As the holidays are approaching I am thinking about all the fun decorating ahead of me. I love to decorate for the holidays! I don't know about you, but the decorating part is easy, it is the putting away and storing that I don't look forward to.
Last year - Halloween Decorations ready to be boxed up - Not my favorite job!
When pulling out my boxes of goodies to decorate the house with, I am excited to open each box and enjoy looking at everything as I take it out. Memories of when it was purchased or when my daughter made it in school or at Girl Scouts and best of all the cherished memories from things we made together. I do love my crafting! My daughter and I have made many things together over the years. I was her Girl Scout Leader so that doubles the crafts we did together and with her friends!
When a holiday is done I am faced with the challenge of fitting it all back in the boxes and it never seems to fit the same way as it did when I took it out. Somehow it always seems to grow bigger and harder to fit! That made sense when my daughter was young and we were adding new things every year to our collection, but that doesn't happen much anymore. So why is it still a struggle? To deal with this challenge last year, I decided to devise a plan to make this process a little bit easier. By taking some extra time when packing it up I found a way to make it easier for future years. By making a way to repeat how all of it is boxed, I save time and no longer dread putting away my cherished decorations!
If you feel the same way, here is what I did. I hope it will help you and make decorating for the holidays fun again with less stress about putting decorations away. I started my new organization process with Christmas last year. This year I am going to do the same with my Fall and Halloween decorations as I put them away.
1. Purge old unwanted or damaged decorations. This one is a hard one for me because I have a hard time parting with anything!
2. Wrap decorations that are breakable or can be scratched with packing paper, bubble wrap or cushion foam and tape. Make the wrapping re-usable with a opening on one end to slide in/out the decoration or a flap that the tape can be pulled back. Use a marker and label the packaging so that it can easily be identified and used again. (photo above) In the past I had a pile of tissue and wrapping after I put out my decorations and had to wrap each item again after the holiday with no idea what wrap I had used previously. Now I just slide it in its wrapper and then in the box! Quick and easy.
3. Picture - As you are packing a storage box, take a picture of each layer of how you fit it in the box. Pictures are the easiest way of showing how you did it. (photo above)
4. Print out a copy of the photos showing how you packed it. (photo above) and put a copy of the pictures in the box for next time.
5. Label each box with the contents. I created some cute labels for fun!
Only 4 of my many boxes for Christmas!
If you would like to make these labels with your Cricut, you can find them on Cricut Design Space on my Cricut Profile Page. They are ready to make or edit as you like.
Once you are done the time saved in the future will be worth the time you spent setting it up. Christmas for example used to take me at least a day or more to pack up. Now I can do it in about one hour! Try this organization project, I think it can work for you too.
Comments