19 Suggestions for How to Pack Up Your Christmas Decor

I love to start a new year with a clean slate. That begins with a holiday decor-free home. Before you begin to pack up all the Christmas decorations, here are 19 suggestions for how to pack up your Christmas decor and get your home ready for the new year.

Before you can clean up and decorate your home for the coming seasons and months, you have to pack up all the Christmas decorations. Depending on how much you decorate your home (We always go overboard.), that can take a few days or a week.

Do you take down your Christmas decorations after Christmas? Before New Years or do you wait until after New Years? I’ve been reading more and more people leaving their decorations up to Epiphany on January 6th.

Since we leave the day after Christmas and return on the 30th, I wait until New Year’s Day to start the packing up. (I did start a little gathering on New Year’s Eve day.)

Sweet Shark estimates that we have 40 – 50 individual boxes, bins and containers for varying sizes and shapes of decorations. I’ll take his word for it.

Our Packing System:

Do you have a system for packing up? I do have an order of attack that works well for us.

Over years of trial and error, we have learned the best and most efficient ways to pack up the decorations. This is the approximate order that we follow:

1. Bring in all the bins from the garage and distribute them throughout the house.
2. Gather all the smaller decorations, such as santas, trees, stuffed figures, etc. and pack those. I place those on the dining room table and kitchen island.
3. Gather delicate items, such as ornaments on the tree, and carefully wrap them in tissue and/or bubble wrap.
4. Take down the wreaths and garland. Place the wreaths in their wreath containers and the garland in plastic zippered bags.
5. Remove any ornaments and embellishments.
6. Remove all the strings of lights from the trees, wreaths, garlands and other decor.
7. Set aside any wreaths or garland to be used in winter decorating.
8. Remove all the batteries and place them in a bag for proper disposal. (Check with your city guidelines.)
9. Pack the tabletop trees in their individual boxes.
10. Pack all the Christmas glasses in their boxes and place in large container.
11. Remove lights from the bushes outside.
12. Remove the Christmas bedding from our bed and wash the sheets and pillows.
13. Remove the inserts (to be reused throughout the year) from Christmas accent pillows. Shake out the throws and fold.
14. Place all pillow covers, throws, Christmas dishtowels, and linens in one container.
15. Make sure all containers are labeled.
16. Organize all the containers by size and shape.
17. Place the containers on the built-in shelves in the garage.

Did I forget anything?

Do you find that there is always one thing that gets overlooked?

How to Pack Up Your Holiday Decorations: 19 Suggestions

Just like the order that we follow for packing our Christmas decorations, I have some tried and true suggestions for how to pack up those decorations and get ready for next year.

1. Determine if you need more storage containers ready for things you will need to pack away until next December. If needed, purchase tissue paper or bubble wrap for securely packing delicate ornaments or other Christmas decorations.
2. Remove all the batteries from battery-operated lights or decorations. Place the old batteries in a sack and research how and where to properly dispose of them.
3. If any lights are gone kapute, don’t keep them in the hopes that they will miraculously work again next year. They won’t. 
4. I like to wrap each battery fairy light individually and then organize by color. Place like colors/type of light in zip-lock bags before placing all the lights in a bin labeled “lights”.
5. Have garbage bags handy for the things you will be throwing away.
6. Have plastic gloves ready to protect your hands when removing ornaments from the Christmas tree and general packing.
7. When packing up your Christmas decorations, discard any that have broken parts, pieces missing or ones that just look old.
8. If some decorations need some super glue to be “good as new” fix them now before packing them.
9. Pack up and set aside decorations that are in good condition, but you no longer want. Donate them to schools, churches or women’s shelters.
10. Organize your ornaments and decorations by type or color. This year, as I pack up ornaments, I’m organizing bins by color. All our silver bells and balls go into one bin. All our Mark Robert’s Elves take up two bins.
11. Remember to distribute the weight of your containers. Just because you can fill your containers, doesn’t mean that you should. Lifting heavy containers can be dangerous. Items like candles can be very heavy.
12. Use containers made specifically for wreaths. They have straps and handles that make them easy to hang.
13. If appropriate, repack items in the boxes they came in. We do this for wreaths, table-top trees, and candles.
14. Label every box and container, even if you can see what’s inside. I know there are digital systems out there, but I use a big black marker. I just find it the simplest method.
15. Discard old wrapping paper that has been reused since your kids were toddlers.
16. Remove the inserts from Christmas pillows to reuse throughout the year. I store our Christmas pillow covers, sheets, and throws in plastic blanket and duvet containers.
17. If you have bows that will need freshening for next year, take them apart.
18. Use cardboard rolls from toilet paper or paper towels to roll and store ribbons for reuse next year.
19. After all the Christmas boxes are put away, give your home a good dusting and vacuuming. Have a Swiffer duster and polish, broom and vacuum cleaner ready to remove the dust and debris left from all the decorations.

After all the Christmas decorations are packed away and the house has been dusted and tidied up, we can now focus on adding all those winter decor accessories. 

After packing away the Christmas decorations, getting our home ready for the short winter months is the first task of the new year.

Now that the house is mostly bare and stripped-down, it’s time to decorate our home a warm and cozy look for winter.

Until a few years ago, I had never intentionally decorated our home with a winter palette. I didn’t know if I would like it – I am such a spring and summer girl.

Happy to say that I loved the results. The house has a different look with winter decor, but one that I’m so pleased with.

Since my first attempt at infusing our home with winter decor, I’ve continued the practice.

Here are some of my winter decor decorating ideas.

Discover that you are short on the supplies you need to pack up your holiday decorations? Here is a collection to help you.

I hope that you gained many new ideas for storing your decorations the best way for the following year. Did you learn some of the best suggestions for packing up your holiday decor. This is a great post to save for future years.