4 Ways to Decorate After the Holidays

I love winter. What isn’t there to love about the season? Even after the holidays, the snow stays on the ground and we get to enjoy hot tea, good books, and other indoor activities. But now that Christmas has come and gone, and all the Valentines candy is picked over,  it’s a great time to redecorate your home and make it look warm and cozy until it’s time for spring.

For some people, however, the last thing they want to do is think about decorations. After all, they just spent two months putting out all of their holiday stuff and then packing it all up again. However, it’s easy for your home to look boring and blah during the last months of winter, especially after all of the November and December holiday decorations are gone. I like to make sure that January and February get a few special decorations of their own, simply because it makes our home feel that much more pleasant and inviting.

Here are four ways to get your home ready for the last few months of winter:

1. Sort decorations by month

When you think about it, winter has four months, each with its own holiday. November has Thanksgiving, December has Christmas, January has New Year’s, and February has Valentine’s Day. If you put out a few holiday-relevant decorations each month, your home will always look warm, inviting, and appropriately festooned.

To make it fun and keep things organized, I purchased a few colored tubs from the store so that I could color code each of the holiday decorations. Decorations that represent Christmas, for example, are all put into a green tub. Thanksgiving gets brown, Valentine’s Day gets red, and New Year’s gets white. There are always a few winter decorations, such as wreathes, that you can keep out all winter long; those decorations go into a plain gray tub, to distinguish them from the holiday-specific ones.

2. Keep lights alive

While anything Christmas themed should be put away, you can still keep outdoor decorative lights up for months afterward. Using solar or LED lights instead of incandescent lights keeps the cost down low too, so there is no need to worry about extending the cost of lights beyond the season. To keep the lights from looking too much like the holiday, I only use it to trim rails or walkways. Everything else is turned off. Once the weather breaks enough to take the other lights down, they will go in another special tub just for holiday lights.

Any lights that remain up are just used for outdoor decoration. Try to keep it universal to any time of year and the lights never even have to come down!

3. Work in 30-minute increments

I know that for me, it’s overwhelming to try and find a full afternoon for house organization and decoration. Luckily, there are very few tasks that can’t be completed in 30 minutes. Instead of trying to carve out an entire weekend afternoon, work in phases. Often, you can accomplish just as much in three 30-minute sessions.

Here are a few things you can do in 30 minutes or less: clean off a dining room table, put out new winter-themed dishtowels, change your sofa’s throw pillows and decorative blanket, add a new scented candle to each room of your home. It often works best to combine a cleaning and a decorating activity, such as cleaning out the bathtub and putting out new winter-themed soaps. Don’t try to do everything at once; simply do a few tasks at a time until all of the jobs are done.

4. Have a Decorating Party

Who says you have to do it all yourself? Make it fun for everyone. If you’ve got kids in the house, spend an afternoon making paper snowflakes for January’s decorations or cutting out paper hearts for February. Take them to a store like Target and let them choose scented candles, window clings, or even decorative throw pillows to add to your home. Kids love to decorate, especially when you make it feel like play. They can also help you clean up, when it’s time to take everything down!

Don’t assume that just because the holidays are over, you have to wait until next year to start decorating again. Winter lasts through mid-March, after all, and there are plenty of opportunities to decorate your home so that it keeps feeling warm and friendly all winter long.

Jan Vespremi

Jan is a freelance writer and work from home mother. She loves DIY projects – and always sees them through to the finish. She most enjoys writing about home improvement tips, organization, and family.