The Useful Hook

I'm linking up on Thursdays with Jules at Pancakes and French Fries as part of her 2012 William Morris Project series. 

The William Morris quote that inspired Jules' project is this:  "Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful."   It's a good quote to live by, although I personally think one is a little off if you don't have at least one seriously junky junk-drawer, somewhere in your abode. It's like the Id of the home, or something. 

My post for today is about a recent purchase that doesn't really meet the standard for "beautiful," but it's definitely proven to be useful, and is something we've needed for a long time.  C'mon in to check it out:

So, you've come in the front door and are standing in my minuscule entry. You look around, it's your first time here. Living room is fairly tidy, but what is that, over on the couch? Let's get a little closer:

Oh look, a big pile of random jackets and sweaters.  Can I take your jacket? Um, well, uh, just lay it right here on top of all the others. 

Seriously. This has been our solution for a coat rack for years.  It's the "coat-couch."  Sometimes, it spills over across the room, onto the "coat chair."  Now, I have a perfectly good closet right in my entryway. But when our family comes home from an outing, or from school, do we hang up our jackets/sweaters right away? Nope. Every one of us just throws our stuff on the couch.  I usually let it build up for a couple days, before I get tired of looking at it and hang it all back up, grumbling under my breath why is it my job to deal with this crap? 

I've looked online and in stores and on Craiglist for a stylish, affordable coat rack to put up for the winter/early spring months.  Because honestly, here in Southern California, we don't need outerwear for most of the year.  So damn if I'm going to spend a lot of money on a non-granny looking coat rack to use for only a few months.  Enter my purchase from Target last week:

Ta-da!!  For $17.99, I bought this over-the-door hook for the entry closet, and voila...

Jackets are hung up!  Now, this is not supposed to mean that nothing will ever get properly hung up on a hanger, in a closet.  Like the couch, the hooks are  only to serve as a temporary way-station, for when we first come in the door.  I'll probably still get cranky about putting them all away.  Still, I was pretty happy to walk in my door this morning after walking my kids to school, and have a place to casually hang my jacket. 

Another view of the entry.  You can see that it's pretty tight quarters immediately inside the door.  (There's another wall right beside that narrow window.)  So perhaps  my hook and the jackets hanging upon it are not the most beautiful things to look at.  But it's definitely a better solution than watching that coat-pile, and my resentment toward it, growing larger until it reaches a tipping point.  And in a few months, say by late spring, I can remove the hook and stow it in the closet until needed again in late fall.  Or the hook might just prove to be so useful, that we'll use it all year long.   Now, if only I can train my kids to actually use it!