27 Ways to Fix That Empty Room Feeling After Christmas Decor Comes Down

The post 27 Ways to Fix That Empty Room Feeling After Christmas Decor Comes Down appeared first on Penny Pinchin' Mom.

The tree comes down, the boxes go back to the attic, and suddenly your living room looks like nobody lives there. It is still January, maybe even February, with weeks of gray afternoons ahead and nothing but bare walls to show for it.

One year I stripped the whole house the day after Christmas, hauled nine bins up to the attic before noon, and spent that evening in a living room so empty I could hear the furnace kick on from the couch. The wool throws came back out the next morning and stayed until April. That is really what this list is about. What to keep, not just what to buy, because winter decor this time of year is mostly a matter of editing what is already sitting in the room.

What to Keep Up

1. Strip the Evergreen Garland Down to Bare Greenery

Pull off the ribbon, the red berries, the ornaments and the pick-in-a-plaid-bow situation, and what’s left on your mantel is plain winter greenery. Nobody reads bare pine and cedar as Christmas once the red is gone.

This costs nothing if you already own it. A new 9-foot faux mixed garland runs about $15 to $30 at Walmart or Michaels, and prices shift a little depending on where you shop. One 9-foot piece covers a standard mantel, so buy two if you’re wrapping a staircase rail.

Real garland will dry out by mid-January, so plan on tossing it and using faux for the long stretch. Store faux on a hanger inside a trash bag so the branches don’t crush flat in a bin.

2. Repurpose White and Silver Ornaments as Bowl and Vase Filler

Those white, silver and clear glass balls you just unhooked from the tree do not have to go into storage with everything else. Pile them in a footed bowl, a glass cylinder or an empty vase and they turn into neutral winter texture.

Cost is zero if you already own them. If your collection is mostly red and gold, a bag of extra silver glass balls goes for about $10 at Target. Plan on 20 to 25 balls to fill a medium bowl convincingly, since a thin layer just looks like leftovers.

Mix matte and shiny finishes in the same bowl so it catches light without looking like a disco ball. Store these in the winter bin, not the tree box.

3. Move the Front Door Wreath Inside, Minus the Bow

Your evergreen wreath, once the red bow and berry picks come off, is just a circle of greenery. Hung indoors over a mirror, leaned against a bookshelf or propped on a console, it stops looking like a doorway decoration and starts looking intentional.

You already own it, so this costs nothing. A plain faux mixed-green wreath, if you want a second one, comes in around $20 to $35 at Michaels or Hobby Lobby in the after-holiday clearance stretch.

One wreath per wall is plenty. Two stacked or grouped starts reading holiday again.

Save the bow and picks in a small ziplock inside the holiday bin so you can reattach them next December instead of buying new ones.

4. Keep the Clear Glass Hurricanes and Cloches Out

Clear glass is the most underused winter decor most people already own. Hurricanes, cloches and glass cylinders came out for the holiday table, then get packed away by the first week of January for no good reason.

Glass reads as ice. Group three in different heights on a tray, a runner or the mantel, and you have a centerpiece with nothing else added. Cost is zero for what you have, and single hurricanes run about $12 to $20 each at HomeGoods if you want a taller one to complete a trio.

Set them on a mirror or a metal tray to double the light bouncing around, which matters a lot when it’s dark by five. Wash them with vinegar and water first, since holiday candle soot dulls the glass fast.

5. Group the Silver and Mercury Glass Candlesticks in Odd Numbers

Silver, pewter and mercury glass candlesticks came out with the holiday tablescape and belong right back on the mantel for January. Metallic finishes in silver tones read cold and wintry, not festive, once nothing red is sitting next to them.

Nothing to spend if they’re already in the bin. Individual mercury glass holders cost about $8 to $15 each at HomeGoods or Hobby Lobby if you want to build the group out.

Odd numbers look styled and even numbers look staged, so aim for three or five across a standard mantel, staggered in height rather than lined up like soldiers.

Polished once now, the silver ones hold through February without another thought.

6. Trim the Red Off Your Bottle Brush Trees and Keep Them Out

White, cream and pale green bottle brush trees stay out well past New Year’s, and nobody has ever asked why the Christmas trees are still on the shelf. Snip off the red wooden bases, tiny berries or mini bows with scissors and they turn into a snowy little forest.

Free if you own them. New white or flocked ones run about $5 to $12 each at Target or Hobby Lobby, and three to five grouped in varying heights fills a shelf, a windowsill or one end of a mantel.

If the base is glued on, cover it instead. A wrap of twine or a scrap of cream felt hides red in about two minutes.

What to Swap In

7. Swap in Silver Snowflake Lights or Wall Decals

Snowflakes read as winter, not Christmas, as long as you stay in the silver and white family and skip anything with red glitter on it. A battery-operated snowflake light set runs about $12 to $20 at Target, and a vinyl decal set for a window or a blank wall totals maybe $8 on Amazon. Prices bounce around a little depending on the store, but that’s the general range.

One set is plenty for a standard living room window. Two if you have a wide picture window and want the spacing to look even rather than crowded.

When March comes, decals peel off in about five minutes and the lights coil back into the same bin you pulled them from.

8. Set Out Three to Five White Pillar Candles in Varying Heights

Three to five unscented white pillars on a tray do more for a bare mantel than almost anything else in this price range. A set of three at Walmart or Amazon costs about $10 to $18, and mixing heights matters more than mixing sizes. Try a 9 inch, a 6 inch, and a 3 inch grouped together rather than three identical ones lined up.

Unscented is the point. You want the look without competing with whatever is in the crock pot.

Real wax drips and needs replacing every few months of regular burning, so if yours are decorative only, pull the wick out flat and they will look brand new again next January too.

9. Add a Simple Winter or Snowflake Wood Sign

When the mantel looks undressed and you cannot figure out what is missing, it is usually a horizontal anchor piece. A plain wood sign reading WINTER, or one with a single snowflake motif, costs about $15 to $25 at Hobby Lobby, HomeGoods, or Amazon.

Lean it against the wall instead of hanging it. No hardware, no holes, and it takes fifteen seconds to move when you want the mantel bare again.

One sign per room is the limit. Two competing word signs in the same sightline start to look like a craft fair booth, and the whole point of this stretch of the year is quiet and uncluttered.

10. Bring in One or Two Birch-Bark-Print Ceramic Vases

Birch-bark-print ceramic vases give you that pale, papery winter texture without hauling actual bark into the house. Target and HomeGoods both carry them for about $12 to $20 each, and one on the mantel plus one on the entry table is usually enough.

They work empty, which is the part I like. Filled with branches they read winter, and standing alone they read neutral enough to leave out in April.

Two of slightly different heights beat a matched pair every time. The mismatched version looks collected instead of purchased, which is the difference between a $16 vase and a $16 vase that looks like more.

11. Corral Everything on a Neutral Tray

Five candles scattered across a mantel look like leftovers. The same five on a wooden or galvanized tray look styled, and the tray costs about $12 to $20 at Target or HomeGoods.

This is the trick that makes inexpensive pieces look intentional. Group your pillars, a small vase, and a handful of glass balls on one tray and the eye reads it as a single arrangement instead of clutter.

One tray per surface you’re actually decorating is the right count, which for most homes means two, one for the mantel and one for the coffee table or dining table. A rectangular tray around 18 inches long fits most standard mantels without hanging off either end.

12. Reprint What Is Inside the Frames You Already Own

Those frames holding your family Christmas card photos are the easiest swap in the house, because the frames are already hung and already the right size. A neutral winter art print from Etsy comes in around $5 to $8 as a digital file, and printing an 8×10 at the Walmart photo counter adds another $3 or so.

Snowy landscapes in gray and white, simple botanical line drawings, or a single word print all work.

Two or three files bought at once will swap a whole gallery wall in one sitting. It takes maybe twenty minutes and costs less than a single new decor piece, and the old photos slide right back in when you are done.

13. Put a Large Woven Basket Where the Tree Was

The empty corner where the tree stood is the hardest spot in the house to fix, because your eye has spent five weeks expecting something tall there. A large woven floor basket, about $25 to $40 at Target, fills it without you buying furniture.

Stand three or four tall branches in it, or use it to hold the throws that live on the couch. Either version gives the corner some height and mass.

Anything under about 16 inches across and 14 inches tall disappears against the wall. When spring arrives it moves to a bedroom or holds toys, so nothing about it is single-season.

Lighting for Dark Afternoons

14. Set Battery LED Candles on a 4 p.m. Timer

By 4:30 in January the living room goes dim, and nobody wants to walk around clicking on lamps one at a time. Battery tapers and pillars with a built-in timer solve that for you. A set of six runs about $15 to $25 at Walmart or on Amazon, with Luminara and Homemory being the two you’ll see most often.

The timer function is the part that matters. You turn it on once at 4 p.m., and the candles come on at that same hour every day for the next six months without you touching them. Batteries last around six months with daily use.

Buy enough for two groupings, three on the mantel and three on a tray somewhere else in the room, so the light reads intentional instead of scattered.

15. Leave One Strand of Warm White Lights Up Year-Round

Multicolor holiday strands come down. One strand of warm white lights does not. A 20-foot strand costs about $10 to $18 at Target or on Amazon, and once it’s tucked along a shelf edge, a window frame, or the top of a bookcase, it stops reading as Christmas and starts reading as ambient light.

Warm white is the key word. Cool white or “bright white” strands look blue against a gray January sky and make a room feel colder, not cozier.

Plan on one strand per shelf run or window. Two strands in a standard living room is plenty. When spring comes, you can leave them, which is the entire point of buying the neutral version instead of the holiday one.

16. Buy Lanterns in Pairs and Fill Them With Flameless Pillars

A pair of metal or wood-framed lanterns with flameless pillars inside gives you real light at floor and table height, where overhead fixtures do nothing. Expect to pay about $20 to $35 per lantern at HomeGoods, with Amazon running similar prices for the black metal versions.

Buy two. A single lantern looks like it wandered in from somewhere else, while a matched pair on an entry table or flanking a hearth looks deliberate.

Years ago the grandkids came for dinner on a January evening and I watched them feel their way up to a house where only one light was on inside. Two lanterns burning by the entry table fixed that, and they’ve stayed there every winter since.

17. Put a Salt Lamp Where You Actually Sit in the Evening

A Himalayan salt lamp on the side table next to your favorite reading chair turns that corner into the warmest-looking spot in the house from about 4 p.m. onward.

The amber glow is the draw. It sits at a color temperature no regular lamp bulb hits, so it reads like firelight instead of like a light bulb. Prices run about $20 to $35 at Target, Walmart, or Amazon for a 6 to 8 pound lamp with a dimmer switch on the cord.

One per seating area is enough. Two in the same room starts to look like a display. Keep it off a windowsill, since salt lamps sweat in humidity.

18. Put Your Lamps on Plug-In Outlet Timers

Walking into a dark house at 5:15 is the worst part of January, and nobody’s decor fixes that from the inside. Plug-in outlet timers do. A pack of mechanical timers costs about $10 to $20 at Walmart, Home Depot, or on Amazon, and the digital versions run closer to $25 for a two-pack.

Set two lamps to come on at 4 p.m. and off at 10 p.m. The house is lit before you get to the door, which changes how the whole evening starts.

Two timers per floor covers most homes. The mechanical dial models are the ones I’d buy, because they hold their setting through a power blip and they cost less than half what the app-controlled versions do.

19. Drop Fairy Lights Into the Glass You Already Have

Battery micro LED strands sold as “fairy lights” come in a two-pack for about $6 to $10 at Target or on Amazon, and each strand is thin enough to coil inside a glass hurricane, an apothecary jar, or a large vase.

The effect is a lit centerpiece with no candle to watch and no wax to clean up. Most strands have a timer built into the battery pack, so they’ll run six hours and shut off on their own.

One strand per vessel is enough, and warm white beats the cool blue-white version every time. Three lit jars grouped on a console table put out about as much glow as a small lamp, for a fraction of the price.

20. Add a Small Lamp to the Corner That Has No Light

Every room has a corner the overhead fixture never reaches, and in December that corner had a tree in it. In January it’s a dark hole.

A small accent lamp fixes it for about $25 to $40 at Walmart or Target, and thrift stores and consignment shops routinely have perfectly good ones for $8 to $15 if you’re willing to buy a new shade.

One lamp in that spot does more for how a room feels than another $40 of decor on the mantel. Set it on the same outlet timer as the others so it comes on before dark.

Height matters more than style here. A lamp that sits too low just lights the floor.

21. Hang or Lean a Mirror Behind Your Candle Grouping

Sounds like a decorating cliché until you try it in a dark room. A mirror behind a cluster of candles or in front of a lamp doubles what that light source actually does, which is why old houses put mirrors over mantels in the first place.

Thrift stores and HomeGoods both carry framed mirrors in the $15 to $30 range, and a leaning mirror on a mantel needs no hardware at all.

One mirror per room is the limit unless you want the place to feel like a fitting room. Angle it toward the darkest part of the space rather than straight at a window, so it bounces your lamp light back into the room instead of reflecting a black winter window.

Textiles and Warmth

22. Leave the Wool Throws Exactly Where They Are

The throws that came out in December for holiday guests should not go anywhere until March. Wool and wool-blend blankets are warmth and texture, and neither of those things has a season that ends on December 26.

Keeping them out costs nothing. New ones run about $25 to $40 at Target or Costco, and you want at least two per couch so nobody is negotiating over one.

A bare, stripped-down room needs texture more than anything else, and two folded throws over a couch arm do more for that than another decoration would. Softness carries a room when everything else has been packed away.

Fold them over an arm or a basket, not in a closet.

23. Cover Your Holiday Pillows in Faux Fur

If your couch is still wearing plaid and reindeer, this is the fastest visual reset in the house. Faux fur covers in cream or gray run about $10 to $15 each at Target or HomeGoods, and you only need covers, not new inserts. Buy two to four per couch depending on its length.

Two on a loveseat, four on a full sofa, and let a few of your existing solid pillows stay in the mix so it does not look like a showroom.

My grandkids fought over the fur ones the first winter I bought them, which told me they were doing their job. Wash them on cold and air dry, or the fur mats down and never recovers.

24. Keep the Snowflake Towels and White Dishware in Rotation

If your snowflake kitchen towels went into the storage bin alongside the Santa mugs, pull them back out. A snowflake is weather. It has nothing to do with a holiday, and it works right through the last cold week of February.

Same goes for white and silver serving pieces, snowflake salad plates and any plain cream stoneware that came out for holiday meals. Keeping what you own costs nothing. Individual snowflake plates run about $6 to $12 each at HomeGoods or Target if you want a set of four on display.

Two or three standing on a plate rack or open shelf, plus fresh towels on the oven door, takes five minutes and gives the kitchen a season instead of a blank.

Natural and Free Materials

25. Fill a Bowl With Glitter-Free Pinecones

A wide bowl of natural pinecones on the coffee table or dining table is the easiest thing on this list, and it holds up through February without wilting, dripping or needing water.

Skip anything with glitter or fake snow tips. Plain brown or cinnamon-scented cones read as winter, while sparkle reads as holiday leftovers. A bag of 12 to 15 costs about $8 to $15 at Target or Hobby Lobby, and one bag fills a medium bowl with a few left over for a tray. Gathered off the ground in your own yard, they cost nothing at all.

The glitter thing is personal. One year I let the grandkids help set the table with the sparkly ones, and I was still vacuuming silver flecks out of the rug in March. Natural cones shed nothing but the occasional seed.

26. Leave Birch Branches Bare in a Tall Vase

Five bare birch stems in a floor vase or a tall entry vase do the work of a much bigger decorating project. No lights, no ornaments, no berries. Just white bark and vertical lines in a corner that suddenly looks empty.

A bundle of three to five stems costs about $20 to $35 at Michaels or Amazon, and good faux birch lasts years. Three stems suit a 12-inch table vase, five suit anything floor height. If you have a birch or river birch in the yard, a few fallen branches do the same job for free.

Height is what that bare corner is missing, and a tall vertical fills it better than anything low — which is also why branches and the woven basket work so well together in the same spot.

Stored standing upright in a closet corner, the bark stays intact for years.

27. Pick Up a Few Frosted or White Berry Stems

I did not think faux stems were worth the money until I bought five snow-dusted eucalyptus branches and realized they have gone into a vase every January for six years running. Individual stems run about $5 to $8 at Michaels or Hobby Lobby, and they go on sale regularly at 40 to 50 percent off.

Buy five to seven stems for a standard vase. Fewer than five looks sparse, and odd numbers arrange better than even ones.

White berry stems, frosted cedar, and snowy eucalyptus all mix well together as long as you skip anything with pinecones wired on, because that swings the whole arrangement back toward Christmas.

Your Living Room Doesn’t Have to Echo

That empty, echoey feeling after the tree comes down is real, and you don’t have to sit in it until spring. A few small swaps keep your home feeling lived-in and warm without a single trip to buy more holiday decor.

Start with the birch branches in a tall vase if you want something that costs nothing and already looks good. Try grouping your mercury glass candlesticks in odd numbers if you want an instant collected look, or set out white pillar candles in varying heights when you need a fast win before company comes over. None of this requires a shopping trip or a redo. You already have what you need. Just leave it out a little longer and let winter earn its keep.

The post 27 Ways to Fix That Empty Room Feeling After Christmas Decor Comes Down appeared first on Penny Pinchin' Mom.