Planning for the holiday season? Why try to wing it, on the fly? To get into the seasonal swing in comfort, find a place in your home for an activity center devoted to Christmas planning.
An “activity center” is a key home-organizing concept. Borrowed from those mistresses of controlled chaos, pre-school teachers, an activity center combines a focus, a dedicated area, and storage for tools and supplies in a single location. For example, sand play is easy at the sand table, and clean up is even easier if shovels and dump trucks live in open bins stacked beneath it.
Just as little ones know where to go to play dress-up, your Christmas planning center is the place you’ll go to make Christmas lists, address Christmas cards, organize décor ideas and plan menus. It’s home to Christmas planning and information, so create a pleasant and efficient place to prepare for the holiday to come. Read more »
A sweet and simple gift celebrating friendship, Dust Pan Cookies are easy to make and give.
A free printable gift tag makes it easy to create this "just because" craft.
To make Dustpan Cookies, bake or buy your favorite cookies. Break a few of them, and crush one or two to create cookie crumbs.
Place the cookies and crumbs in a new dustpan, and wrap with clear food storage wrap.
Hint: a few pieces of strategically-placed cellophane tape stretches the food storage wrap to the back to create an attractive gift.
Attach our free printable Dust Pan Cookies gift tag, or create your own tag with this poem: Read more »
Are you ready to make a plan ... to simplify your holidays?
This week, we kick off the Houseworks Holiday Plan. Part book group, part get-organized club, we'll travel together toward a calm and stress-free holiday season.
As we begin our journey to a clean and organized holiday house, one job comes first: organizing planning and paperwork. Where do you go to pay bills, keep a calendar, or handle the mail?
Whether it's a dedicated home office or a rolling file cart under the dining table, it's time to declutter, organize and clean the planning area. A holiday prep bonus: we'll set up a Christmas organizing planning center this week, so we can move ahead with holiday season preparations.
Planning and Paperwork Week Assignments
Ready to prepare for the holidays with friends? Join these Christmas message board communities to discuss the Houseworks Holiday Plan:
Magical Holiday Home HHP Forum
Our Home for the Holidays HHP Forum
Week One is List Week at the Holiday Grand Plan!
During this week, we kick off holiday prep with lists, lists and more lists. We'll print helpful calendars and forms for Christmas organizing and begin to create a Christmas notebook.
This week's cleaning focus is the front porch: We'll clean and organize the area around the front door so that our home will be ready to welcome visitors during the holiday season.
Ready to jump into List Week? Let's get organized with the Holiday Grand Plan!
List Week at the Holiday Grand Plan
Will you be joining one of our holiday plans to prepare for the coming Christmas season? Get ready! Long-time readers know that creating a Christmas planner is the first step to an organized holiday season.
We've got help! Announcing a focus site from OrganizedChristmas.com: ChristmasPlanner.com!
To make easy to create and use your Christmas organizing power tool, check the site's Make It! Christmas planner section, which offers a complete guide to making a Christmas planner notebook. You'll find how-to articles and supply lists and divider ideas.
To help you fill your Christmas planner, we're gathering the Web's best free printables and resources in our new Print It! section.
Don't miss our growing list of Christmas checklists. Our Plan It! feature is designed to be a quick and easy guideline for holiday planning.
Most of all, this site showcases you: the Web's best and most creative Christmas planners. In the Tour It! section, you'll find Christmas planner tours and tutorials from the Web. Whether it's a simple Christmas notebook or creative Christmas planner printables, you'll find inspiration to guide you as you make your own holiday planner.
Welcome! It's time to get organized for the holiday season ... with a Christmas planner!
You asked for it, you got it: blog badges from Organized Christmas!
These small linked images, or "badges", will help you tell the world how you get organized for the holidays.
Grab the code below to decorate your blog with these blog badges from OrganizedChristmas.com: Read more »
It's summer and canning jars, like fresh produce, are in season--but you can do a lot more with them than put up tomatoes for winter!
Savvy holiday planners know that gifts in a jar are easy, welcome and fun to make, so check out these gift-in-a-jar ideas from FreshPreserving.com.
You'll find a great round-up of gifts in a jar, mason jar recipes and crafts projects for all the seasons of the year. Check 'em out!
Gifts in A Jar (and More!)
Need more ideas? Visit our Gifts In A Jar page for recipes, inspiration and easy gifts:
Gifts In A Jar Index
Warning! Site updates ahead!
It's that time of year for Webmistress Ming (author Cynthia's techie alter-ego!) and the Organized Christmas Elves. During the hottest days of summer, we hunker down under the air conditioning, and spruce up our site for the coming holiday season.
During the next couple of weeks, expect a few loose ends around the site. Behind the scenes, Ming and Webmaster Ryan will be updating forms and features--and sometimes, the process can get a bit messy.
We'll do our best to get all spiffed and ready as quickly as possible. But until then, bear with us!
---Cynthia
