Get Your Home Ready To Handle The Big Holiday Season
Once fall begins, it feels like you jump on a nonstop roller coaster that won’t slow down until after the New Year. With all the holidays celebrated during this season, it becomes one of the busiest times of year for a lot of people. If you host seasonal events, you have even more reasons to get your home ready for the holidays.
Designate holiday landing zones for extra clutter, anticipate your guests’ needs, and have a plan for any pets in the home. Make sure to leave at least one room off limits, so you have a retreat when things get chaotic. Test your appliances before the season gets underway, and create a plan for cleaning up after parties.
Even though the holidays can kick your life into overdrive, you still want to enjoy them. With the right prep, your home can handle the seasonal excitement and become your reliable holiday headquarters.
Can Your Home Handle The Holidays?
Before diving into how to prep your home for the holidays, it’s worth pointing out that this article isn’t about decorating or designing a seasonal look for your home. That's a whole other part of holiday house prep. While cleaning and decluttering your house before the holidays is a great idea, you’ll find more specific tips here. This article focuses on systems and steps you can take to better prepare your home for the hustle and bustle the holidays bring.
Create Temporary Homes For Holiday Clutter
During the holidays, your home ends up with a lot more stuff than you may normally have the rest of the year. You might have gifts to wrap or presents to hide, which also leads to more wrapping supplies. Packages show up on your doorstep multiple times a day. Leftovers from parties multiply in the fridge, and sweet treats collect on the counters.
Coats, scarves, and other cool-weather gear come and go nonstop. And when everyone is busier, they drop their wallets, keys, and phones wherever they happen to be standing. Instead of trying to keep everything perfectly organized, create a few temporary landing zones for the holiday season.
- Designate a specific area to drop incoming packages until you can deal with them.
- Hang up extra hooks or get a temporary standing coat rack to handle the influx of jackets and hats.
- Place a basket or similar bin in the most common drop zones for phones, wallets, etc. This might mean you have one in the kitchen, one in the family room, and one in the entryway. At least when someone is looking for their stuff, they know it’s going to be in one of these places, instead of stuffed under a couch cushion.
- Stock wrapping supplies in a large bin where you usually wrap gifts. Get another bin in this same area for the presents you still need to wrap.
- Decide what spot makes the most sense to hide gifts, and place a box or bags there to stash items quickly before anyone sees.
- Tape off one shelf in the fridge for leftovers and mark them with a use-by date. If they’re still there beyond the date, toss them.
- When you receive edible gifts, designate one spot on the kitchen counter or island for these snacks rather than stuffing them into cabinets or pantries. (Bonus points if you serve them at your holiday gatherings or bring them to the office to share.)
- Set up a holiday charging station when you or your guests need to charge their phones, tablets, or other devices.
This isn’t about creating some elaborate organization system. It’s about adding extra landing zones to handle the inevitable holiday chaos.
Answer Guests’ Questions Before They Ask Them
If you entertain a lot of people during the holidays, whether they stay overnight or not, anticipate their needs. You’ll save a lot of time when you don’t have to scramble for supplies or have to repeat the same answers over and over. Think about the things visitors always ask you. Guests might want to know the Wi-Fi password, which bathroom they can use, where to put their coats, how the TV work, and which switch works the porch light.
In the bathroom, have hand towels ready in a small basket and bath towels accessible for overnight guests. Make sure the soap is full and stock up on toilet paper, with an extra roll or two by the toilet. You can even add a few toiletries like shampoo, conditioner, extra razor, toothbrushes, etc. Solve as many of these questions as possible in advance so everyone can settle in without requiring you to serve as a 24-hour tour guide.
Have A Holiday Escape Room
Being a good host or hostess doesn’t mean you need to open your entire home to guests. Decide which areas are the social zones, such as the kitchen, dining area, and living room, and maybe one or two bathrooms. The rest can be off-limits, and that’s okay. It’s less to clean, and it also gives you a place to stash your holiday clutter. You also give yourself a retreat when you need a break from the holiday cheer.
Make Your Home Easier To Navigate At Night
Holiday gatherings often run late, and visitors may be moving through your house in the dark. Think beyond the usual advice to turn on the lights. Instead, consider the paths people will actually use. It might be your front walkway, the hallway to the bathroom, or a corner of the patio. Identify these spots and let there be light with plug-in nightlights, motion-sensor lighting, or strategically placed lamps.
Give Your Appliances A Trial Run
Your appliances are likely working overtime during the holidays, so don’t wait until the season starts to find out that something’s broken. Pay close attention to how your washer, dryer, dishwasher, water heater, and other units are functioning before the holiday season. Address any issues promptly, so everything is in tip-top shape once the season gets into full swing. Don’t forget about smaller, lesser-seen appliances like the garbage disposal and ice maker.
Create A Party Recovery System
Save yourself time and stress by planning for the after-party (meaning the cleanup). Instead of imagining that you'll clean everything immediately after guests leave, make the recovery process as easy as possible.
- Put a few reusable containers somewhere convenient for leftovers.
- Have extra to-go containers on hand if guests want to take some snacks with them.
- Decide where serving dishes will sit before you can wash them.
- Keep a laundry basket or large bin available to collect cups, blankets, toys, and other miscellaneous items that you can deal with the next day.
The point is that part of your holiday prep should be about helping future you recover and reset.
Have A Plan For Your Pets
If you have furry family members, the holidays can be just as disruptive for them as they are for people. Your pet might get nervous about doors opening more often and unfamiliar people in the house. You also have to be vigilant about food left within reach and about visiting children who want to play with your pet. Some guests might even have pet allergies that you need to consider.
Pet-proof your house for the holidays. Also, decide in advance where your pet can go when the house gets busy. It might be a bedroom, laundry room, crate, or another comfortable space where your fur baby can relax. You also won’t have to stress about your pet escaping if someone leaves the front door open.
A Holiday-Ready Home Lets You Enjoy the Season
When your home has a few built-in systems, you spend less time hunting for chargers, answering the same questions, moving everyone's belongings, and wondering what you're forgetting. That leaves more time for what the holidays are actually supposed to be about.
Instead of running on fumes and catering to every request nonstop, you can breathe a bit easier. A home that’s ready to handle the holidays allows you to enjoy the season. You can focus more on the people, traditions, meals, and moments that make it all worth preparing for in the first place.
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Stacy Randall is a wife, mother, and freelance writer from NOLA that has always had a love for DIY projects, home organization, and making spaces beautiful. Together with her husband, she has been spending the last several years lovingly renovating her grandparent's former home, making it their own and learning a lot about life along the way.
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