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One of the reasons why I love Christmas is that my home is at its loveliest for one whole month.  Over a big window facing the back yard is strung a lush garland of pine entwined with tiny white lights.  My two trees (Mom’s, done in all red and gold and the “family” tree with our personalized, handmade and Disney ornaments) fill a living room and family room, respectively, and take my breath away.

All too soon, it will be time to take down the lights, trees, decorations, and ornaments and store them until next year.  My memory is so faulty, though, how will I remember where everything went?  After all, even the hall bathroom received its’ fair share of Christmas decor!

At my age, my memory isn’t as good as my forgettery, so to help it along, I’m going to take a series of photos to remind myself where everything goes.  A quick shot of the hall bathroom, one of the dining room table, another of the kitchen island, the outside lights, and on and on will be a lasting, photographic record so that next year I won’t be standing there with decorations in hand saying, “Now where does this thing go?”  This is an easy task to delegate to your kids, by the way, and since you’ll probably have the camera out anway, Christmas Day is a good day to get ‘er done.

Once your photography session is finished, you can store everything on your computer in a  file, “Christmas decor 2011″ or, better yet, store them on a CD in case your computer crashes.  I prefer having the photos printed and placed in a small photo album, which gets stored in one of the holiday bins.

One of the secrets to a relaxing holiday season is getting up all your decorations, including the tree, early in the month.  Knowing ahead of time where everything goes makes that job a piece of (fruit)cake!  With the photos you took this year, your kids can decorate the house next year, and you can relax!

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