added coffee cup hooks to a piece of 2x4 and made a coat rack.

Kids coat rack

Next, I used scrap 2x2 pieces to make braces for the open back of the play structure.

Add 2x2's to make braces for the backpack rack

I added some old crib railing to the back of the restaurant to hold backpacks.  I wanted to add hooks to hold backpacks, but I didn't want anything that might poke or injure the kids.

Old crib railing and drawer pulls hold backpacks

I found drawer knobs that were long enough and strong enough to hold the kids backpacks.

Drawer pulls instead of hooks

With just an hours worth of work, the kids coat closet was all done!

Kids Coat Closet

The inside of the closet is a pretty dark, so I added a little light!

Light inside the closet

With the lights on!

Now for the charging station!

I added a piece of scrap 2x2 to the back side of the structure.

2x2 screwed on to the back of the structure

Using heavy duty velcro, I mounted a power strip to the 2x2.

Power Strip for the kids electronics

Power Strip mounted in place

Finally, I mounted a basket just inside the coat closet/restaurant.

Basket to hold the kids electronics

To be honest I wasn't sure that the kids would use the charging station without me making them do it.  Then late yesterday I saw this:

Quiet Game place area

I found my youngest son sitting on a pillow playing games on his ipod inside the coat closet.  He said that he likes the space because he can charge his games and play without being in the way.


For more CRAFTY ideas, click HERE!

Done!

Very soon this little coat room will bet a paint job and carpeting.  I'll keep you posted!