I put everything away Friday/Saturday. My house always feels soooo cold and open and empty in January. I put out snowmen and all things WINTER in January so it is no surprise it seems cool in here. I do leave out this one nativity set..it blends so well, and TECHNICALLY Christmas isn't over until the 10th!!

Inside, everything is packed. We did this on Friday. But, the wreaths are still on all the windows and doors, and we are still lighting up our two outdoor trees.

I'm going to call sanitation to see when the tree etc. pick up is and then we'll toss all the wreaths.

We took our tree to the Boy Scout chipping station today. Everything is put away but on our rock fireplace I have 3 wooden stylized snow flakes painted white and I drape a ribbon of small silver balls from one to the other and I just find it to be so pretty. Anyway, it's put away.

I do keep our outside Christmas planters that flank our front door until the end of February/beginning of March. Then they make way for the spring planters.

I'm always sad to see the Christmas decorations go. I put away anything Santa related on the 26th or 27th. The trees, wreaths, and any non-Santa decorations stay up through Epiphany.

I would (and have) kept everything up through much of January. The house looks so empty! Planned to take all my santas and angels down today, plus the two trees, but didn't happen. Perhaps during the week. Will keep all my snowmen out for a bit. In NE, it seems like winter has just begun.

NH, like you, winter only just arrived in Illinois. And I figure, as long as the deer are eating my evergreens outdoors, I can have deer nestled in the evergreens on my bookcase indoors. Maybe I will clip the berried wreath circles off their necks, though...

My Christmas decor gives way to paperwhites, forced hyacinths which give way to forsythia and pussy willow branches. A little bit of Spring in the dead of winter.

I'm glad it's over. All decorations packed away. Just bought a ticket to an SF Giants game in April. Roll on spring!!!

All the inside decorations were packed up today, except for the glass beaded snowflakes I have hanging in each window in the living room. All the outside decorations are still up, including the garish big colored lights that I love. They'll go next weekend, but the garlands and wreaths will stay until they start dropping too many needles. Maybe I should change the color scheme on those so they look less Christmas-y...

I put everything away, but the lights on the house might stay up until spring as the mister takes care of that. I really like the clean and fresh look my house has in January with all the things put away and a fresh dusting, cleaning, sweeping out of corners that comes with moving stuff around to accommodate Christmas.

I put everything away two days after Christmas. It normally doesn't happen until the 1st but I wanted to get it done early this year and once I got the idea in my head I went with it.

I'm always ready to see less stuff. I have a large bowl filled with different pine cones in the foyer and a wreath on the door.

Generally speaking, I go all out for indoor Christmas decor. It goes up Thanksgiving afternoon, a tradition I've kept from my parents. It comes down on New Year's. I also usually do big decor for Easter--goes up on Mardis Gras, comes down the day after Easter. I also really like seasonal throw pillows, like the pretty primary colors striped ones I put out for part of the summer, although I don't think they'll go well once the new house is remodelled. We'll see.

But, as some of you know, this year (school year 2015-16) I'm renting a room in a huge old house owned by my university, and I share the house with 7-9 other women--I can never tell who lives here and who's visiting, lol. I'm 55 and they're all early to mid 20's, but I'm really enjoying it. I have my own room, 12x12, and my own bathroom, at least until the room next to mine is rented.

So Christmas was a low key affair, decor wise, this year. Any other year I probably would have bought a tree and decorations for the house, but this year my mantra was, and is, I just bought a house! Gotta save every penny for the refurbishing!! And I was busy with classes and didn't feel like driving out to my storage unit to dig around for the decorations, so that was that.

I did put out one thing. In September, I returned from a year of research in Zambia. While I was there, this dear little lady, Mrs. Phiri, knitted a nativity scene for me. It's so beautiful! Mrs. Phiri is in her 80's and knitting is her passion. It was such a precious gift. And truly one of a kind.

I think .im going to keep it there until I move into my new place in June. It makes me smile and keeps Zambia close to my heart.

I'd enjoy hearing from people who decorate for winter holidays other than Christmas! :-)

Shee, I'm the opposite of you this year. We usually have ours (inside and out) down and packed up within a couple of days of Christmas, but this year we left everything up until this past Saturday. All down and packed away. I'm always a bit sad to see it come down, but changed a few things around, so that is nice. No seasonal decs out now other than a wooden snowman head hanging out front and a wintery scene flag. We're actually feeling a bit like winter here for a few days but will be warmer again by the weekend LOL!

We packed away Christmas decor on the 29th. This is the first year I can remember, that I didn't want to take it all down! I'm usually eager to.

For winter decor, I like natural elements, soft lighting, cozy throws, warm colors, candles. I try to find interesting twigs and berries to use inside. For outside, I hang a plain grapevine wreath on every front window (5 in all). I have electric candles in our two dormer windows, and they stay on at all times.

I was browsing for inspiration, and found this candleholder I'd love to have:

And are these cinnamon sticks? I might try this.

These people take the term, "Bring the outside in", literally. I'd be constantly shivering in this room. :D

Funny, but this is the first year in a long time that I'm more than ready to take down my Christmas decs before Twelfth Night. Very ready. As much as I love them, I'm tired of the clutter and the red & green. I actually would have started packing them away earlier (than today), but DD had three wisdom teeth removed a week ago today and has had an unusually painful week recuperating . . . with me taking care of her.

I try to live my life appreciating the beauty of every season. Once the Christmas decs are gone, I just enjoy getting back to our normal and celebrating Winter. I'll use some pine cones along with my candle lanterns, and pull out my pewter antler candleholders to put on the mantel, but that's about it. When I set my table for dinner each evening, I do like to alternate between my blue & white china with silver and white accents and my pine cone plates with brown and green accents. To me, both make for a cozy dinner.

I love the new candlesticks I bought and whitewashed this Christmas, and am planning on using them, sans Christmas candle rings, on my Winter table occasionally.

My son was commenting that we are not so much doing the jolly red and green anymore but the restrained elegance green and gold lol. I guess he's right, pretty much just my santas, some of which are burgundy and brown, mostly St. Nicholas more than Nast Santa Claus. Since it goes with the decor, I leave a bit up.

Coming home from school drop off this a.m. I thought I'd take down the garland around the garage door (a new thing for us this year), came down easily but...the bottom is in the snow that FROZE as it fell, so it's encased in ice on the ground on the way to the outlet. I may need to take the blow dryer to it! But, at least we don't have a foot of snow on the shrubs as in past years, causing the lights to stay on the bushes till February. (Sometimes we'd turn them on for fun to see if they'd glow through the snow, but once it gets packed in it doesn't let the light through as well)

Debbie, my brother was in Zambia for two years teaching and left just last spring.

We didn't put much up for display this holiday season so there wasn't much to take down. The tree and wreath were packed away on the 1st, and DH has since said he misses the wreath on the front door. I happen to like the hearts and flowers and frills of Valentine's Day so may start focusing on a bit of decor for February before too long.

I always feel at least a little bit sad when Christmas is over, but once the decor is packed away I'm ready to move on.

I packed everything away the day after Christmas except for two white swans on my buffet and candle rings on my chandelier and bouilottes.

i am keeping the dome collage up for a while that I made with the anniversary clock domes from thrift stores and battery operated rice lights

We always take our trees, decorations etc (inside & out) down on Twelfth Night. Tbh, I'd like to take everything down sooner, but DH won't hear of it! Maybe it's just me, but here in the UK we don't seem to go in for Winter decorating as such, although we personally have a series of wreaths for the front door that we swap around depending on the season, but as it's currently too early for the Easter one I may need to go shopping for one that says "Winter" as opposed to Christmas, lol!

i always leave everything up(except the stockings) til at least the epiphany, which is 1/6... then i slowly start taking everything down and packing it all away. the tree will probably get taken down and hauled outside this weekend. i will probably leave our white lights up outside thru most of january... unless a big snow is forecasted! it is a drawn out process for me!! our front door wreath is already looking a little brown even tho i sprayed it, so that will come down with the lights this year...

Once Christmas is done, I am DONE with Winter, lol! Sadly, usually Winter is not done with us, but I root for that darn groundhog to man up each year! I pretty much just suffer through the next 2 months. I buy lots of fresh flowers at the grocery, and do enjoy a bit of Valentines decor. Easter is my favorite season, I love bunnies and pastels. I do like the idea of Mardi Gras decor...I am going to NO with Dh at the end of the month so will be in full Mardi Gras spirit!

I used to try to keep things up till 12th night (in-laws British homeland) but we have a birthday season starting then, and I just need to get rid of the tree lol! So now it's the days right after New Years.

Love the starlight dome collage :)

I just loved our tree so much I kept it up usually until end of Jan. Until so many needles fell off it stopped looking good. Decorated trees don't necessarily have to stop once Christmas is over. I like seeing Christmas lights inside during cold dark winter nights. No reason to take down my pinecone wreath or throw out the evergreen boughs until they start to droop too much. I don't put out much of the other stuff anyway, I try and steer clear of any dust collecting items that are not greenery that can be discarded eventually. My Christmas tablecloth and napkins have a cardinal pattern which I like all winter long.

LynNM, as a side note, I LOVE your pinecone plates! So classic and fun. They remind me of my mom's Westwind china. Hers has such a strong seasonal bent that I don't use it for Christmas, but I'm hesitant to buy a strictly Christmas set. Your pattern would be so fun to have as a second set. And then a third set with flowers, lol!

My dear little noble fir is sitting out at the curb waiting for the yard waste pickup tomorrow. It was a sweet tree and it's sorta sad seeing it discarded like that. But hopefully it will someday be serving as mulch keeping the weeds at bay in someone's yard. This was the first year I got a wreath at Costco and it was totally worth $16.

My mother always said it was bad luck to leave the outside décor up past NY's. So all outside and Santa related decor was down and put away by the 30th when we left town for our NY's weekend mountain trip.

I've left religious décor out and will take down after Epiphany.

I am enjoying my winter décor, especially the deer. The mantle is still decorated with greenery and gold pine cones. My stair banister is still decorated with greenery and Christmas cards. All will get packed up with the religious items.

My outdoor urns are still filled with pines and magnolia, plus added rustic spheres in place of the red lanterns and bows.

I even have my small artificial tree still lit up in the kitchen. The larger tree has been taken down and out to the curb where it was picked up last week.

We had an exciting Christmas with lots of gifts around the tree, but the best gift of all was the news that we will be grandparents to a second grandchild next summer. :)

Happy New Year, y'all!

Like nhb, my mom liked to get the holiday decorations put away before the New Year. Since I set our tree up on Thanksgiving weekend and decorate pretty soon after that around the house, I've pretty much followed that schedule since by the end of December it's been a month+.

This year for some reason although I got the tree down and collected all my holiday decor to store for another year, I have procrastinated in packing and putting all the various decorations away. I have a system in place, with all my holiday storage bins colored red or green, or with those color lids so they are easily visible in our loft. I number each bin and have a corresponding master list of box contents by number. So when it's time to decorate and I want the boxes of ornaments, I just go to my list and pull out boxes 1, 2 and 3 for example.

Anyway, I do rearrange and shift each year which means having to edit my master list....and I've just not felt in the mood to do that. So I have lots of boxes and stuff to be put away that are just sitting in our florida room (AKA home of random objects). Maybe I'll make myself work tonight, unless I laze out and resolve to do it tomorrow :).

I have mine in mostly clear tubs so I can just take a glance to see what's inside.

bpathome, oh well then I was in Zambia at the same time as your brother! I arrived on October 1, 2014 and came home September 1, 2015. Where and what did he teach?

Here's my Zambian nativity scene, a very special gift:

nhb, I keep my holiday decor in tubs too, but you were smart to get clear ones! I have to take the lids off everything to see what's what, haha! And congratulations on the upcoming birth of another grandchild! How exciting!

I'm thinking next year about getting a living Christmas tree. Until I build a shed, which will not be before Christmas next year, I would have nowhere to store a fake tree, but I hate the idea of chopping them down, using them for a month, and then discarding them. (When I downsized and put everything in storage before I moved to Zambia I gave away my fake tree.) Have any of you ever contemplated or done this? If so, what was your experience?

He taught at the international school (I don't recall the proper name) in Lusaka. He teaches math, econ, and business. Love your nativity set!

Nhb, love the deer! And the table setting, oohh.

Thank you!

Debbie, We had a live tree one year. Worked out well until the red mites came out while the tree was still in our living room. What a mess! The tree was heavy, and digging a hole for it took a lot of elbow grease. I wonder what the tree looks like today. It's been about 33 years since we planted it in another town.

We were away for five days and got back midnight Sunday. Monday was recovery and washing all the ski clothes. Today,well, I don't know where the day went today!

We took down the fresh greenery from our MBR mantle, LR, DR and FR mantle. It had been up a month and was starting to look sad. Our trees still look great. I will probably take them down Thursday; I'm busy tomorrow.

As I mentioned in another thread, I will keep the ornaments i have in the urn on our entry table out until Valentine's Day, since they are all metallics and pinks.

bpathome, I know exactly where that school is! Very well regarded. Small world! nhb22--Well, I'm certainly not a fan of red mites or any other insects or what have you. I bet it would be pretty cool to see the tree you planted 33 years ago. Well, I'll keep it under consideration; I don't have to decide right now.