Since my family is from the north, I grew up taking off my shoes when I entered the house.  You wouldn’t want to track in snow and mud!  But I have lived in Texas my WHOLE life, so the snow is not really an issue.  Taking off your shoes when you enter the house is just a habit (unless you are Wade and then you don’t understand the point).  Either way, taking off your shoes helps keep the floors clean.

We have always had 2 wicker baskets behind the couch right by the door.  The get filled with dirt, sand and dog hair, not to mention we usually have a pile of shoes outside of the baskets.  In an effort to make it look at tad bit nicer, I cut pieces for a shoe cabinet at the same time as the laundry room cabinets.  These I decided needed a door though to hide the innards.

I had some scrap beadboard (wainscoting) left over from the girls desks that I decided to use on the inset of the door. I have never built frames or cabinets before so this was an experiment for me. I set up the table saw and made a small 1″ line through the frame pieces to insert the beadboard.

I had to make 2 passes to get the track wide enough to fit the beadboard. Then I assembled the frame around it. Not too bad for my first time!

For this project I opted to paint it before assembling it (since I did already have the pieces cut).  I used a metallic oil based paint that I just love!  I could have added 3 tracks and put in another basket…but that would mean more shoes would get put in here instead of the closets.

We now have a nice place to hide our shoes!  (These are iPhone pics, so they are a bit grainy…just trying to get caught up on blog posts.)