14 After Christmas / Holiday General Tips & Shopping Tips

This is a great time to start thinking about the holidays for the following year while this is all fresh on your mind. Last year I wrote about 21 Tips & Tricks for Getting Organized After the Holidays and Organizing Christmas decorations. Below are some additional various tips and tricks:

Tips: 

1. Label each bag, bin and box so you know what is in them.
2. Make a list of all things you want to change for the previous year or things you want to remember. Did you want to purchase stamps earlier, ship items earlier, get certain decorations up by a certain time. Hire or outsource certain services, etc? What did you run out of? 
3. Sharpen your scissors.
4. Budget now for next year. How much did you spend this year? More or less than last year? In the new year set aside a little money each month so you do not feel as overwhelmed and stressed closer to the holidays.
5. Write thank you notes for gifts you received.
6. As you are putting new items away, donate items you know you no longer need, want or like. 

If you are shopping the day after Christmas here are some things to think about.

1. Make a list ahead of time of everything you are needing to avoid impulse purchases. For me this year I am looking for timers, more bike bags, various decorations, etc. 
2. Did you receive gift cards as a gift? USE them on sales for purchases you may be making if you can.
3. Only get supplies that you know you need. Did you run out of wrapping paper, tissue, gift card holders, etc.?
4. If you are thinking of getting new Christmas lights for indoor or outdoor, now is a great time. Hardware stores usually have them deeply discounted. 
5. If you buy new decorations, make sure you have the proper storage solutions to put them.
6. Shop early if you are looking for something specific or shop a couple of weeks later when discounts consistently get higher and higher.
7. Don't forget to shop drugstores and various hardware stores. 

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Gift Wrapping Tips & Tricks

 

At Eco Modern Concierge we are gift wrapping experts and we help residential and business clients all over Houston and beyond with their gift wrap needs. From shopping, organizing gift wrap, organizing the gift wrap process, meeting deadlines and trying to get things done early, etc. It can be a tedious time consuming thing that many people do not want to do. So if this is something you don't like doing consider hiring a professional organizer or concierge to help you get this task done. 

• Always use excess ribbon.
• It is best to use a medium to heavy grade paper. 
• If you are doing special things to your presents like pleating the paper buy paper that has grids. 
• Buy gift wrap & ribbon at the end of the season when it is inexpensive and practice, practice, practice. 
• There are many ways to measure paper so you get the exact amount like going 2/3rds up the side, measuring 1/2 from the middle of the box, using a ruler (handy on large packages), etc. 
• Measure ribbon by getting a tail on the ribbon and measure 5x by the longest edge. You would rather have too much than too little ribbon. 
• Place the top of the package facing down when you are wrapping. 
• Use fabric scissors only on ribbon, not gift wrap.
• Use double stick tape to get the no edge look.
• Use clear twist ties to secure special bows and embellishments.

You can shop all gift wrapping essentials on the Eco Modern Concierge shop page. 

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Holiday Mailing Essentials & Cart Organization

The holidays is a crazy time for mailing gifts. As a concierge we do a TON of mailing on behalf of clients.  Below are some mailing cart essentials. 

Stamps: An essential for mailing cards and any correspondence. 

Shipping Labels: You need to make sure that your packages are properly addressed. 

Envelope Sealer: If you are mailing a ton of cards, this is a life saver.

Correction Tape: Just in case you make a mistake.

Sharpies: Perfect to using on addressing packages. 

Pen: An essential for addressing any card. 

Glue Stick: Just in case you need to make embellishments on anything or seal anything. 

Tape: In case you need to mail small packages.

Mailing Tape: A MUST for shipping any packages. 

Scotch Flex & Seal: If you have not used this before, it is awesome. No tape needed. 

Bubble Wrap: An essential for mailing fragile gifts.

Envelope Wax Seals: Great if you want to elevate your envelopes and correspondence.

Cards: Needed for mailing holiday cards and sending thank you notes. 

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Eco Modern Concierge Gift Wrapping Essentials & Cart Organization

At Eco Modern Concierge we specialize in all things holiday from decorating to wrapping and every single thing you can think of in between. As professional organizers and concierges in Houston, TX it is our job to make sure we have some of the essentials on hand. 

Cart: I like a simple cart that is mobile, so you can move it from room to room. 

Cart Trays: These are great for organizing the inside of your cart. 

Wrapping Paper Storage Bin: This is my favorite wrapping paper storage bing because it holds tall wrapping paper rolls.

Regular Scissors: I like to use regular scissors for cutting paper products.

Fabric Scissors: I like to use fabric to cut fabric products like ribbon. 

Elf Cutter: This is a relatively new product that I got last year and it does work great once you get the hang of it.

Regular Tape: Regular tape is great for wrapping up packages. 

Double Sided Tape: Great for heading seams on wrapping paper

Super Sticky Tape: for things that are hard to stick to like glitter paper.

Wrapping Paper: An essential.

Tissue Paper: You can wrap gifts with it, use it as box stuffing or bag stuffing.

Boxes: Needed if you are wrapping clothing or items that are better in a bag.

Bags: If you don't want to wrap presents.

Tags: Needed so you know what gift goes to whom.

Ribbon: The perfect accessory for any gift.

Bells, greenery, berries, pinecones, etc.: Needed if you want to dress up any package. 

Hot Glue Gun: Makes putting on flowers and package accessories easier as it can cover imperfections and knots made by ribbon.

Straightener: This is a tip, use a straightener to straighten wrinkled ribbon.

Slap Bracelets: Great for keeping wrapping paper rolls and some ribbon rolls together. 

Clear Twist Ties: These are extremely helpful when attaching bows or accessories to packages.

Bow Maker: If you need help making bows, I suggest getting and using a bow maker.

Glue Dot Roller: Great when when you a little something to stick to help you wrap gifts.

Wrapping Paper Cutter: Perfect for helping tear paper especially if you have a small amount.

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The Ultimate Holiday Essentials Bag for Holiday Concierges and Professional Organizers

We help clients year round with all of their concierge and professional organizing needs, but we are experts in all things holiday related and it is one of our busiest times of year. We do everything from decorating to shopping to gift wrapping to getting organized before guests come and the list goes on and on and on. We are located in Houston, TX, so we often get a lot of requests. Below is a list of products and essentials we like to keep on hand during the holiday season for every little thing that we may need when it comes to decorating and random other little things.  We hope you find this list helpful. What are things that you like to keep on hand during the holiday season? You can shop all of these items on the Eco Modern Concierge Shop page as well. 

Gardening bag: This is the bag I currently use to store everything because it has lots of pockets. 

Gloves: A necessary to not cut your hands and arms up when decorating especially with live tress, garlands and wreaths.

Double sided tape: A gift wrapping essential.

Regular tape: Another gift wrapping essential.

Glue Dot roller: Perfect for gift wrapping and helping various things stay in place. 

Super sticky tape: Great for glitter wrapping paper or things that really need to be stuck down. 

Super glue: To fix broken items.

Scissors: I have talked about these scissors for a long time and really like them.

Fabric scissors: To only be used used on fabric. 

Velcro: Perfect to wrap cords and hold various things in place.

Command hooks in varying sizes: We use command hooks ALL the time with various holiday projects. We love using the small, regular, gold / silver, cord wraps, etc. 

Nails: You never know what you will need to nail down. They are great for hanging various things like garland, wreaths, etc. 

Tacks: We use tacks for all kinds of things like securing ribbon to windows, securing wreaths to doors, etc. We use various colors like white, green, silver and gold.

Floral wire: This is a MUST in our bag because we use it to tie garland on banisters, rails, hang wreaths, etc. We usually carry green and silver wire.

Zip ties: These are necessary for your holiday bag and we use them most often to tie garland to banisters and securing lots of garland parts together.

Clear twist ties: perfect to secure various things like bows on decor, gifts, etc.

Beaded flexible ties: I like that these have notches and you can use them for various things like lights, garland, etc.

Flexible twist ties: These come in green and white and perfect to secure cords or various things that need to stay together.

Twist ties: 

Garland ties: These green pine ties are also great for tying garland in various places. 

Fishing wire: Perfect for hanging things like wreaths when you don't want string to show from afar or to use to hang other decor items.

Banister clips: Great for securing various things to the banister

Wreath picks: These are wonderful to have on hand because they help fill in areas of wreaths & garland that have fallen off through the years, great to add to presents, etc. Here are pinecone picks and berry picks.

Mallet: We always keep a mallet on hand to secure nails, put stakes in the ground, fix things, etc.

Ornament hooks: You can get standard in expensive ones or we love these decorative ones we saw at Target this year that come in gold and silver. 

DW40: A necessary to have on hand always.

Batteries: A necessary to have on hand during the holidays because you never know what remote, decor item, toy, etc will need a battery.

Wreath suction hangers: Great when putting wreaths or hanging items on glass windows, doors and mirrors. They come in various weight holds 10lbs and 20lbs.

Wreath hangers: We keep these on hand because we never know when a client may need one.

Magnetic wreath hangers: These are wonderful for hanging wreath and other items. Please the magnets are usually pretty strong.

Slap bracelets: Helps keep wrapping paper and various ribbon rolls together. 

Beeswax lubricating compound: Great for using with scores, 

Stick um: Candle adhesive, which is great for keeping candles in place inside of holders.

Straightening iron: To unwrinkle ribbon and various holiday decor. 

Hot glue gun: Great for putting embellishments on presents, wreaths, garlands, and various other holiday decor. 

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Happy #GivingTuesday

 

Hey! Today is #GivingTuesday. For those who don't know, it is a global day of giving.  It happens on the first Tuesday after Thanksgiving. For the past several years I have tried to gather toys for MD Anderson Children's Cancer Hospital. What do you do on Giving Tuesday. Also you can check out the Eco Modern Concierge website to see various ways we give back throughout the year. 

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