Pack Smart

As I start packing up our Christmas decorations and materials this year, I try to think about ways to make things easier in the fall when we start getting ready for Christmas next year.  Here are a few tips that have worked well for us.

• Make a Christmas binder.  I have a simple three ring binder that holds various Christmas related resources that I want to make sure that I don't lose.  I use plastic page protectors so that I can rip things out of magazines or print materials off of the Internet and then just slide them in.  This is where I keep my Christmas notes for the following year. 
• Store Christmas planning materials in the house.  This would include items such as magazines, books and my Christmas binder.  I start planning for Christmas well before we are pulling Christmas decorations out of the attic.  It just works better for me if these materials are easily accessible.
• Make it easy to find your nativity scenes.  If you decide that you want to put your nativity scene(s) out before decorating the rest of your house, make them easy to find.  I am always scrambling the afternoon of our first family night because we are trying to transition to Christmas right out of Thanksgiving.  Last year, I purchased new Christmas storage bins.  Everything but my nativity scenes were stored in green bins.  The nativity scenes were in red bins--a fact that I completely forgot about but thankfully had written down in my Christmas notes.  Anyway, it was so easy to find them this year.
• Christmas books and crafts. I also like to be able to easily find my Christmas crafts and the kids' Christmas books.  I do store these in the attic, but they are in boxes/bins that make them easy to find.

I am sure that there are other ways to pack smart, and I would love to hear what works best for your family.  These are just a few things that have worked well for us.