The holidays are in full swing which means parties galore and if you’re unprepared, the thought of hosting might send you into a full on panic.
While there’s all sorts of preparation that you can do to make sure that your home is in tip top shape for hosting during holiday gatherings, there are also a few last minute hacks that you can implement in case you don’t have all the extra time to make things super fancy.
After all, the holidays shouldn’t make you feel stressed or overwhelmed. Instead, you should feel excited and joyful to be spending time and creating memories with those you love!
So, to achieve that and to ultimately create harmony in your home this holiday season, here are my top last minute tidying tips that you can use for your holiday gatherings and beyond.
Focus On The Most Important Things
Have you ever seen one of those funny memes or TikTok videos where a wife has asked her husband to help her prepare the house for visitors and he decides to do something so totally random like change the door knobs? 😂
These funny videos are the perfect depiction of how, for some reason, when people are coming over, we tend to get wrapped up in projects we’ve been putting off for months or focus on things that don’t actually matter.
The best thing you can do if you don’t have much time to prepare for your guests is to focus on the most important things and forget the rest!
For example, if your guests won’t be entering the upstairs of your house, then don’t spend your time and energy there. Instead, focus on the areas of your home that your guests will be using, like your kitchen, dining room and living room.
Make sure those areas are vacuumed, cleaned and decluttered, close the doors to the rooms that won’t be accessed and you’ll be good to go!
Create a Warm & Welcoming Environment
Oftentimes, people don’t actually care what your home looks like, but they do care about how everything feels. People love a warm, welcoming environment so if you can create this for your guests, your decor will hardly even matter.
After you’ve completed your regular cleaning for the most important rooms in your home, light a candle or turn on a diffuser with seasonal oils so that your guests are greeted with pleasant smells when they arrive.
In addition to lovely smells, make sure that the areas of your home that your guests will be using feel cozy and inviting by using lamps and natural light versus overhead lighting when you can.
And finally, make sure that your guests have clear options for seating. There’s nothing worse than entering someone’s home and not knowing where you can sit down.
To avoid this potential awkwardness, make sure your couch isn’t overloaded with decorative pillows and that extra seating has been made available if needed!
Empty the Sink & Dishwasher
When you’re preparing for a holiday gathering, the kitchen can very quickly become a crazy place and has the tendency to get messy very quickly as you cook and prepare all of the food.
While this is pretty inevitable, one way to minimize the messiness is to make sure that your sink and dishwasher are completely empty beforehand. This will allow you to utilize the sink and dishwasher as you go versus having to leave it for later.
Doing this will also ensure that when the event comes to a close you’re able to clean up fairly quickly and aren’t left with an abundance of dishes with nowhere to put them.
Take Out The Trash
This one sort of goes hand in hand with emptying your sink and dishwasher. As you prepare food and use your kitchen before holiday gatherings, the trash will start to pile up very quickly.
While it might not seem like a big deal at the time, a full trash can can cause a lot of distraction and overwhelm as guests finish their plates and need to throw away their items.
Before guests arrive, go ahead and take out a load of trash, so that you start your event with a completely empty trash can and you aren’t having to worry about it during the actual gathering.
Overall, if you follow these 4 last minute tidying tips for your holiday gatherings, I can almost guarantee that you’ll feel less stressed and can truly enjoy the event with your loved ones.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year, so don’t let unnecessary overwhelm take that away! If you need more resources for hosting during the holidays, check out a few of my other blog posts to help you out:
Here’s to a happy holiday season!
