Declutter: Christmas edition

I decided it was time to tackle something I had been putting off for years:  my Christmas decorations.  When my husband got the tubs of decorations down from the attic this year, I had him get everything so that I could look through it all before it went back in the attic until next December.  

So here are my results!  I think I did pretty well.  I feel like I got rid of about half of the Christmas items.  

But first:  Halloween decorations?!  Yes, there were a couple of tubs of those too.  I had completely forgotten that I even owned them, so that should tell you how many years it had been since they were used.  I had a family Halloween party here once or twice after we moved into our house, but it's been well over 10 years since these items have been touched.  We don't get any trick or treaters in our neighborhood and I'm just not into decorating for Halloween, so it's all going away.  

These decorations were great when I felt like moving all the decorations I already had, putting them away, and fancying up the place for Christmas.  But I'm pretty much over that and have moved on to more simple times.  

Oops!  More Halloween things.  A strand of really cute lights for which I have absolutely no use.

And then it started to get tough.  Many of my Christmas items were given to me by various family members.  Or I bought them when we were first married.  But I don't want to hang on to everything and honestly, I believe items from family members mean more to you when there are fewer of them.  If you have an entire house full of things that belonged to your parents or grandparents, nothing is really all that special.  But just a few items, or even one, and you treasure it.  

I used to put out a small little village.  But it's little cheap, fiddly pieces that keep falling over and I'm tired of them.  If I want a village (and right now I don't) I'll invest in good quality pieces that make me happy.  

I bought this reusable gingerbread house last year.  My nephew and I had fun with it.  And then it was a greasy mess on plastic to clean.  Let someone else have that fun!  

I had three outside signs and kept two of them.  This one is old and tired and maybe someone else will want to give it some new paint and enjoy it outside their home.  

There were more items that I didn't show in the pictures above, including a wreath, tree skirt, and other miscellany.  Here you see most everything that I culled from my Christmas and Halloween decor.  

And here are the empty containers that used to have decorations stored in them!  

Here are the containers that are left.  There's also a small Christmas tree in one of these tubs plus our (heavy) stocking holders and stockings for every being in this house.  The four blue tubs will go back into the attic.  The red tub contains our ornaments and a couple of candles.  I don't want to take the chance of the ornaments getting broken in the attic, so this tub stays in our bedroom closet.  

Here are some of the items that are in the tubs.  I used to collect snowmen and Santas.  I got rid of some of each but I truly enjoy my snowman collection so am keeping the majority of them.  

Every living creature in this house has always had a stocking, and I am happy to hang on to the ones that belonged to the animals who have passed.  

These were the items that were decorated by myself and my sisters when they were young. It makes me happy to look at them and remember those times, so I'm keeping them too.  

All in all, I feel very good with what I managed to let go.  It's all still setting in my garage right now though!  I have to decide if I want to save it for the humane society garage sale or take it all to Goodwill.  I'm leaning toward Goodwill because I really just want to get it out of my house.