A DEBBIE-DABBLE CHRISTMAS: January 2015

Happy Rudolph Day!!

What is Rudolph Day you ask....

It is the 25th of each month!!!!

For January's Rudolph Day , I want to show you how I am planning and organizing for next Christmas....

First, I want to thank Laura, over at I'm Not Trophy Wife, for featuring my post, Christmas Reflections, Traditions and Shopping Before and After Christmas Sales, from her Jan. 15th Friday Favorites party!

Thanks so much, Laura!
Please stop by and visit and link up to this great party!!

I am frequently asked "Where Do I Put I t All?" and "How Do I Pack It All Away?"

Well, I am going to show you..........

Have a seat and grab a cup of Tea...........

These are most of my Living Room Decorations......

There are also 2 large tubs that contain the Village that is set up under the Living Room Tree on a platform and a huge ornament box which contains everything from the Living Room Tree except for the lights ......

This is the huge ornament box which I have had for over 30 years and I need to replace next year with maybe 2 tubs that are for ornament storage.

The ornaments are in 2 tiers under the top section where the beaded garland and bows for the topper are stored......

No, I do not wrap all my ornaments individually because I use these types of ornament storage!!

The tubs for the Village, LR Tree Ornaments and a few tubs of heavy items from the Kitchen and Den go in here......

This is the closet in my downstairs hallway that we use for our coats. There is a trap door that leads under the steps where our hot water heater is since we do not have a basement.

I have almost all tubs stored here because when the hot water heater blows and water goes all over, nothing gets ruined........

We store heavier items in here so we do not have to haul them upstairs and then up the attic pull down stairs to the attic.

Now back to the rest of the stuff.....

I have a lot of sets that were bought in Sam's Club many years ago and I have kept the original boxes with the styrofoam so I pack them away right in those boxes......

Tubs are all marked as to where the decorations that they contain go like in the Hutch......

This is one of 3 new ornament boxes that were bought at Dollar General for $5 each.

These are perfect for storing ornaments from smaller trees like this one that I had in my Living Room this past Season.

And this one in the Kitchen......

Here is one with the ornaments from the Living Room Small Tree in it.....

Joe also bought 10 of these tubs which were marked down from $10 each down to $4 each in Wegman's....

These are a little bigger than a computer paper box and are easy to handle and not too heavy if you put a lot of ceramic pieces in them.

I used 6 of these to pack away the decorations from the Kitchen replacing some boxes......

4 of these smaller tubs went under the stairs in that storage space because they were heavier and 2 of them and this smaller tub will go upstairs in the attic..........

I label them as to where the decorations in them go.....

Can you see I wrote Hutch on this one for the Kitchen.....

I bought a new comforter set for my bedroom in the Summer and saved the heavy plastic zippered bag that it came in for storing a lot of Christmas linens, rugs and pillows in......

All of this gets hauled up the attic via pull down stairs.......

We have just about all of our attic floored and the roof trusses look like this.......

Excuse how it looks until I get everything up there organized better .....

I can stand up there but crouched down a bit.....

The truss system forms sections that look like this.....

For Christmas decorations, I store everything from one room in each section which are marked......

Here is the Living Room Section......

This massive tub stores all the Living Room Florals......

Why the bags? I bag arrangements up and label them too as where they are used!!

This tub stays up there and I carry the florals up and down in a laundry basket because this tub is too big to haul up and down all the time.

I have another one of these large tubs for the Kitchen and Dining Room florals.

The one side of the attic has 8 of those sections and the other side, where the stairs are, has 6.

I store decorations for other Holidays in the other sections.

One of my goals for this year is to go through and organize things up the attic because I also have linens, serving items for parties and some garden things stored up there.

Now where do I store the outside decorations and all my larger Trees........

We rent a Storage Shed!!

It is 5 minutes down the road from our home!!

When my mom died 11 years ago, we had 2 weeks from the date of death to clear out her Senior Citizen Apartment that she had lived in for the last 17 years of her life after my Dad died.

With funeral preparations and everything else, my sister and I paid a moving company to move everything down to her 4 car garage until we were able to go through everything but since I had inherited my mom's bedroom furniture and cedar chest, I rented a storage unit until I could get rid of my current bedroom furniture and re- do my bedroom and then move her furniture into it.

Once we rented the unit, we found it was invaluable for storing things and then moved everything into this larger unit that we pay a little over $80 a month for.

These photos were taken several years ago but this is what the inside looks like....

I store all outside decorations in this shed........

Joe brings them home when I am ready to decorate......

Also stored in this Shed are my already made crafts for craft fairs and some supplies, all outside garden things and Joe stores his seasonal clothes down here in tubs too along with some furniture not in use.

One of my goals this year, is to go through and organize this shed a bit better than Joe has it done!!

We bag the larger Trees like this, with only the larger set of lights that I wrap around the inside of the Trees along the pole, when not in use......

And take them down to the storage shed....

One year, Joe stopped at a Burger King Drive Through on his way home with the Trees and could not imagine why the girl behind the window kept looking at him strangely.

I was afraid she would have called the police , saying he had 2 bodies in the car!!!!!

Okay, so that is where and how I store everything!!!!

I hope it answered those who wanted to know!!

LOL!!

Planning for next Christmas.....

Several years ago, I decided to keep a Christmas Planner using the Web Site Organized Christmas

This is a wonderful site that featured posts, recipes, tips and all kinds of pages to print out to help you with keeping organized for Christmas!!

This is my Planner.....

HERE is a link to a post I did on this!

I keep a record of where everything is stored, my Christmas recipes for food and baking, a shopping list of my baking supplies, how much fish I order for Christmas and New Year's Eve dinners.....

A record of how much I spend on everyone, my Christmas card list and what cards I will be using for the following year because I buy a lot of cards on clearance and right now I have enough cards for the next 4 years!!!

Here is the tub where they are stored......

Along with Christmas Computer Paper, Recipes Cards, Christmas party Invitations, Thank you cards, Etc.

I also write notes to myself and keep them in My Planner .....

Like what new things I bought for next Christmas and where I plan on using them ....

I have packed new decorations away according to the room where I intend to use them next Season.....

Also notes if I want to move any decorations around or what I want to buy for next season.....

I use the planners that can be run off from the site.....

Here is an example of some of them......

Planning Pages

Get ready for Christmas with these calendars, planner pages, gift lists and inventory sheets. Create your own Christmas planner to simplify the holidays!

Holiday Budget	Holiday Values Worksheet
Christmas Card List	Master Gift List
Gift Ideas Planner	Gift Closet Inventory
Gifts To Make List
Here are some of the Pages that I use....... I organize them in Categories..... I have already made some changes for next Season..... You may remember these swags in the Living Room......

And this wreath....

I made these many years ago and I freshen them up every so often by changing the bows on them and for next season, I wanted to make bows out of this ribbon......

To match the candle ornaments that I am now using on the Living Room Tree.....

So before these were packed away, I changed the bows......

I also made bows for both the Living Room Trees so they will all coordinate.....

One of my co workers bought this pretty swag for me at 90% off at Family Dollar.....

It was $1.00!!

I added a bow to the top of it and plan on using it by the stairs next season......

Now I also do not put away all the Christmas Decorations at once......

I leave out some and decorate for Winter.......

Click HERE to see my post on my Outside Winter decorations......

I quickly threw together a Winter vignette on top of the TV Entertainment Center using some Christmas decorations.....

Click HERE to read that post.......

I decorated for Winter in the Den this year instead of Christmas as I was running late......

Click HERE to read that post.......

And right now I have FINALLY gotten all the downstairs Christmas decorations packed away so the Living Room and the Dining Room Trees look like this.......

Waiting to be decorated for Valentine's Day!!!!

Why do I decorate for Winter you ask????????

Because I love the glow of the house decorated for Christmas and don't want to lose that warm feeling.....

And We live in NEPA and Winter does look like this.......

These photos were taken on Saturday, Jan. 24th with 5 inches of snow on the ground at day break during a snow storm......

I was off that night and did not have to drive in it but another 4 inches or so is predicted for Sunday night into Monday and I will be driving to work in that one because there are no Snow Days off for Hospitals!!

I do LOVE Snow and Winter but I just wish I did not have to drive in it and could admire it from the windows of my home!!

I hope to continue to post here on my Christmas Blog once a month for Rudolph Day but until the next one, please stop by my regular blog, Debbie-Dabble, to see what I am up to.......