Why? It’s still Christmas! It will be through next Wednesday.

I don't know. I am not tied to any date but today I felt like doing it. (I had though I might leave them up though mid or even the end of January but it felt right today.

It took several hours this morning and it is almost completed. I have halved the number of boxes from last year. One of the stored boxes, the largest one, is marked to be given to my favorite thrift store in September; it is filled with various items I have decided not to keep. I only have two boxes for the shed and one to take back to the office with my office's tree in it. But we are being warned that we may go entirely remote again so that may end up in the shed too.

I did choose to keep one thing out to remind me of my two favorite seasons / times of the year. For autumn I kept a small glass black & white pumpkin out on top of a book on the coffee table. For Christmas, I kept out the small miniature forest I have removing only the sleigh and the wreath-decorated English type outdoor lamps. I have placed it inside my "bookcase" after removing what was there.

(Therese, if next Wednesday is Epiphany is that day I have no reason to choose it; I am absolutely not religious in any way, shape or form.)

I discarded what is broken or is getting shabby looking. All decorations are stored in plastic tubs. Tubs do a good job of keeping out the stink bugs and are sturdy. Roaches love cardboard box glue and cardboard boxes makes nice nesting places for mice. We store some decorations in a storage room under our 3 season room or in the shed loft.

I got a new oak staircase a few years ago; I hang garland on it for the holidays. This year, prior to decorating my pencil artificial tree, I threw out the glass balls that were stained / discolored, and donated decor that I never liked. When putting my decorations away, I carefully wrapped them in tissue paper and stored them in tubs. They were placed in the basement. My artificial tree was 14 years old, dried out, 1/3 of the lights did not light up, and too many of the plastic needles came off, so the tree was placed in the trash. I now need a new tree and plan to get another quality pencil artificial tree. Any suggestions for a quality artificial tree with white lights? Happy New Year!

I just took my tree down yesterday and instead of storing in its bag this time I amleaving it put together with the lights and storing in a corner in my large store room . I also sorted and rearranged all my ornaments in separate boxes for each color and also eliminated a lot to send to our second hand shop here. I am slowly getting rid of stuff that I honestly just hang onto with the thought I might use it again. My problem I have a huge storage space and it just seems to be the place where everything goes so time to sort and get rid of stuff. I just need to get hubby to do some purging too. (good luck with that )

Its all coming down today! Hopefully, I will get some help. Every year I purge or give to Goodwill a little bit more. I use plastic storage bins for all my Christmas decorations even the tree and then store everything but the tree under a staircase closet, all the way in the back. Perfect location, only need to get to that spot twice a year. Decorating then putting it all away.

I love it when it goes up and I love it when I take it all down :-) When it goes up, I don't dust for a whole month lol

When it comes down, it's very freeing.

Happy New Year Everyone!

All mine is still up! I guess we will take most down on NYD and Sunday, but the winter-but-not-holiday things will stay up for another month, like some artificial greenery, the deer, little trees, and I will add some snowmen.

Oh, and I have a couple of large items that I store in clear plastic trash bags or in the giant ziplocks. They can hang from hooks or from the posts of the shelving, and stay off the floor and dust-free.

I took my down on Sunday and Monday. The boxes are sitting down in the gameroom. Hubby can take them out to the storage room when he comes home. After all I shouldn't hog up all the fun.

It’s still the holidays. I take ours down on Jan. 2.

Aphaea, your post made me think of something I saw recently on a blog regarding a solution for storing your holiday decor.

storage.makespace.com/spaceplz

This reply that made good sense…

”...the day I need to use a storage facility to house my Christmas decor is the day I’ll organize a garage sale or make an appointment with a therapist.”

Bwahahahahahaha! I know a woman in my park for whom I used to do dog sitting when she was out of town. She had a two and two, about 1600-1700 square feet. And the first time I walked in there in December I was absolutely floored. Decor was everywhere in the living room, the kitchen, the den, the laundry room/back entrance and the front porch. When I say everywhere, I mean everywhere but the ceilings. it didn't matter if the surface was vertical or horizontal. It was covered. Her bedroom had empty boxes stacked all over it. (That couldn't have been all of them either because of the amount of Christmas stuff. Maybe the others were in the shed temporarily.) I spent ten minutes wandering and staring before I fed Susie so unhinged did I feel. Later, a close friend with whom I shared the dog sitting duties told that Ellen told her she kept all her decorations in a rented storage unit the other eleven months of the year. All I can remember thinking is "She pays to store them???" She could have easily opened a store.

No therapist, no garage sales. It was amazing, and I like to think that it was influential though I tended more toward the minimalism range myself already. Ironically, there wasn't a single thing I would have taken from her if she offered it to me.

"When I say everywhere, I mean everywhere but the ceilings."

Holiday Hoarders! Trust me, I know exactly what you mean. Not a single thing I'd take, either.

I have scaled way back in recent years, since my kids are grown now, and I just don’t like a lot of stuff. I used to always string my lights but I bought a pre-lit 3 years ago and I haven’t looked back, and gave away all my lights. No more fuss. I also bought clear bins, all the same, and organized everything and used my label maker to label each side. So much easier to find what I’m looking for now.

I was scaling back until I cleaned out my parents’ house. Mom had some lovely holiday decor, from the ’50s on. I may need a therapist because I kept the ones I remember from my childhood, and the ones she especially loved. And I already have enough! I don’t think my young adult sons are interested in the older ornaments, and by the time they (or their future spouses) are, MCM will be passe. Oh well, I will enjoy them myself, but I really need to reduce.

I do have a storage unit for my parents’ things that we want to look at, after everything is done. The letters, old old photos and movies, etc, and things for my siblings that they don’t have room for yet, but will this year when they both move into larger digs. I’ve seen a lot of uses of those storage units, and did see one couple picking up their holiday decor. I hope it’s just because they are in a condo and have no storage. I imagine it makes daily life easier, to have the stuff that is stored most of the year out of the way.

Mine is still up and will probably be for at least another week. My other half likes it up. It's a bit of a hassle because everything goes into the walk up attic and that is on the third floor. I am exhausted by the time we are done. I usually weed out a few things but always seem to buy more and I did already this year! I keep everything wrapped in tissue paper and then into storage bins. The tree comes apart in 3 pieces and then goes back with a cover over it until next year.

I know what you mean by that exhaustion, Richard. I suspect that word is the reason most of us change the amount and type of decorations we use as we get older. I have a good friend who lives in the senior mobile home park next to (my senior mobile home park). A neighbor of hers is leaning more and more on Donna to help her, and one of those is with her Christmas decor. Cheryl, the neighbor, apparently has a shed that is filled to the brim with it. It's neatly packed, thanks to Donna, but it is a massive amount of stuff. It took Donna two days to take it out and it is taking her two days to put it back. (Cheryl is in a wheelchair but can get around and put it in place. She can actually walk, slowly, but refuses to do her exercises to help herself get stronger.) Donna has said this is the last year she'll do it as she's now 74. I hope so. Donna is a minimalist Christmas decorator herself.