The holiday season fills us with a sense of warmth and cheer, but it also fills our homes with seemingly endless decorations and collectibles. When all those Christmas lights, ornaments, and festive keepsakes keep piling up year after year, it may be time to re-examine how you are storing Christmas decorations when they aren’t in use.
DIY Christmas Ornament Storage
From one household to the next, Christmas ornaments generally have a few special things in common. They are typically delicate, meaningful, and treasured. With these things in mind, it makes sense to take extra precautions to keep your holiday ornaments safe and sound in self-storage. You can rely on a trusty plastic bin or snap-lid box with individual compartments for all of your ornaments, or you can use your creativity to create or upcycle a DIY ornament personal storage solution.
Here are a few suggestions:
- Use a wine box or empty beer case with six-pack holders to store candles and other similarly sized decorations. Fill the gaps with newspaper or tissue paper for extra padding.
- For very tiny ornaments from miniature trees, consider using egg cartons that are clean and good shape. Place a rubber band around the carton to keep them safe.
- Create your own clever storage solution ala Martha Stewart with plastic cups hot-glued to a piece of cardboard and layered inside a plastic bin.
- Make an ornament storage box with a sturdy cardboard box and some spare cardboard, scissors, and tissue paper. Use the tissue for extra filling around those very delicate items.
DIY Christmas Light Storage
Installing and taking down Christmas lights may give you fits, especially if your strands become a tangled mess of wires. Plan to store all of your holiday lights, spare bulbs, electrical cords and components, and timers together in one bin, if they will fit. A holiday light storage kit may come in handy, or you can easily optimize the way you store your Christmas lights with a few DIY tips.
- Check that lights are functional before packing them up. Replace spent bulbs and discard any strands that pose electrical hazards.
- Before stowing your lights in a bin, bag, or box, wind them carefully around something like a piece of sturdy cardboard or a clothes hanger.
- For a low-budget hack, simply place each strand of lights in a plastic zippered bag, one to a bag.
Storing Holiday Decorations
Organizing Christmas decorations helps reduce clutter in your home while also keeping your holiday items better protected in the off-season. Whether you prefer DIY or readymade solutions, you can clean up your Christmas clutter quickly and easily with just a little time and effort.
- Organize your Christmas décor by packing like items in the same box. Designate a box or two for Christmas decoration storage, one for lights, one for wreaths or window dressings, and so forth. Some Christmas decor might already come with their own storage bag, such as the wreath storage bag, which means you can still on storage containers.
- Label your boxes to make decorating a snap, especially if you plan to break up the task across an entire weekend or a few days.
- Determine whether a Christmas tree storage bag may be easier to handle and more efficient than your tree’s original box. The artificial tree is trickier to store because it has to be disassembled first, so it can feel like solving a puzzle.
- Consider using self-storage options to safely stow your holiday belongings until next year.
You can also use some of these tips for Halloween storage solutions. We hope these fun Christmas storage solutions tips help you stay organized by cleaning up the holiday clutter. If you have other favorite tips for storing Christmas decorations, please share them in our comments below!
