As Christmas approaches, everyone is eager for the great day and starts early preparations awaiting the celebrations. You’ll try to avoid the last-minute rush, buy your Christmas decorations before time, and set them up. But the main challenge with Christmas decorations comes after the merry-making season when you need to keep them away and create space for other things.
Can you store the decorations in the garage as you wait for the next year to celebrate Christmas in your home?
Christmas decorations are extremely fragile and can spoil when you carelessly place them in a garage that’s full of moisture and heat. However, you can assemble some of the decorations in your garage and store them there if you’ve got the best strategies for packing things. This means you need to have a good holiday decoration storage plan which keeps all your things safe until the next use.
Read this article to understand how you can achieve this with ease.
Can I Store My Christmas Decorations in The Garage?
The answer to this question is yes and no. Yes, because some Christmas decorations can withstand the garage’s extreme temperatures. You can also store all your Christmas decorations in a temperature-controlled garage and have them safe for the next merry season.
On the other hand, you shouldn’t store some Christmas decorations in the garage as the extreme temperatures will damage them. Some will break down if you don’t have an organized garage making your efforts worthless. Remember, most people store almost all the items they don’t use in the garage and pile them on top of the other. This will damage the fragile Christmas decorations if you’re not careful about the arrangement.
Christmas Decorations You Shouldn’t Store in The Garage
If your garage is not heated/ temperature-controlled, you shouldn’t store some decorations here. Remember that such a garage is prone to experience extreme cold during the winter and it will be hotter here in the summer.
High moisture content will affect some of your Christmas decorations as they can rot, freeze or have mold growth. Excess heat in a closed garage will melt, leak, or burst some of the decorations. Others might encourage pest invasion in the garage, leaving your other important items vulnerable.
Christmas decoration items you shouldn’t store in the garage include:
- Tree skirts
- Tablecloths
- Christmas hats and stockings
- Candles
- Antique, crystal, and glass ornaments
- Food-based decorations
How To Store Your Christmas Decorations in the Garage
Most people store unused items in the garage or basement. However, you need to have the right measures in place to ensure all your Christmas decorations stay in shape until the next use. You can achieve that by:
Have Plastic Storage Bins
The garage tends to house more things you don’t intend to use any time soon. So, it’s advisable to look for your delicate Christmas decorations in a safe place to stack them before storing them. You can use plastic storage bins for this. The plastic bins are stronger, easy to stack, and moisture resistant. This means your Christmas decorations will be safe from mold or breakages.
You can opt for clear plastic storage bins to easily identify its components. But there are some Christmas decorations you shouldn’t store in transparent plastic storage bins as they’ll be affected by light over time. So, use the colored bins but ensure you label them for easy identification.
Make Overhead Racks for Your Christmas Decorations
Opt for overhead racks if you want to stay organized and have better, bigger storage spaces for your Christmas decorations. You will easily stack these decorations on the rack while protecting them from the cold floors. Also, they’ll be safe from accidental damages when someone knocks them.
Things like Christmas trees will fit in the rack perfectly. Then place tree ornaments, holiday lights, and lawn inflatables in a plastic storage bin and neatly arrange them on the overhead rack.
But if you don’t have the plastic bin, stash them high up where they’ll be safe. The good thing with this overhead rack is that it will help you create more room in your garage, providing adequate space for storing other things.
Cover/Seal the Christmas Decorations
After storing your Christmas decorations in the garage, especially in the overhead rack, make sure you cover them properly. Use anti-acid wrapping papers that will repel moisture and dust from these items. Do this for the fabric-based Christmas decorations if you’ve no alternative storage space.
But don’t forget to cover your Christmas tree from dust as it will be hectic cleaning it after months of absorbing dust and dirt in the garage. You can buy a plastic tree storage bin and safely keep it for future use.
Helpful Tips for Your Christmas Decoration Storage
Re-Arrange and Declutter the Garage
You need to declutter and rearrange the garage before storing your Christmas decorations. Doing this will help you create more space as you’ll get rid of old or unusable tools. RRe-arranging will also enable you to have a neatly organized garage that will give you an easy time identifying your items.
When doing this, categorize your items and place them so that those you’re not likely to use soon are at the furthest end.
Buy Quality Storage Bins
If you don’t want to spend a lot of money buying the Christmas decorations next season, invest in quality storage bins. You can buy the plastic storage bins in different colors but ensure they’re durable to have your items safe for long.
Other Important Tips
- Before storing fragile Christmas decorations like bauble balls, place them in boxes with dividers, then keep them in plastic storage bins. This will give them extra protection as they’ll not break.
- Avoid using newspapers to wrap your decorations as they will discolor. Instead, opt for bubble wraps.
- Don’t pile heavy objects over your fragile Christmas decorations, as this will automatically destroy them before time. If your garage is squeezed, make good use of the walls and hang some of your items to create space. Overhead racks will also do you justice in this case.
- Don’t store your Christmas decorations in boxes or linens as they’re prone to absorb moisture, destroying your items. The boxes will also bring pests and hide unwanted insects, which will damage the items in these rooms.
- Check your Christmas decorations after some time and declutter those that won’t survive through the next season. If you had some Christmas decorations from the previous season and they’re in good shape, consider giving them out. But if destroyed, throw them away to create more space in the garage.
Bottom Line
The garage is a savior room for most people with small indoor spaces. For this reason, you can use it to store your Christmas decorations until the next merry season. However, you need to carefully choose the items to store in this space as some cant withstand the extreme weather conditions in the garage.
For items, you can keep them here, ensure you cover them well, use the right storage bins, and label them properly to avoid confusion. Make the overhead racks to create additional space for your Christmas decorations and categorize your items for easy reach.
