10 Creative Places to Hide the Kids’ Christmas Gifts

When the kids are little it usually isn’t all that difficult to keep their gifts a secret, but as they begin to get older and understand that Christmas entails receiving gifts, they tend to get a little more inquisitive and may start poking around trying to find out where you’re hiding the presents.  If you think your kids are going to be poking around before Christmas in an attempt to locate their gifts, try these 10 different places for hiding them away from their prying eyes:

1. Trunk of the car – If the present isn’t going to be affected by heat or cold, keeping it in the trunk of your car is a great hiding spot because the kids rarely have a reason to be in the car without you being there too. Just don’t forget you stashed them there and send the kids to get something out of your trunk!
2. Empty suitcases – These are the best hiding places! Those suitcases sit there day in and day out and no one has any need to move them or look at them.  You can hide quite a bit of small gifts in one of the larger suitcases, however, if you have an overly bulky item you may need to think of another spot for it.
3. Under bed storage boxes – Most kids don’t have any reason to go under mom and dad’s bed, and the under the bed storage boxes will hold a lot of stuff.  If you have a typical bed, you won’t be able to store very big items underneath it, but Barbie dolls and video games fit well!
4. The neighbor’s garage – If you and your neighbor are friends, this is the ideal hiding place for big items.  You can put your item in a corner and cover it with a blanket.  This is especially great if their kids aren’t little anymore so they can tell their kids the present out there isn’t theirs.
5. A box in the attic – Attics offer a perfect hiding space as long as it doesn’t double as a play area for the kids.  Also, be sure that you don’t store things up there that might be affected by extreme heat or cold. Big items work well in an attic as long as you are strong enough to get them up there.  Cover them up with a blanket and you are good to go.
6. Behind your clothes in the closet – Keep the kids out of your closet this time of year! Hiding presents behind long dresses and suit bags is a smart place to stash them because at first glance, the closet looks the same, and only you will know where you stashed the secret items.  You can even use this spot to hide stuff for your spouse since it’s not likely he will move all of your dresses and shoes looking for his gifts.
7. Your work place – If you pick up some gifts on your lunch hour don’t bring them home, just leave them under your desk at work.  Or, if they are expensive, you can lock them in your desk or file cabinet.  Make sure the cleaning crew can be trusted.
8. Storage box in the garage – Buy a few extra storage boxes that match the ones you have in the garage already and hide the gifts in there.  Then, store the boxes behind normal storage boxes in case someone would happen to look in one.  Add an X or something on the box so that you will know where you stashed the gifts; it’s not good to lose the gifts you went to such lengths to hide!
9. High shelf in the closet – Use a coat closet or a guest closet to hide gifts in a box up on a high shelf.  Put some blankets or other storage items in front of it so it won’t stand out if one of the kids is playing hide-n-seek and decides to hide in that closet.
10. Linen closet – Most kids probably don’t venture into the linen closet very often, and if they do it’s probably just to grab a towel.  Hide small items on the top shelf in the back and no one will be the wiser.  Closets in the laundry room work well for this too, as the kids rarely would have any need to go into the laundry room, let alone the closet in there.

Make sure you keep a list of your hiding places somewhere so that you know where everything is hidden. You don’t want to be scrambling around in the days leading up to Christmas trying to remember where you so carefully hid everything!

 P.S. This post was  proposed to me for publication by Paul Taylor. I'm therefore publishing it by his invitation and under his permission. See also the link below fore more information:

http://www.babysittingjobs.com/blog/10-creative-places-to-hide-the-kids%E2%80%99-christmas-gifts/ 

How to Create a Look Book to Avoid Wardrobe Wars

A ‘Look Book’ is a 3-ring binder that contains pictures of outfits.  Not just any outfits though, pre-approved school outfits for your kids.  And these outfits aren’t ones that you need to buy or that you aspire to buy, but ones that can be made out of the clothes that are already in your kids closet.  Going through this process may help you figure out some holes in your kids’ wardrobe, but the idea is to create multiple looks using the clothes you already own.  The kids will then be able to go to the book and find an outfit they want to wear that day and pick out the pieces and put it on.  No more, “I don’t know what to wear!”  Or the dreaded, “I have nothing to wear!”

To get started you will need to go through all of your child’s clothes and pull out everything that doesn’t fit.  Pack these away if they are too large or donate them if they are too small.  Only things that fit should be in the closet.

Next, put all of the dresses together (for a girl), all of the bottoms together and all of the tops together.

Now get ready to shoot some pictures.  Take a white sheet and lay it on the bed.  This is going to be the back drop for all of the outfits.  Set up your camera on a tripod if you have one so that you can just go back and snap a picture and move on to the next outfit.  If you don’t have a tripod, no worries, just have your camera sitting nearby to use.

Start with the dresses because those are easy.  Lay a dress on the bed; pick out appropriate shoes to go with the dress.  Are there accessories that go with the dress?  Lay any necklaces, earrings, scarves, belts or hats down near the dress.  Snap the picture.

After all of the dresses are completed you can move on to the separates.  Pick out a bottom, be it pants, shorts or skirt and lay it on the bed.  Now look in the closet and pull out all of the tops that will go with that bottom.  One at a time lay the tops on the bed with the bottom, add any accessories and snap a picture.  Now you can see that many things will go with a black skirt, but if it’s a ruffled skirt make sure to only pair unruffled tops with it.  Sometimes the accessories won’t need to change and you can just change the top and take another picture.  Continue going through the entire wardrobe like this.

Now you will need to print or have photos made of all of the outfits.

Gather together a 3-ring binder, some subject dividers with 3-ring holes and blank paper or cardstock with 3-ring holes.

Create different categories for the outfits.  These will be up to you, but here are some ideas to get your started, play clothes, school clothes, church clothes and dress clothes.

Go through the pictures and put them in piles according to the categories you just created.  Count how many outfits you have for each category and insert that many blank pages into the binder behind its divider.

Finally, use some double sided tape to adhere the photos to the individual sheets.  Write any notes on the page, if your child can read, telling them any extra information they might need.  Like, make sure you wear white underwear with these white pants.

If your child is fussy about what she wears to bed then create a pajama category so that she knows what tops go with what bottoms.

These categories can change seasonally so you may want to box up the out of season clothes so that there is no confusion.

Jeans are a different story and one that you can handle a couple of different ways.  Jeans can really go with almost any top so that would be a lot of pictures to take.  It might be best to take a picture with 5 pairs of jeans laying on the bed and a few tops.  If the jeans have colored embroidery or sequins then that might limit what tops can go with them, but otherwise lump them altogether.  Make a note that says, “Jeans can go with most tops so you choose”.

To save time in the morning have your child look through the book the night before and pick out an outfit and pull out the clothes for the next morning.  This way, there won’t be an issue in the morning, if one of the items happens to be in the laundry.

  P.S. This post was  proposed to me for publication by Debbie Denard I'm therefore publishing it by her invitation and under her permission. See also the link below fore more information:

 http://www.nanny.net/blog/how-to-create-a-look-book-to-avoid-wardrobe-wars/