Your mudroom or coat closet should be the landing spot for coats, shoes and gloves during the fall and winter months, but, unfortunately, these items usually end up on the kitchen counter or strewn about the floor.

Wouldn’t you love those items to go where they belong? If you can overcome these three obstacles you are on your way to solving the chaos.

Obstacle #1:Buying more stuff. Thinking that if you had the right hooks, the right baskets or the right amazing lockers from Pottery Barn, all of your storage solutions would be solved.

Solution: It’s more about keeping it simple than having more space. No space, no matter how large or gorgeous, looks great with too much stuff. It starts with one jacket and before you know it, each person has 5 or 6 hanging in their space. Add a few backpacks, purses, bags, dog leashes and reusable grocery bags and it no longer looks great. Less is more here. Keep your most used coat (or two) in your locker or on the hook in the entryway. Others can be stored elsewhere and they can be rotated as the seasons change.

Obstacle #2: Kids can’t reach their stuff. The hats, gloves and scarves are stored in a basket above the hooks which only a parent or older child can reach. When the basket comes down, everything is dumped out to find what is needed.

Solution: In closets, use clear over the door shoe holders on the back of the door work great for scarves, hats and mittens. Younger kids can use the lower pockets. In an open locker, place a pair of mittens and a hat in a bag and hang it on the hook next to each child’s jacket. Designate this bag as the “home” for their hat and mittens.

Obstacle #3: You don’t know what to do with wet boots. They drip snow, rain and mud all over the floor and make a big mess.

Solution: If you enter through your garage, I strongly recommend that the boots land in a location just outside the door. Boots can be placed on the garage floor, on a shelf or hung. If you live in a warm climate, you may even want your mudroom in the garage. Inside the house boot trays or serving trays keep melted snow, rain and mud contained and off the floor.