086. The Christmas Decor Clutter Trap: 3 Mistakes You Don’t Realize You’re Making

Learn the 3 hidden Christmas décor mistakes creating clutter and stress, plus simple holiday organizing tips for a calmer January and a beautifully intentional season.

If you’ve ever found a stray stuffed snowman in March still smiling at you like, “Hey girl, remember Christmas?” - this episode is for you. Today we’re talking about the three sneaky holiday decorations mistakes that create clutter, stress, and that make undecorating a depleting chore. You’ll learn simple, Choosy Organizer–approved ways to decorate intentionally now so your January feels lighter, calmer, and a whole lot less chaotic.

What you’ll learn today:

✨ Why decorating every surface “just because you own the décor” creates visual noise (and what to do instead)

✨ How overstuffed bins lead to holiday clutter creep, and the boundary that fixes it instantly

✨ Why storing décor in random spots sets you up for chaos next year, and the smarter way to use a Holiday Landing Zone

✨ The CLEAR-5 Framework mindset shifts that make holiday decorating joyful instead of overwhelming

✨ Simple tweaks you can make today that protect your energy in January 

Take a breath, pick one tiny tweak, and get started.

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Transcript

I want to tell you a quick story about me and a snowman.
Not just any snowman, but the stuffed one I found in March on my mantel.
He was still smiling, still wearing his little felt scarf, was a bit dusty, but still reminding me that at some point, three whole months earlier, I had promised myself I’d deal with all the Christmas décor that weekend.
Have you ever had that moment? And was yours a snowman, or something else?
It’s that December is full of sparkly energy and cheer, but January can be…whatever the opposite of that is, I guess it’s fatigue and the blues, right? Especially when you live in the North and it’s gray and dark and cold.
We decorate with excitement but we undecorate through exhaustion. And that mismatch is why Christmas clutter gets out of control.
So today we’re getting into the three most common holiday decorations mistakes I see all the time (and we’ve all done these).
AND the Choosy Organizer way to fix them so your holiday home looks beautiful now and January isn’t a disaster zone, and decorating next Christmas feels really good.
By the end of this episode, you’ll have a calmer, clearer plan for holiday decorating that feels joyful, not overwhelming, and you’ll know exactly how to avoid the clutter creeping into February, March, or honestly, Easter.
But before we dive in, let me welcome you properly.
Welcome to Organizing for Beautiful Living with me, Zee Siman — The Choosy Organizer.
This podcast is for women who are done organizing everything and ready to be choosy — about what matters, what’s enough, and what can wait.
Because Beautiful Living starts with a little less stress… and a lot more intention.
So if you’re ready to get beautifully organized, let’s make it happen.
Okay, so here we go.
If your Christmas decorations ever feel like they multiply when you’re not looking, or you swear you had fewer ornaments last year, or your January self is currently glaring at your December self through time, because January You knows what’s coming,
You’re not alone, and you’re not doing anything wrong.
You’re human. And December is basically one long emotional and physical marathon.
So let’s talk about these mistakes with compassion, and with some humor, and practicality, because they all have simple fixes that make the holidays calmer this year and so much smoother next year.
OK, let’s get into the first mistake.
MISTAKE #1: DECORATING EVERY SURFACE JUST BECAUSE YOU OWN THE DÉCOR
We all have made this mistake at some point or another.
You open a bin, you find something adorable and your brain goes:
“Oh! I forgot I had this! Let me put it… right here.”
And you place it on the first flat surface that isn’t actively on fire, right?
Before long, your home looks like Christmas just exploded onto every solid surface of your house.
Your entry table has that snowman, your kitchen counter has a ceramic tree, your bookshelf has twinkle lights and a reindeer.
Now, I’m not saying that you should be minimalistic in your decorations. Far from it! If you love decorating to the max, go ahead. But the mistake is putting decorations out just because you have them, with no thought.
Because when everything is decorated, your brain stops being able to rest.
So it’s not that décor is bad, it’s that visual noise is exhausting.
Clutter raises stress because your brain is processing too much information.
So what’s actually happening?
You’re decorating based on possession, not intention.
You’re saying, “If I own it, it must go somewhere.”
No. No, my friend. You’re a Choosy Organizer.
You decorate like an editor, not a collector.
So here’s what to do instead:
Pick your focal points, not every available surface.
The homes that you see on Instagram and Pinterest, they’re not covered in décor. Even the most maximalist holiday homes curate their decor.
Now maybe your focal points are the mantle, the entryway and the tree.
That’s it.
Those get the magic, with whatever over-the-top decor you want, or as minimalistic as you want.
The rest though stays relatively calm so you can stay calm, OK?
So when you open your holiday decor bins this month, ask yourself which holiday decorations are sparking genuine joy, and which are sparking guilt because you bought them on sale at Target in 2017?
And listen, this isn’t a moral test.
It’s just about choosing what makes your home feel beautiful to you, all right?
Your identity as a Choosy Organizer is telling you “You curate holiday magic; you don’t drown in it.”
You’re not wrong for wanting your house to feel festive. You just get to do it intentionally.
OK, now, this next mistake, this one is sneaky, and honestly, it can really cause chaos and frustration at the start of every holiday season. 
MISTAKE #2: OVERSTUFFING STORAGE BINS “JUST FOR THIS YEAR”
Let’s talk about our holiday decor bins because sometimes those bins are where you can lose your holiday spirit.
Every December, the bins come out of storage. You open them gently, you take things out thoughtfully.
Then January 1st hits. Or December 26th, or January 6th, whichever day you’ve planned to undecorate.
And suddenly you’re shoving things into bins like you’re packing for a trip you don’t want to take.
You tell yourself, “Oh, I’ll reorganize it next year.”
(Um, you won’t.)
Or you say to yourself, “It’s fine, it still closes!”
(Yes, when you’re sitting on the lid.)
Or “It’s not that full.”
(But you’re sweating trying to carry it back to storage.)
Here’s why this mistake matters:
Overstuffed bins lead to clutter creep.
And clutter creep leads to more bins, right?
And more bins lead to storage areas that feel overwhelming.
Overwhelming storage leads to you avoiding it.
Avoiding your overwhelming storage leads you to decorations you forget you even own.
And that leads to buying more décor you don’t need.
It’s a holiday clutter cycle.
But here’s the Choosy Organizer way to think about it:
Your limit is the bin, ok? Not your entire home or your entire attic or your entire garage.
This is the CLEAR-5 framework in action.
LIMITS make decisions easier.
Maybe it’s one bin for ornaments, one for décor, and one for Christmas textiles.
Done.
If you have more décor than fits in those limits, you’re not failing. You’re just being invited to choose what you want to keep.
Let me tell you a quick client story:
I helped a woman organize her holiday décor and she had fourteen, fourteen, Christmas bins. Those big ones.
And she used the same 3 every year.
The rest?
She hadn’t opened some of those boxes since her kids were in elementary school.
And they’re in their twenties now.
When we pared her down to four bins, the 3 that she normally used plus we picked a number of decorations from the other 17 bins, she cried, you guys. In a good way.
Because all of a sudden Christmas decorating was light! And most of what she kept in those 4 bins had wonderful memories attached to them.
So think about it as you pull your decorations out this year. What is one holiday item you keep every single year, but you haven’t used in the last three years, let’s say?
So your identity as a Choosy Organizer will tell you: “You protect January you from December you, ok, by not overstuffing those bins.”
Okay, ready for the last mistake?
This is the one that creates clutter all the way into spring.
MISTAKE #3: STORING DÉCOR WHEREVER IT FITS INSTEAD OF WHERE (AND HOW) YOU ACTUALLY USE IT
I love this mistake because it’s so deeply human.
We all have this fantasy version of ourselves:
She’s rested, hydrated, full of energy, she labels everything and organizes everything.
She climbs into the attic wearing she’s matching socks.
But real January you? She is doing the bare minimum to survive.
She is tired. She is done. She is eating leftover cookies for breakfast and thinking it’s balanced.
So then what happens?
Well the holiday décor ends up where you happen to be standing when you finally take things down.
A little lands in the hallway, a little bit in the coat closet, a little in the laundry room on the counter, some in a random bag behind the couch.
Because when you store décor based on an aspiration and not on your actual behavior, well that always leads to chaos.
So let’s fix this in the smartest way that we can think of, ok?
Store your décor where and how you actually undecorate, because that’s often in a tired and uninspired mode after a wonderful holiday season, right? And also store it based on how you’ll pull things out to decorate next year, not in random available space.
This is CLEAR-5 again, ASSIGN HOMES based on real habits.
So when you say, “Okay, that’s it. Christmas is done,” you set your Holiday Landing Zone.
Now ideally, each of us would have a huge full room for seasonal decorations, right? A big old room with so many drawers, and lined bins, and hanging areas for the seasonal linens, and pull out shelves for our serving platters and things like that.
In reality, we’ve got a bunch of bins that we need to find a spot for. What I can tell you is that we used to do what we think we’re supposed to do, and we’d lug them to the attic, the basement, or the garage and we’d store them away until next year. But years ago, I questioned this because getting them out, and then cleaning the bins because they were grimy, dusty or whatever, and then taking them all back after we undecorated became such an unpleasant chore! 
What I realized is that keeping my seasonal decorations closer to where I wanted to use them, and keeping only what fit in the space we had available instead of shoving bins in the basement or attic or garage just made more sense for us.
So I repurposed a hallway closet to be our seasonal closet. And that’s my limit. If seasonal decor doesn’t fit in there, well I have to choose whether or not I’m going to keep it. OK?
And let me say that that closet was full before. So I either re-homed what was in there, or I decluttered it until I had an empty closet to work with.  
It’s my Simple Single, right? The Simple Single place I keep seasonal decorations, and I love it! 
What other options are there for your Simple Single space for holiday decorations if you don’t have a full hallway closet?
Well, an entire room could be your Simple Single. So if you have one room that tends to be a focal room during the holidays, for example, where you put up your Christmas tree, if that’s your living room or your family room, well what storage do you have available in that room? Or what storage can you make available in that room?
A shelf in a nearby closet? Or a couple of cabinets in a built-in? Or a full shelf on a bookshelf?
And your storage doesn’t have to be in the huge industrial plastic bins if you’re keeping things inside your house where they’re protected from the elements, right? So all your ornaments could be in a set of matching elegant bins or boxes right on the bookshelf, and the rest could be in smaller bins or boxes inside a piece of furniture.
And I’ve found that having a limited space means that I’m keeping the things that we value as a family. We just don’t value a bunch of plastic decorations for the sake of it. Believe me, there was a time when I would buy new decorations every single year because I felt like I had to refresh my Christmas decor. Again, that’s me, and everyone’s values are different. 
But what if what your refresh was the music? What if you placed your candles in different spots? What if you brought in greenery from outside instead of buying the artificial stuff? Could that be your refresh each year, instead of accumulating more stuff?
So the storage space does not have to be your dream storage location. Again, not many of us have the luxury of a seasonal decorations room, right?
But it needs to be easy and accessible when you’re tired. Because systems should work with your energy, not against it.
So before you put your decorations away this year, or in January, think about where your décor actually piled up last year when you were done with it? Where you take it down is a clue for where you should look to try to store it.
So your identity as a Choosy Organizer will tell you to “Design systems around real life, not fantasy life.”
Okay, let’s recap our three holiday decorating mistakes:
Mistake 1: Decorating every surface because you own the décor.
Instead: Decorate focal points, not every flat surface.
Mistake 2: Overstuffing storage bins “just for this year.”
Instead: Your limit is the bin. That things fit comfortably in that bin so you can easily take them out and use them. Those boundaries will protect you in January when you undecorate.
And Mistake 3: Storing décor based on aspiration, and not reality.
Instead: Use a Holiday Landing Zone as a clue to where your storage could be so that your Christmas decorations storage space matches how you actually live, especially when you’re tired after the holidays, and maybe less than motivated to take things down.
And I want you to remember this:
You’re not disorganized. You’re not behind. You’re not doing the holidays “wrong.”
You’re just human. You’re busy. You care about creating a beautiful home for your family.
And the fact that you’re even here, listening, thinking about how to make the season lighter, that already makes you a Choosy Organizer.
OK? And you start by asking: What’s one tiny tweak you can make to your holiday décor today that will bring you more calm in January?
It doesn’t have to be dramatic. It might be choosing one focal point. Or editing one bin. Or designating your Holiday Landing zone.
One small step is enough to start out with, ok?
I would love it if you would you share this episode with a friend who also finds random holiday décor leftover someplace in March.
And if you want to show me your current Christmas decorations storage area for tips on making it lighter, send me a DM on Instagram @fireflybridgeorganizing. I’m happy to help
Have a beautifully organized week.
I’m Zee Siman, and I’ll see you on the next episode.