We have this little area right off our kitchen that was probably meant as a butler’s pantry or something, but I saw it as the perfect little homework/command center area. A place where we put the mail, charge our phones, put the kids homework, have a junk drawer, etc. You can see in the before picture that there was a set of upper cabinets. The first thing we did was remove those uppers. I replaced one of those glass doors with another door in my kitchen because I like the glass door. Then we removed the little back of the countertop. I lined the back wall with the leftover hardwood floors. You can see a tutorial for that HERE when I made over my fireplace using the same technique. I then added floating shelves just like I did in the kitchen. You can see that tutorial HERE. I added a thin piece of wood trim to go along the walls and cover the plank edges. I stained the shelves using Jacobean Minwax stain. I also painted the cabinets white, see a tutorial HERE and we had our floors refinished. Read more about that HERE.I wanted the decor in this area to serve a purpose. So I got the file shelves and pencil holder from World Market. It’s great the kids each have a little slot to put their homework or important papers in. We also have a little basket for mail. Most of my other decor came from Gordmans. 
I love this little vintage clock because you can see these shelves from the family room and the kids are always wanting to know what time it is, especially when getting ready for school. The adorable little mason jar is also one of my favorites. This is a little chalkboard square where I write the date every day and the menu is also for the kids to know. I don’t know if it’s just my kids, but they are so interested to know things like this, what the date is and what we are eating for meals. They are very schedule oriented and I’m pretty sure they get that from me…
I also got this sphere from Gordmans. I have my own little craft project planned for it that I will do later, but for right now I love having it on my shelf. 

The kids have craft supplies and school supplies in the cupboards below. It’s a great one stop shopping place for them. I love anything that helps keep me organized and this is one of those places. 
Check out this coupon for Gordmans below. You can get 20% off your entire purchase in store or online. But hurry it expires this weekend!