Putting Away the Decorations

When holidays end, putting away the decorations is bittersweet. It’s sad to think of the celebration as over, but it is also exciting to look forward to what comes next!

At the moment, I am particularly thinking about putting away December holiday decorations, but these principles can apply to decorations you put up for anything - from Halloween and Valentines Day to birthdays and DIY weddings.

First things first, if you use lights or any other stringed decorations, you know the horrors of having to untangle them the next time you want to use them. To help avoid this, store them wrapped around a piece of cardboard (or the plastic frame they sometimes come on).

When you buy ornaments or decorations, many of them come in boxes shaped to protect them. Keep those boxes! Not only do they help prevent things from breaking in storage, but it is also much easier to pack away square and rectangle shaped boxes than to try to puzzle together a bunch of oddly shaped items. If you have old ornaments without boxes, use a small shoebox to collect them together within the rest of your decorations. This also will make it less likely that the ornament hooks get lost. (If you do lose them, though, just buy a cheap box of paper clips that matches your color scheme - they work great as ornament hooks!)

Make sure to carefully wrap any fragile items that don’t have boxes. This is a good opportunity to recycle any bubble wrap or packing paper that resulted from gift purchases.

Depending on the storage space you have - pack everything into one large box, several small boxes, or even a sturdy bag. I suggest keeping them in an out of the way place, especially if they are decorations for once-a-year occasions. I keep mine in two boxes and a bag on the top shelf of my closet.

Shout out to my parents, who I learned several of these techniques from!

What weird items do you find yourself packing away once a year?