You know the Christmas season is really over when you’re taking down the Christmas Tree. While it’s definitely not the most exciting part of the season, the process of meticulously packing away your festive treasures is still pretty important. We have put together a few tips to help with the clean up to ensure that your precious pieces are well looked after until you need them again next year.
1. Christmas Lights
Packing away the Christmas lights is perhaps the most important part of any Christmas storage exercise. Remember how much of a messy tangle it was unravelling the lights at the beginning of the season. Now you can make sure this doesn’t happen again. The easiest way to store your Christmas lights is to grab a rectangular piece of cardboard, wrap the lights around it and put a label in the bottom corner. This will not only keep them neatly stored but you’ll be able to easily identify the warm white for the tree from the multi-coloured for outside without having to plug them in! Or you can even leave yourself little notes about where they are to be hung or any other helpful reminders for the next time you bring them out.
Source: Countryliving.com
If you can’t get your hands on cardboard, some other alternatives you might have around the house are: pieces of mdf or cheap timber, tin cans (great for smaller sets, you can store the cord and controllers inside the can), coat hangers or a power cord holder. Wrap a layer or two of tissue paper around the lights to protect them while they’re in storage.
Source: Countryliving.com
2. Baubles
A neat trick to safely packing and storing your precious baubles, are egg cartons. You don’t want them to be rolling into each other in storage, so with the egg cartons, they are already well divided.
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If your baubles are just too big for the carton, you can custom make your own dividers and arrange them into biscuit tins, shoe boxes or any other suitable container. Remember those tin cans you might have used to wrap your Christmas lights, they’re also handy for storing a couple of baubles. For baubles that might not need so much protection such as the shatterproof style, use zip-lock bags to keep items of similar size, shape or colour together.
Source: Goodhousekeeping.com
3. Christmas Ornaments
We’ve talked about your round baubles, but for any of those odd shaped, delicate decorations, egg cartons probably won’t help. Here you could use a combination of clear zip-lock bags and containers packed with tissue or bubble wrap to keep these ornaments well protected for the rest of the year. Various types of boxes and containers can work well here. You could ask the local bottle shop for some empty wine boxes with dividers and cut and fold them to suit your pieces.
Source: Goodhousekeeping.com
Empty paper towel rolls are perfect for wrapping small garlands around.
Source: Countryliving.com
4. The Tree
This is likely your biggest Christmas decoration and will take up the most space. A great option is to buy a Christmas tree bag. This helps to keep it organised and makes it easy to carry from your lounge room to storage space. But that is not the only option. You could use some drop sheets or old pieces of material or clothes to create a tight and protective layer around the Christmas tree. Consider breaking it down into a few smaller pieces .
Source: Countryliving.com
Alternatively, you could wrap it tightly in cling wrap to keep it tidy and dust-free and just cut it open the next year.
Source: Countryliving.com
5. Wreaths
Wreaths also need to be stored carefully so as to avoid them getting squashed and damaged and collecting dust. You can store your wreaths much like you’d store clothes, such as over a closet organiser in your wardrobe or hook it over a coat hanger and cover with a large plastic bag and hang over a hook or rod in your wardrobe or storage area. A dry cleaning bag is perfect.
Source: Goodhousekeeping.com
6. Finding Storage Space
When Christmas is over and everything has been packed away, you don’t want those boxes and containers full of your bulging Christmas collection scattered all over your house. The easiest way to make them seemingly disappear, is in any overhead storage space. Whether this be in your roof space, or on top of the cupboard hidden away in the study room, it’ll be out of sight. Empty space under beds can also do the trick.
At the end of the day, it’s going to have to go wherever you can find the space. But it’s definitely best (for protecting the items and also for next year’s Christmas decorating adventures) if you are able to keep it a bit organised.
