As the holiday season approaches, stress can often overshadow excitement and joy, especially when your home feels cluttered. With decorations, gifts, and gatherings on the horizon, now is the perfect time to start doing some quick and easy pre-holiday decluttering.

We’re not talking about whole room declutters, just 25 targeted items you can quickly declutter before the holidays, which will help you create a more inviting and stress-free atmosphere to enjoy all season long. I’ve organized them by room below, so let’s get to it!

Kitchen & Pantry Decluttering

1) Food Storage Containers: Edit containers that are no longer in good condition, don’t have their matching lid or bottom, that you have too many of in a particular size, that you don’t otherwise use, or that need to be returned to someone.

2) Mugs. Pull them all out, edit ones that are badly stained, chipped and that you don’t like and never use (even if they were a gift).

3) Water Bottles & Travel Mugs: Decide on a reasonable number to keep (which is informed by your space) and then edit.  Easy ones to start with are the freebies you received and just tossed in the cupboard, the ones with chewed straws/spouts, ones missing their matching tops and, of course, the ones you don’t like or use.

4) Take Out Menus & Flyers: You can look up almost every place online, so there’s no need to keep these around.

5) Take Out Cutlery & Condiments: Pull out all the delivery forks, napkins, chopsticks, and condiment packets, and if you actually use them, only keep a realistic amount based on your space and use habits.

6) Cooking Utensils: Gather all your utensils and edit any duplicates, ones you never use and whose function can be completed with something else you’re keeping. For example, you can cut an apple with a knife instead of a specialty (and awkward to store) apple cutter.

BONUS TIP: For utensils you use less frequently (1 X month or less) but want to keep, consider storing them separately in a “rarely used” bin. Often this includes items like a turkey baster, spider scoop, rolling pin, cake server or knife sharpener.

7) Cookbooks: Recycle or donate ones you no longer use.  Remember, you can find almost any recipe online now! If you enjoy one or two recipes in a book, you can take a photo of the recipe or photocopy it instead of keeping the whole book.

8) Kitchen Towels & Dishcloths: Pull these out and edit out any that are stained, torn, threadbare, have an odour despite washing, are no longer very absorbent and that you don’t like.

BONUS TIP: If you have seasonal/holiday towels, consider storing them with the coordinating seasonal décor to free up space in your drawer for your everyday towels.

9) Cleaning Supplies: Get rid of any supplies you’re no longer using or that you tried and did not like.

BONUS TIP: Check out my FREE Disposal Guide to find locations to properly dispose of cleaning supplies.

10) Fridge: To make room for all the holiday deliciousness, go through your fridge and toss out leftovers past their prime, expired condiments and anything else that is past its best-before date.

11) Pantry: Similar to the fridge, go through your pantry and edit out expired items, items you tried, didn’t like, and won’t otherwise use. If you keep small appliances in your pantry, edit out any you don’t use.

Bathroom & Linen Closet

12) Toiletries & Makeup: Go through and edit any makeup, toiletries, nail polish, lotions, perfumes, etc., that are expired or you just aren’t going to use up (including free samples that you can donate to local shelters).

BONUS TIP: Click for my FREE MakeUp Expiry Guide.

13) Medications: Go through your medications and first aid supplies to remove anything expired or unused (and return to your pharmacy for proper disposal).

14) Linens: Go through your towels, sheets and blankets and remove ones that are worn, stained, or otherwise not in good condition. It’s also an excellent time to assess how many sets of towels, sheets and blankets you need.

BONUS TIP: Check with your local animal shelter and vet clinic for items not in good enough condition to donate. Many accept these items to line pet cages, clean messes and dry wet animals.  Just be sure there is no stuffing.

Holiday & Entertaining

15) Holiday Decor: As you pull out your festive decorations, edit out any you have not put out for a few years, that are no longer in good condition, or you otherwise don’t care for anymore.

16) Gift Wrap & Bags: Go through your gift wrap, bags and bows and edit out any that are too crinkled or crushed to reuse, torn or just not your gifting style.  Also, edit out any excess (i.e. if you have too many of a particular size).

BONUS TIP: Make a list of items you need to replenish on your phone.  When you’re out wondering if you need something, you can consult your list and know what you need and, importantly, don’t need!

17) Vases: It’s not uncommon for gifts of flowers to come with vases, so it’s easy for your collection to grow fast.  Pull them all out and only keep your favourites.

18) Candles: Pull out your candle collection and edit it to a reasonable amount, given your space and candle-burning habits.  

19) Old Party Supplies: Clear out old décor and supplies from birthday parties and celebrations you won’t reuse (for example, milestone birthdays, baby showers, etc.).

Kid Stuff

20) Toys: Not only will decluttering toys before the holidays help create space for new items coming into your home, but your donated toys, games, and books will also likely help other families have a better holiday, too!

BONUS TIP: I wrote a blog post on decluttering toys, and you can find all the tips here.

21) Craft Supplies: Go through craft supplies and edit out dried-up glue, markers, paint, play-doh and remnants from completed (and abandoned) craft projects that won’t get reused.

BONUS TIP: You can donate small amounts of craft supplies and games missing pieces to Goodwill.  For the craft supplies, they combine supplies and create kits with different donations.  With the games, they make complete games out of various games donated missing pieces. Just mark the game as “Missing Pieces” when you donate it.

Other

22) Reusable Shopping Bags: These can pile up fast if you forget to bring your bags to the store a few times. Go through and edit out the excess and the ones that are no longer in good condition.

23) Your Purse & Wallet: Toss old receipts, gum wrappers, snack wrappers from being on the go with your kids, empty lip balms, excess pens, expired or empty gift cards, expired coupons, business cards you do not need and cards for stores/services you no longer frequent.

24) Old Magazines & Papers: Recycle any edition over 2 months. You probably aren’t going to get to it, and if you do, the content won’t be current..

25) Specialty Disposal Items: Get the empty paint cans, burnt-out light bulbs, dead batteries, etc., out of your space.

BONUS TIP: Use my FREE Disposal Guide to find out where to dispose of these items properly.

Conclusion

Small changes can make a big difference!  Tackling these 25 easy decluttering projects before the holidays will clear some physical and mental space so you can focus on what matters most – time with friends and family!

Is there a category you’d add to this list?  Let me know in the comments below.  And if you like this post, please share it!

Happy Decluttering!