Christmas is fast approaching. It seems that this time sneaks up on us every year, leaving a mountain of work to do in decorating the home. From pulling out the classic white Christmas ornaments to finding the safest space to light up the advent candles, it may only be once a year, but there’s a lot to do between the start of the advent season to Christmas eve. The festive season also means that hiding presents from the children become a full-time job once more. With younger children, this can be a fun exercise, but as they grow up they become far cleverer, and some even begin to search the house for their presents. Hiding them becomes art as your children become more adept at finding, and compromising, your tried and true hiding spaces.
Hide them in the attic.
Using the attic as a hiding space is a time-tested tradition. This is a space that you can access without much difficulty at all, but it proves a daunting, if not an impossible task, for the smaller ones in your home. The children may come to suspect that the gifts are out of reach when they continue to come up empty in all the usual places, but they won’t be able to access your perfect storage space, no matter how hard they try. If this is where you ordinarily store your Christmas ornaments, then you will already have sufficient space available. The only thing to be careful of here is humidity. Placing presents inside of plastic containers is a great way to keep them safe from unknown elements, and is good advice for other belongings stored in the attic too. So, with their presents in the attic, you can sit back and wait for Christmas to arrive, as your children search for their loot in vain.
Put them under your children’s beds for a real sneaky spot.
Ever heard of “hiding in plain sight?” If your children don’t yet make use of the space under their beds, then it may serve as the perfect hiding spot for the presents they are due to receive on Christmas Day. They will continue searching through your closet, in the laundry room, or garage, and never suspect that the gifts have been in their rooms the whole time. If it works, it’s a great ruse that you can laugh about after it comes time to open the presents, or with your children’s children when they’re older.
Find a self-storage space to keep them off the property and away from prying eyes.
Seeking out self-storage facilities can protect the surprise incredibly well. If the attic takes them out of reach, a storage unit will really throw them for a loop. A quick search for ‘mini storage near me’ will give you plenty of options to choose from, with very affordable rates. This might not just be the solution to your Christmas gifts problem, but utilizing the services of a storage facility all year round gives you ample space to store your seasonal belongings when they’re not in use. They can hold your summertime wares during the holiday season, and your Christmas ornaments for the rest of the time.
Throw them off the scent with decoys and mislabeled gifts.
Using a box labeled ‘taxes,’ adding decoy presents, or labeling all of the gifts “for Mom” are all great ways to hide your presents in plain sight. Your children will continue hunting for their gifts, unaware that the actual boxes and bags which are right under their noses. This is another easy solution to implement and may work exceedingly well for your home.
Try to engage the responsibility of trust with your kids.
One final way to hide presents is to simply put the burden of trust on them not to spoil the surprise, and then not hide them after all. Place the presents from family members under the tree, and make sure your children know that you trust them not to peek inside, or play around with the boxes and try to deduce what might be hidden within. Trust can be a powerful motivator for children and they will want to protect that relationship with you as the parental figure, even if they don’t quite understand all of the mechanics of it just yet.
Hiding presents is a rite of passage for parents, so have some fun with the process and try your best to make the experience memorable. After all, those advent candles will melt a lot faster than you think, and it will all pass by in the blink of an eye.
