As usual, Christmas came and went in a blur. We squeezed in as many holiday traditions as we could into what felt like a short time frame. Unfortunately my daughter came down with a stomach bug on Christmas day and was quite sick for several days after. As much as I love Christmas, when it's over, I'm kinda done and am always itching to pack everything away before New Year's eve. I like to start the New Year with a clean-ish home, and putting away all of the holiday decor makes things feel less cluttered. This year I had it mostly binned up before New Year's Eve, but true confession, I just finished boxing up the decorations yesterday as I had to go to IKEA to buy more storage totes.
Today I thought I would share some tips and tricks for navigating the Christmas tear down process and storing your decorations. These are things that work for me and help me feel less overwhelmed.
Helpful Strategies
Work in zones
My approach to un-decorating our home after the holidays is to break it up so it feels more manageable. The easiest way to do that is to start with one room/zone/space at a time. For me this year, I started by boxing up the decorations in our kitchen and family room first. I decorate our open shelves and kitchen island pretty much the same way every year, so it makes sense to store these decorations together. The next day, I tackled our Living Room and Dining Room.
Set a timer
This is a strategy I use all of the time when it comes to getting started doing something that I don't want to do. I often set a 15 - minute time limit and challenge myself to see how much I can accomplish in 15 minutes. With many household tasks around here, I always surprise myself with what I can do with 15 uninterrupted minutes!
Clean as you go
I like to clean and wipe things down as I go, so I have a micro fiber cloth, some multi-purpose cleaner and a cordless vacuum on hand while I work.
Storage Tips
Group things into categories
Before I start packing things up I try and group them into categories. For example when packing up our front living room, I made groupings of the following items: tree ornaments, garland, stockings, bottle brush trees and ribbon.
Storage within Storage
Separating Christmas decorations into categories helps to keep everything organized and easily accessible -you will thank yourself when it's time to decorate next year! The best way to keep your categories separated is to put them into a smaller box, bin or ziploc bag before putting them into your larger storage bins. I have some decorative boxes that I display on our built-ins and bookcases, and I use these to store smaller groupings of items. I also use smaller plastic boxes where necessary - this year I used one for bottle brush trees and another for ornament hooks. I had some smaller gold ornaments that I wanted to contain but keep separate and I was out of bins/boxes so a large ziploc bag did the trick!
Use clear bins
I have been buying clear storage bins for many years now, and I find it the most useful way to store all kinds of things in our home - but especially decorations. I keep our holiday decor (Easter, Thanksgiving, Halloween and Christmas) in a large Pax Wardrobe (from IKEA) in our basement. Using clear bins allows me to immediately know which bin is for what holiday and I can also see what is inside. My favorite storage bins are these ones from IKEA - they come in many different sizes and they all stack together easily.
Label
Even though my bins are clear, I still label them. I love these chalkboard labels and I buy them by the roll from amazon. This year I made new labels for our bins and I labeled the directions not only by holiday but by which room they go in - this should make decorating much easier next year.
Happy un-decorating everyone!
Well, there you have some insight into my organizing and packing up process!. These are strategies that help me not just to pack up our decorations, but also to keep everything organized to minimize overwhelm when it's time to haul everything out next year. I hope you found this helpful, thanks for reading!
Happy 2025!
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