A Softer Kind of Christmas
Watching our usual Christmas movies with our kitties snuggled around us.
Another Christmas in the books. I briefly mentioned decorating in my Thanksgiving post, so I figured it was time to share the rest of the story.
For years, my relationship with Christmas decorating swung between two extremes. I either went all out, or I did absolutely nothing. There was rarely an in-between. Some years I skipped decorating entirely because the thought of it felt overwhelming before I even pulled a single box out.
When I Decorated Everything
Growing up, Christmas in our house was anything but minimal. I definitely get it from my mom. Every surface, every corner, every nook had something festive on it. That song, “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas,” could have been written about our house. That was my entire childhood experience of Christmas, and I absolutely loved it. Because of that, I collected a lot of decorations over the years. Some were passed down. Others I bought myself. And all of it was beautiful and sentimental.
Here are a few pictures of Christmas when I was growing up. My mom always decked out the tree, especially the one on the left. I still have my stocking and the advent calendar (see right pic).
When I got my own Christmas tree in my 20s, I went all out. For years, it was packed with peppermint candy-themed ornaments. Stuffed. I still love them, honestly. I have a full-blown peppermint obsession. Everyone else can keep pumpkin spice. Peppermint has always been my thing.
This was how I used to decorate my tree. (This was a few years ago and the last time I decorated it this way). I love it and I always will! But it takes hours to decorate:
But in my 40s, something shifted. Decorating stopped feeling magical and started feeling like a chore. And it was not just the decorating. It was the scheduling, the obligations, the crowded parking lots, the chaos of holiday shopping. Christmas slowly became something I dreaded instead of looked forward to.
When I really sat with it, the decorating itself was hard for a few reasons.
First, it took hours to put everything up and then hours again to take it all down. Second, I genuinely love my everyday decor, and I hated packing it away just to replace it temporarily. And third, it was just Mark and me at home. Most of the decorations were really just for us. Even when someone came over, they might see everything once. That was it.
If my bonus daughters had lived with us, I think it would have felt different. There is something about watching other people enjoy the magic with you. But since it was just the two of us, and Mark was perfectly fine either way, it started to feel like a lot of effort for something that did not fully land.
Even the nostalgic pieces became harder. The advent calendar my mom made, which I adored as a kid, and still do, did not feel the same when it was just me opening it alone instead of siblings fighting over whose turn it was. Eventually, the decorations started to remind me of the parts of Christmas I felt burned out by. Some years, I honestly felt relief when it was all over and everything was packed away again.
That said, I still missed it sometimes. I would skip decorating one year and regret it, then decorate the next year and feel so worn out that I skipped the following one again. It became this constant back and forth. A quiet love-hate relationship with the season.
Then last year, something finally clicked. And it feels almost silly that it took me so long to realize it.
I did not need to choose between minimalism and the cozy magic of Christmas. They could co-exist.
I did not have to put everything out. I could choose the pieces that mattered most. I could have a tree without stuffing it with ornaments. I could decorate in a way that supported how I actually live, not how I thought Christmas was supposed to look.
Letting the Tree Change With Me
Last year, instead of my peppermint ornaments, I tried something completely different. Dried orange slices and a homemade cranberry garland. Yes, it was work, but it felt creative instead of draining. And more importantly, it felt fresh. Christmas felt new again.
I loved it so much that I wanted to repeat it this year. Since I decorated early for Thanksgiving guests, I skipped making the garland and bought one instead. I went with red cranberries with a bit of “snow” on them to match our flocked tree. In hindsight, I probably should have gone with plain red, but that is part of the fun too.
Here’s my Scandinavian-inspired citrus tree last year, with real dried-oranges and strung cranberries:
And here was my tree this year, close to the same as last year, but I bought the wooden snow-themed cranberry garland, and topped with a midcentury-modern starburst, which fits my aesthetic so well:
I also have another Christmas tree that I sometimes put up in the front room. I haven’t brought it out in a few years, but this year it felt right. It’s my fiber optic Christmas tree, and I’ve been fascinated by fiber optic decorations for as long as I can remember.
The soft, glowing bubble lights feel especially nostalgic to me. They remind me of decorations I remember seeing when I was very young. I paired the tree with vintage-style metal ornaments, the kind you can decorate in any theme, and leaned into a classic, nostalgic look to match the rest of the tree:
Organizing for the Kind of Christmas I Want
So, if any of this sounds familiar, I promise you are not alone. You do not have to decorate the way you always have just because you always have. And that realization naturally led me to rethink not just how I decorate, but how I store everything too.
Last year, I decided to make things easier for future me.
I started by taking inventory of all my Christmas decor. What did I truly love. What could I let go of. Some pieces were easy to donate. Others I passed along to family so they could continue being part of Christmas in a new home. And some things I kept simply because they hold history. After editing everything down, I went from six large bins to four.
Taking inventory. These fit in priority boxes 1 & 2
Then I organized everything by priority. I use large Costco bins and created a number system. My number one box holds my absolute favorites. If I only feel like doing a little decorating, that is the only box I need. The second, third, and fourth boxes are there if I want to add more, but there is no pressure to use them.
Inside each box, everything is labeled so I know exactly what is where. If I want one specific item, I can grab it without digging through everything else.
As you can see above, for the 1st two boxes, I even separated out each item per strip of tape in case I wanted to move any items from one box to another without having to re-write everything again. Each to switch around if I wanted to.
This small shift changed everything for me. Decorating no longer feels like a chore. It feels optional, flexible, and supportive of whatever season I am in that year. Some years I can do more. Some years I can do less. And both are completely fine.
Letting go of the pressure to do Christmas “the right way” lifted a weight I did not even realize I was carrying. Now I get to enjoy the coziness, the glow, and the quiet moments without the obligation to deck every hall.
And that, for me, has been the most magical part of all.