How You Can Declutter Your Easter Decorations Now
This year I hired myself to let go of treasured items that no longer fit my life.
New Life Phase
Suddenly your kids are at university and beginning to navigate their own adulthood. Knowing your kids won’t be home for Easter may bring up ambivalence.
When it’s time to declutter your Easter decorations, drumming up motivation to declutter may not come easy.
On the one hand you save time no longer setting up Easter. But you also feel a bit blue knowing the holiday excitement shared by your then young children, is past.
It’s time for all those Easter knickknacks to grace other people’s homes.
Confessions of a Professional Organizer
I own enough Easter decorations to open my own store.
Our Annual Easter Eggstravaganzas sported color coordinated clues for Easter basket hunts.
Joyous children scampered in search of spectacular surprises from the Easter Bunny. Yes, that would be me…complete with adorable white fur bunny ears.
After the Easter Basket Hunt
Easter Eggcitement parties gave much pleasure to my extended family and my boys!
Magazine Spread-Worthy Easter Decor
Intricately designed, hand painted Eggcellent Eggs garnered our home.
I’m talking serious hand painted eggs!
Egg yolks blown out with a special tiny bellows from Germany. Delicate painting of hollowed eggs with a straight pin stuck in a pencil eraser as a stylus.
Easter hand painted eggs hanging from chandelier
Vintage adorable rabbits and Dept. 56 SnowBunnies uplifted every room. Our Easter decor was worthy of a spread in a fancy magazine.
Easter Decorated Foyer Built-Ins
Easter Exile: Declutter Your Easter Decorations
While it’s easy for me to empathize and help my clients declutter holiday decorations, for myself, not so much.
I’ve struggled to part with my precious Easter Decorations, despite knowing it’s time…for some time…i.e. a couple years. Each ornament prompted memories with my sons and family.
My own Easter declutter took dedicated mindset work first. I had to continually remind myself I could keep Easter memories and still make room for new beginnings.
How to declutter your Easter decorations: startling insider scoop!
Here’s what I did:
- Unwrapped each item, photographed and priced to sell
- Listed all on a local online Tag Sale
- Designed/printed in canva.com “Easter Decorations Sale” flyers
- Rolled and ribboned flyers – put in neighbor mailboxes
- Emailed my book club photos for buyer first dibs
- Displayed all with prices on sticky notes in our mudroom
I’m happy selling my beloved Easter decorations to good homes.
Now the prep work’s done, it’s easy to repost in online tag sales and reuse flyers. I’ll give what’s left as gifts to friends/family or pack away to sell again next year.
Easter Decoration On Display In Mudroom
START EARLY—I BEGAN 5 WEEKS BEFORE EASTER
Tell me in the comments if the need for holiday decluttering looms over your head or if you’re a holiday minimalist.
Happy Easter!
P.S. Secretly worried you’re a “Holiday Hoarder”? I can help you declutter, organize/set up your holiday decorations so you reclaim your home. Let me help you go from chaos to FREEDOM.
Hi, I’m Jul’s Arthur. I’d love to help you get organized! What I do: I help women professionals & entrepreneurs STOP endlessly spinning their wheels stuck in anxiety and overwhelm with the chaos and clutter in their home, and instead START simplifying, so everything has a place, they gain FREEDOM, CLARITY and easily step into their DRAM LIFE. I’m also the author of the book 25 Days of Holiday Organizing!
wow! i’ve never seen so many easter decorations! 🙂 good for you for knowing when/how to appropriately pass them on. just think how happy others will be with displaying your lovely items.
It’s been so much fun to see the new owners delight in their new Easter decorations! I am finding I am happy to let these special items be loved anew 🙂
I am so impressed with the number of Easter decorations you have and how organized you are with them! I think even when kids are at home there is always decluttering to be done.. Having moved a few times and to countries that do not necessarily celebrate Easter has made it a little easier on my storage space.. However, Easter is still around as are decorations and things to do, so as my son transitions to double digit age next year, it may be time to start! And I agree with Cachet, these could be applied to some other holiday decorations I have around!!
Thanks for your comments! So glad my intention of Easter decoration decluttering working for other holiday decorations too. I declutter regularly. Our lives change, our interests change, and though I will always love Easter decorations and all the fun that holiday has brought to my sons, it’s exciting to realize I am ready to let it go. I will keep a few precious decorations to put out at the holiday or pass on to my sons…but only a few 😉
Aww, this is a tough step, but you handled it with such grace like you always do, while setting a beautiful example for the rest of us! This process could work in so many other areas and holiday’s, too. Thank you for sharing the importance of mindset with this as well. You are so gifted at connecting the heart to the mind in your work. Nicely done, yet again, Jul’s! Wishing you a very Happy Easter!!
Thank you so much April. It was tough at first, but shifting my mindset allowed for ease. In fact, as people have come to buy they are so happy and surprised to see my “Easter store”, and then I get such joy seeing the excitement they have to bring home the Easter decorations they chose. Or chose them, couple people have said, “That darling decoration is calling me.” Happy Easter to you and yours!
Wow, I’m impressed by your Easter decorating prowess! I have to admit…I’ve never decorated for Easter BUT the helpful advice you provide can used to declutter other holiday decorations (or declutter and profit in general) so SCORE! BTW, I also love the personal touches in your post (i.e. the pictures of your boys).
Aww thank you for your comment and compliments, Cachet. I love my boys <3. They are the reason I was so inspired to make Easter so special a family celebration. Love your connection Declutter = Profit....so very true, I shall have to write a blog post about that!
Jul’s, I can tell how much you value these trinkets by the tone of your writing. I’m way too young to understand what it means when kids leave home, but I do share your sentiment about letting go of things.
I have loads upon loads of things from when I was a kid, and now that I’m moving overseas, I really have to cut down on my things – I can leave some behind and come back for them later, but I only want to keep what’s really important.
I think the issue is that we worry that once these things are gone from our lives, we may not remember the beautiful memories that went along with them, which we cherish so dearly!
One thing I’m surely not letting go of is this little bag I have of clothes when I was little. I’m hoping I’ll dress my daughters in them, when I have them 🙂
Lovely! I have a box that I kept a few precious baby clothes in of each son, and I think it lovely you are hoping to can dress your future daughters in them. Nothing like a long distance move to make you decide what items are very important to you. We get to decide what to keep and what to let go of and when. We deserve the relief decluttering offers.
Hi Jul’s, I know what these decorations mean to you and it is hard to let go, but you are right in passing them to your family and friends to help them celebrate their Easter holidays. I also love your de-clutter tips of Easter decorations. So amazing you get to organize this few weeks ahead of time . Happy Easter!
Happy Easter! It’s always been a favorite holiday of mine as I love being the secret Easter bunny and designing such fun activities for kids and my family! It’s morphing into something else and some day when I have grandkids I will get a new kind of fun to celebrate. For now, I keep some decorations for this holiday, just not decorating the entire house as I did all these years. What feels good is coming to terms with the fact all these adorable and fun decorations served us well, now they get to keep serving new children and families. It feels so freeing and honestly I’ve gone from feeling kind of sad about the past being the past, to excitement for my open present and future 😉 It’s all about mindset and reframing, not about the decorations themselves. Even this professional organizer needs to take her own advice sometimes 😉
Jul’s I can hear how it is hard to part with your Easter decorations, and I’m sure you are so glad you did it! Now they are gone, does it still feel good? do you need the items to keep the memories?
I have a large tupperware trunk and any special things I think my kids might want goes in there (special books, stuffies, etc). That’s how I am able to declutter..knowing that I’m keeping a few key items for prosperity 🙂
Thanks for your comment Caroline! Yes, it was hard to part with all the adorable Easter decorations initially, but once I practiced my mindset and shifted my viewpoint, it was actually so enjoyable to have people come to my home and buy for their holiday and children. As I am in no rush to declutter and I have room for storage, I’ll pack up what does not sell and give it a go next year to sell and donate. I’ve managed to eliminate one 29 gallon Rubbermaid® container!
Jul’s! What about when you have grandchildren?! You always inspire me with your holiday organization tips. I love how you’ve created beautiful traditions with your boys and extended family. I would like to be better at this but am missing that visually creative gene. I would love some tips on how to organize creating your decorative traditions. Happy Easter & Spring!
Oh that’s a great idea —how to organized and create holiday/decorative traditions! Putting it in my blog idea file! Thank you! As to the grandchildren…hope that day comes some day, but my boys are still along way from that 😉 I possibly raised my sons too well lol…they are not nostalgic of things. The SnowBunnies and SnowBabies (Christmas) were what they collected through the years. Guess what, they have no interest in having them for their kids. They feel this way about everything lol. I imagine their future wives will be glad of any old toys, decorations from their childhood, but they may get very few as the boys say no thank you to my saving things for them. It’s okay, they may keep some of their traditions or they may start their own. I accept that what means/meant so much to me, may not be the same for them. At least not yet. At this point, this mama is gratefully learning from her cubs 😉
oh Juls you got me all Eastered up 🙂 I am going to dig and see what I find! I am way behind and to be honest, when I arrived my now hubs’ house was…well… a man’s cave 😛 so there’s not much but every year I get more and more inspired to decorate during this time. I love spring colours! Thanks for the inspiration!
I admit I love holiday decorating, and being the youngest of 5, Easter was my holiday by default–only one left 😉 So much fun for the kids and extended family! We enjoy many gatherings and the stuff that goes with it. The key, is to realize things have their time in our lives, and then it serves us more to transition them out. Happy you were inspired by my post…Happy Easter! Happy decorating. Enjoy all the spring colors and excitement as these items bring joy in this phase of your life!
It was so great to read your ‘confession’ Jul’s and to see your very practical tips and process. It is such a great reminder that you can still keep the memories 🙂
I am glad my confession hit home for you! I believe in accepting myself with all my “flaws” and showing, I work at being organized and sometimes get attached to things just like most of us! I love the memories, and I let go of the items that brought so much joy, little by little to allow new joys in my life.
Wow! Jul’s – you are awesome for being organized enough to get this taken care of 5 weeks before Easter! Pat yourself on the back.
I love the fact that you go through this yourself, and are helping us with your own experience.
It isn’t easy to get rid of trinkets and things that you and your children have spent so much time, energy, and effort creating.
Luckily, it looks like you have found a way to help them find happy homes.
So glad my exposing my journey resonated with you, Susan! It may sound funny, I know I could have donated my Easter decorations, and I may do so with some, but selling them felt like I was honoring them somehow. The money is minimal, though I have taken it and put toward a Hawaii trip coming up several months from now! It helped to have a new goal to let go of the old. I loved decorating all those years, and now I am shifting to decorating in new ways—decorating with experiences like more travel, because home is wherever I am. Thanks so much for you thoughtful and kind words. I am indeed patting myself on the back. More so for knowing my sharing my journey helps others for when they too may want to let old items go. 🙂
Oh gosh, you’re not wrong about having a lot of Easter decorations Jul’s. I totally know what you mean about the sentimental value and kids growing up, but you’ve created some beautiful memories for them which is priceless. Letting go of these sentimental items is tough but you’ve shared some great tips here for us. Thank you.
So happy you found my decluttering Easter (holiday) decorations helpful. It’s funny, Angela, but going through the process of taking action to let of our Easter decorations actually helped me as I keep going through the waves of letting my kids go and focusing on this new phase of my life. It’s so true, it wasn’t the decorations that were special really, it was the family time and connection with my sons 😉 I’ll keep the memories…the stuff gave us so much joy and it’s time to pass that joy on!