What to Declutter Before the Holidays: A Practical Checklist

If you want to declutter before the holidays, don’t start by emptying every closet in the house.

That is how a perfectly reasonable Saturday turns into sitting on the bedroom floor at 8 p.m., surrounded by things you haven’t seen since 2014 and wondering why you started.

The better approach is to focus on the areas that will actually make hosting, cooking, decorating and everyday life easier over the next few months — not every closet, drawer and storage bin in the house.

The holidays tend to bring more of everything into the house: more food, more packages, more decorations, more people and more coats hanging over chairs because apparently nobody can find the coat closet.

Clearing a little space now makes room for all of that without turning pre-holiday decluttering into another enormous project.

Here’s what is actually worth tackling.

1. Start With the Kitchen Counters

Holiday cooking requires counter space, and somehow kitchen counters are very good at attracting things that have absolutely nothing to do with cooking.

Mail. Receipts. Water bottles. Chargers. Vitamins. Sunglasses. A package that needs to be returned.

Before worrying about the inside of your cabinets, clear the surfaces you’ll actually need. Put away appliances you rarely use, move papers somewhere they can be dealt with properly and return wandering objects to wherever they belong.

You don’t need completely empty counters. You just need enough clear space that making dinner doesn’t require moving six unrelated objects first.

2. Make Some Room in the Refrigerator

The week before a holiday meal is not the ideal time to discover that half the refrigerator is occupied by condiments.

Take out everything that is expired, nearly empty or unlikely to be eaten. Check the produce drawers too — there is often something hiding underneath the perfectly respectable vegetables that would prefer not to be discussed.

Then look at what needs to be used soon and plan a couple of meals around it.

The goal is not a beautifully organized refrigerator. It is room for groceries, leftovers and the very large serving dish someone will inevitably insist needs to be refrigerated.

3. Check the Freezer Before Buying More Food

The freezer deserves its own inspection because it is remarkably easy to forget what is in there.

Pull out anything you can no longer identify, food that’s been sitting there far longer than you intended and the collection of almost-empty bags taking up an unreasonable amount of space. Then take a quick inventory.

Knowing what you already have can prevent duplicate purchases and, more importantly, create some actual freezer space before holiday cooking begins. If you are trying to declutter before the holidays, this is one of those small jobs that pays off surprisingly quickly.

4. Clear Out the Pantry

You don’t need matching containers or a pantry worthy of its own social-media account.

You need to be able to see what you have.

Check expiration dates, combine duplicates where it makes sense and bring ingredients that need to be used soon toward the front. Pay particular attention to baking supplies, spices and holiday staples before buying more.

There is nothing quite like coming home with cinnamon and discovering three containers of cinnamon already waiting for you.

If you are also working on a broader seasonal refresh, you may like these fall reset ideas for a more organized home.

5. Deal With the Entryway and Coat Closet

This is one of the easiest places to ignore until people start coming over.

Remove shoes nobody is currently wearing, bags that have been dropped there and jackets that belong somewhere else. Then check the coat closet — if it’s packed so tightly that a guest’s coat would need to negotiate for space, move out anything that doesn’t need to be there for the season.

You don’t have to reorganize the whole closet. Just make enough room for it to perform its primary job: holding coats.

6. Clear the Main Living Areas

When you’re getting the house ready for the holidays, concentrate on what people actually see.

Coffee tables, side tables, consoles and other flat surfaces have a tendency to slowly become storage areas. Put away the things that have migrated there and clear out anything you no longer want in the room.

Don’t start opening drawers. This is important. The minute you start investigating the contents of a drawer nobody can see, you have left the practical checklist and entered an entirely different project.

Focus on the visible clutter first. Even a quick reset of the main rooms can make the whole house feel noticeably more put together.

7. Tackle the Paper That Has Been Collecting

Holiday cards, catalogs, receipts, school papers, coupons and mail are about to have plenty of new friends.

Deal with the existing paper before more arrives. Recycle what you don’t need, shred anything sensitive and take action on papers that require something from you.

The important part is not creating an elaborate filing system. It’s reducing the amount of paper sitting around waiting to be dealt with.

8. Give the Guest Bathroom a Quick Check

You don’t need to remodel the bathroom because someone is coming for dinner.

You do, however, want to open the cabinet without seventeen nearly empty bottles falling out.

Throw away expired or empty products, remove things that don’t need to be there and check the basics: extra toilet paper, hand soap, clean hand towels. Done.

This is also a good time to clear the counter if it has accumulated everyday products that can easily be put away.

9. Look at the Guest Room Before It Becomes the Holiday Storage Room

If overnight guests are a possibility, deal with the guest room early.

These rooms have a strange tendency to become temporary homes for everything that doesn’t have another obvious destination — returns, donation bags, extra bedding, packages, clothes waiting to be dealt with.

Clear the bed and make enough closet or drawer space for someone to actually use the room.

And if nobody is staying overnight, this still isn’t wasted effort. A clear guest room gives you somewhere to temporarily put gifts or holiday supplies without spreading them through the rest of the house.

10. Go Through Holiday Decorations as You Take Them Out

You don’t have to pull every holiday bin out right now just to declutter it. Instead, deal with decorations as you unpack them.

If something is broken, you don’t like it anymore or you haven’t displayed it in years, ask yourself whether it really needs to go back into storage for another twelve months. The same goes for tangled lights that haven’t worked since sometime during the previous administration.

Holiday storage becomes much easier when you’re only storing decorations you actually want to use again.

11. Make Room for Incoming Gifts

This one is particularly useful if you have children or if your family exchanges a lot of gifts.

Before new things enter the house, look at what’s already there. Books nobody reads, games nobody plays, clothes that no longer fit and toys that have been outgrown can be donated while they’re still in good condition.

Adults aren’t exempt either — beauty products, kitchen gadgets, books, clothes and decorative items can accumulate just as easily.

You don’t need to get rid of something every time you receive something new. The point is simply to create a little breathing room before another wave of belongings arrives.

12. Finally Deal With the Donation and Return Piles

There is a special category of clutter made up entirely of things we’ve already decided should leave the house.

The donation bag in the closet. The return sitting by the door. The box that needs to go back to the store.

Technically, you’ve already decluttered these things mentally. Unfortunately, they’re still physically in your house.

Finish the job. Put the donation bags in the car. Make the returns. Drop off the packages.

Few decluttering tasks are as satisfying as watching an entire pile disappear in one trip.

Don’t Try to Declutter Everything Before the Holidays

The purpose of trying to declutter before the holidays isn’t to create a perfectly organized house. It’s to make the next couple of months easier.

You want somewhere to put the groceries. Somewhere for guests to hang their coats. Enough counter space to cook. A bathroom nobody has to apologize for. And perhaps a fighting chance of finding the tape when it’s time to wrap gifts.

That’s enough. Pick the areas that will make the biggest difference in your home and leave the rest for another time.

The holidays are going to arrive whether the junk drawer is organized or not.