We plan to put up our trees this weekend. As we put ornaments on the tree, I'm going to decide if we keep each ornament or not. Most still have meaning, but some do not. Sometimes they don't even get hung. Those are the ones that need to go! (Of course, I already took care of the lights!)
We store children's Christmas books, movies and CDs in the drawers of our family room tables. I'm going to scour those as well. With one daughter in college and another in high school, I think the picture books read at Christmas are a thing of the past. I'm pretty sure they haven't been read in at least two or three years.
Another place to look for Christmas clutter now, is your kitchen. You may have holiday dishes, linens, Christmas themed serving pieces, holiday cookbooks and baking items. If you don't like, or use, let them go. So many recipes can be found online now, so don't save a book for just one recipe. I can only think of a few items we have in our kitchen specific to Christmas (salt and pepper shakers, cookie cutters, and two mugs) and I think they all can stay for now.
Do you keep old Christmas cards? If you come across those consider if you want those saved. If you rarely look at them, or wouldn't know if they have been lost, it might be time to recycle either with your regular paper or mail to St. Jude's. Do you have excess stationary you don't plan to use? That can be recycled too. One year I made sure to use up the various extra cards before buying more. I saved money and decluttered at the same time. And Christmas wrapping is another place to look for excess clutter!
I'm excited that I can keep decluttering while I prepare our home for the Christmas season. So often it feels like we have to put it all on hold while Christmas happens, but if we do a little during the midst we might just end up with less at the end of the season. That is my hope at least!
Do you have excess Christmas decor that you can declutter this season?
I think my mom should do this, ha. Growing up there were two giant-ish totes of Christmas decorations...that couldn't go up until after Thanksgiving, and had to be down before or right after the first of the year. A whole lot of stuff that you only see once a year! I never quite understood.
ReplyDeleteI will admit, I have a few keepsake ornaments from when I was growing up, and my mom has some as well, and those I will keep forever. But they are, well, keepsakes. Not something that we have just to make a tree look pretty.
I have two bins of decorations...primarily for tree. So they are only used for the season. It's those items that stay in the bin each year that aren't worth keeping. Keepsakes that bring us happiness are worth keeping. If they have any guilt attached, they aren't worth it...in my opinion.
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