We understand how the holidays can be daunting. Buying gifts, planning travel, and everything that comes along with this season can be a lot. The good news: You still have time. That’s why we’ve rounded up some of our favourite ideas we use in our own homes, to help you get through it all.
Many of us try to make each Christmas better, more delicious, more original than the last – piling new traditions on top of old ones, holding drinks parties and dinners, festive weekend lunches and by the time New Year rolls around you feel as deflated as a month-old balloon. The festive season can be a whirlwind of get-togethers, so it is of little surprise so many of us struggle to find time to tick off the to-do list in the lead-up to the holidays. We have ways to make entertaining over the holidays an easier, more festive experience for everyone involved.
Fortunately, if you lack the time or the talent, there are ways to lighten the load, leaving you more time to be a fabulous host or guest.
Leave time for things that make the holiday meaningful to you. For many, that’s lots of sustainable, seasonal flowers in the house, such as Melissa’s city home with blooms by Oxley Hill Farm. Photo: Abbie Melle.
The optimism stage is when you’re online browsing for goodies. Curating ideas and pulling inspiration. Next comes the unboxing stage – you relive the memories with every ornament you take out. You’re not sure why you saved it all. You find that one thing you swore you’d fix, but never did. This year, forget DIY decor decisions. You don’t want to go through the stage of, ‘this looked easier on pinterest” with no glue anywhere and your bows are not bowing. Avoid the creative spiral collapse when one tree turns into 74 saved reels and there are Norfolk pine pins stuck in your fingers. Avoid impulse buys (going out for ribbon and coming home with reindeers).
Don’t make those last-minute panic Amazon buys for more ribbon, more garlands, more baubles. It will bring on the emotional breakdown stage. You think it looks terrible. Suddenly you’re questioning every life choice that led you here.
It’s no wonder the thought of cramming all the decorating, entertaining and gift wrapping into the scant month between now and the holiday, brings on a certain Christmas dread. People either get carried away and do more and more for the holidays, or go on autopilot year after year—until one year all the traditions and the social pressure feel overwhelming.
It’s called Christmas Fatigue Syndrome and apparently can strike at any age. If you had a baby this year and spend your nights soothing a teether; if you’re the only one who decorates the tree even after your teenagers swear they’ll help; or if you’re dreading your 40th standing rib roast. And that’s the whole secret to making holiday celebrations such as Christmas merry again: Winnow out things you do just because you think you should, and leave time for those that make the holiday meaningful to you.
The solution is a Christmas cutback. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Recognise which things sound fun and which things overwhelm you.
The solution to creating stress-free holidays is a Christmas cutback. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Recognise which things sound fun and which things overwhelm you. Melissa fills common rooms at her city house with seasonal flowers around this time of year. Photo: Abbie Melle.
Set a budget and declutter traditions
To simplify Christmas, focus on what truly matters by setting a budget, saying no to unnecessary obligations, and decluttering traditions. Practical steps include making a gift-buying list and budget, and buying gifts for only children
You can also simplify decorations, food, and social events to reduce stress and cost.
Edit the decorating
You don’t have to decorate every surface, so pick a wow spot—like the Christmas tree. We swear by a pre-lit, artificial tree from Balsam Hill. You snap together the three pieces, and the lights are already on it. After Christmas, within a couple of hours you have the entire tree down.
If unboxing (and worse, re-boxing) ornaments is your pain point, try this method: buy a couple of crates of clementines, poke ornament hangers through their tops and cover your tree in fruit and lights. It smells great, it’s gorgeous, it glows and afterward they go in the rubbish. Another approach is to limit your palette to neutrals and one colour. This year, use just gold baubles, for instance, and your white lights, and save everything else for next year. A neutral colour scheme is soothing, especially if you’re feeling overwhelmed by too much colour, too much stuff, too much to do. It’s no wonder people feel holiday-party fatigue before the holidays even start. Some people swear by boxes of tableware that can be delivered to your door on a requested date with linens, napkins, cutlery, plates, votive candles, candle holders and even custom place cards with your guests’ names. Prices are surprisingly affordable for the tabelsetting service. After the party, scrape the plates and repack the box. Specialists can pick it up and do the dishes.
We downsized to a smaller, pre-lit Christmas tree this year. It still lights up the living room—and gives us peace.
Set a budget, say no to unnecessary obligations, and declutter traditions. Melissa keeps it simple for holiday garden gatherings using flowers from the garden. Photo: Abbie Melle.
Consider outsourcing the food, too
Every year we order filets of beef, a ham and turkey from my local Sydney caterer. You pick it up the day before your party or Christmas celebrations, then serve it at room temperature. It’s always delicious, and we spend time catching up with people instead of cooking all day.
Small humbling moments can be equally effective as grand gestures
All you need is a little creativity and a bit of help from Mother Nature. Instead of going over the top with huge decorations that take days to put up (and take down post-holiday), opt for a couple of quiet ways to deck your halls. A bunch of fir, spruce, holly or rosemary from the garden – or streets around your house – makes a simple, affordable table decoration, that takes seconds. Combined with bowls of apples and white candles, it’s going to improve the general look of things. When creating festive floral arrangements, consider repeating a dominant colour or bloom in every room.
A quick trip to the grocery store may be all you need
It’s about incorporating more low-lift, bare-minimum pleasures into your life. Decorating might be as simple as piling freshly cut flowers into vases for an instant update. You don’t need to spend much.
Be ready for anyone
If it’s drop-in guests you fear, keep some good rose wine and champagne in the refrigerator, as well as fresh potato crisps and Sicilian green olives on hand over the holiday season. You’ll be ready for anyone.
A quick trip to the grocery store might be all you need to decorate tables for entertaining over the holidays. Photo: Abbie Melle.
Lighten Santa’s load
Gift-giving gets out of hand. Try bestowing neighbours, co-workers and schoolteachers on your list a simple present you’ve made or bought in batches.
Last year, I bought sustainable, seasonal flowers at the markets, put holiday music on while I wrote handmade notecards to attach to bunches with ribbon. People were texting me to ask where the blooms were from.
To those you want to give something special, limit it to one significant gift that feels personal, and ask them to give you just one.
Redefine ‘bouquet’
Christmas spending can quickly get out of control. One festive, affordable way to decorate is to add branches. Not only is it cheap and chic, but bringing the outdoors indoors feels natural, authentic and individual. A time-friendly alternative to an elaborate floral arrangement? Foraging. Whether you have a garden or become an urban gatherer (think sidewalk shrubs and vacant lots), limit yourself to what is outside—holly with red berries, other evergreens, even a branch that’s a nice shape.
It’s easy to forage a wreath out of willows–basically any flexible branch. These can be left plain or adorned with floppy dark green velvet ribbons, or foraged pinecones, berries, or evergreens.
Instead of a centrepiece last year, I cut a one-and-a-half-metre-long branch of pine, and suspended it from the ceiling rafters with string. It was enough—especially with my 2-year-old grandson Rupert on the move.
A time-friendly alternative to an elaborate floral arrangement? Foraging. Melissa’s homes feature garden flowers from her own garden as well as roadside find. Photo: Abbie Melle.
Consider swapping decor for an easy alternative for something a little different
Or maybe you don’t need table decor at all. Stop being stuck in the story about what the holidays have to be—including what the table has to look like—and instead think of your table as an expression of what makes the holiday fun for you. At Christmas, I put piles of seasonal fruit of one or two types in bowls on the table, and fill huge champagne buckets with ice and just one or two drink offerings. It’s instantly glamorous.
All of these are great strategies. But they’ll only help make Christmas more fun if you can give ourselves permission to embrace them. Concentrate on the warm-and-fuzzy final scene, when the family reunites.
Regifting
Done right, regifting is the way to survive December with calm. It once seemed tacky, but now is being recast as a more thoughtful and sustainable way to shop this Christmas. Regifting is the responsible choice for both your wallet and the environment. For last-minute gifts, look no further than your own things. Regifting is the perfect way to funnel your next purge in a way that benefits your friends and family. If you had a good experience with an object, energetically it gives it a good feeling to the person you give it to. The bonus? Then you get to see it in your friend’s home. Hand it to them with love. I have so many things, and it’s time to spread the wealth.
Some of the best gifts draw on shared interests. Perhaps the best known example of such a gift are from interior designer friends who, over the years, have given me bolts of Fortuny fabric, an 18th-century French tapestry stool, even an unwanted, bespoke sofa, as holiday hostess gifts. Each so unique no price could be placed on it. Think about an heirloom gift.
In a season of high spirits and spirited spending, focusing on sentiment over receipts is more likely to bring holiday cheer.
Choose the things in the supermarket that are really good and not worth making yourself. Melissa buys cakes from local patisserie stores, to save time making them.
Do not make different dinners to accommodate food allergies
People tend to have family members and friends with food issues. Do not make five different dinners for them. It’s a jigsaw puzzle, but figure out one meal that everybody can eat, and if somebody is a vegetarian, make sure you have several sides.
Store-bought is not fine when it tastes like store-bought
For example, cake mixes always taste like cake mixes. But if you can buy pre-cut vegetables, it saves you a lot of trouble. Haagen-Daaz makes fabulous vanilla ice cream, so you never bother making it. That’s the distinction. Choose the things in the supermarket that are really good and not worth making yourself.
The best thing about growing older is clarity
You understand what’s important and not necessary. You pare down anything that doesn’t bring you joy. It doesn’t mean not working hard, but it’s working towards things that make you feel good and that you think are worth doing these holidays. So remember, for anyone who sometimes feel like hosting Christmas is a pain in the neck, remember these are the people you love. You invite people you love, and want them to have something delicious.
We wish you a very happy holiday. Melissa.
Pare down anything that doesn’t bring you joy. A past Christmas at Melissa’s Australian country house.
