Where do you hide Christmas gifts?

[AimeeM]

Our basement is in the middle of being finished, so I don't want presents down there with paint fumes, sawdust, etc.

The only other option that I can think of is the guest room - but the kids go in and out of that room and it will probably need to be used (as a guest room, lol) at some point this holiday season.

At our old house, we hid it in the unfinished basement's bathroom - because none of the children went in that area of the house. Not an option at our new home. 

 

I don't see a solution to my dilemma, but it did make me curious. Where do you hide the gifts?

[Slache]

I wrap them as soon as I get them. I love gifts. I think they're beautiful and I love having them out to look at.

[HomeAgain]

In our current house: above the fridge, under my bed, bottom dresser drawer, under the master bedroom sinks and back of the walk-in closet.

[hjffkj]

My closet, the garage, or at my parent's house depending on the size.

[Cindy in FL.]

I wrap them, but I don't label them.

[Emba]

In my closet, in a drawer of my dresser or my husband's dresser, and in empty suitcases.

[mmasc]

In my closet on the top shelves.

[AimeeM]

I envy those who can hide them in multiple places - and remember where they're hid, lol. I would absolutely forget half of them.

Edited October 26, 2016 by AimeeM

[mamiof5]

I wrap them, but I don't label them.

Yikes!! I'd lose my mind! I can't trust my memory, if I don't put some sort of visible tag immediately I have to unwrap it to see who it was for :(

[mamiof5]

I envy those who can hide them in multiple places - and remember where they're hid, lol. I would absolutely forget half of them.

This is me. I have spent weeks looking for hidden Christmas presents.

 

ETA: it has helped me to keep a note on my cell. I do under the bed, in my closet, boxes under our desk, oldest dd room if needed. One year it was the garage, a large Barbie house. We also hid a playground one time... can't remember how we did that? But kids went to bed, and playground was assembled by Christmas morning 😊

Edited October 26, 2016 by mamiof5

[alisoncooks]

In my master closet, on a shelf in a cardboard box. I usually have stuff stacked away in there, anyway, so it doesn't stand out.

[Tina]

Our room is always off limits this time of year. Throughout the year I stash small things in my 'gift drawer' , and the rest in my closet. Then I end up uncovering lots of things I've forgotten about.

One space I used one year was the under floor storage in the Caravan. 😀

Edited October 26, 2016 by Tina

[hjffkj]

I envy those who can hide them in multiple places - and remember where they're hid, lol. I would absolutely forget half of them.

I have an excel spreadsheet that tells me where they are

[history-fan]

I use 18 gallon storage boxes, Rubbermaid. All my seasonal decorations are in these boxes in the basement. So a few extra boxes never get noticed by anyone. Its much easier having all the gifts together for me.

[SKL]

So far I've gotten away with just having them in boxes in my bedroom.  I tell my kids "that box is stuff for the nieces/nephews."  They assume their stuff is better hidden.  LOL.

[Peaceful Isle]

In my walk in closet. It's packed by the time I am done shopping!

[Ethel Mertz]

We're lucky enough to have a locked storage closet. If we didn't, I'd wrap gifts as I got them and hide them in empty suitcases. I keep a word document list on what I got for whom. Sadly, even with only the 3 of us, I can't remember.

[Katy]

Those rubbermaid storage containers on shelves that have been in the garage in some houses and in the basement in others.  The kids associate them mostly with chores (seasonal decorating again?  Do I really have to help paint?), and they stay out of them.

 

This year though I'm going to wrap each kid's gifts with a different wrapping paper except the stocking gifts, which will be wrapped with brown paper.  Then in the bottom of the stocking will be a gift box with a small piece of their wrapping paper inside, so they'll have to go through the stockings to figure out which paper is theirs.

[Guest]

I keep them in laundry baskets in the closet draped with sweat shirts because heaven knows no one else in this house would ever touch a laundry hamper.

[RioSamba]

I have a weirdly shaped walk in closet where I store most of the gifts. I also store some holiday decorations and keepsakes in there. I will often store things in boxes for other things, or hidden within decorations, etc. I have a great app called Xmas Organizer that lets me track gifts from idea through order/delivery or purchase, wrapping, and most importantly, assign them a location.

 

The year that youngest DS was born I hired my friend's daughter to wrap. I like to do special bows and tags, some of which are traditionally used year after year. The wrapper was to make notes and take pictures so I would know what was in each package. The wrapping was acceptable, the record keeping was terrible. Everyone opened a few gifts that didn't belong to them. It was hilarious and worth the extra sleep. I've loosened up considerably since DS2 came along!

[TABmom]

I keep them in various places- my closet, under my bed, linen closet. For awhile we had an extra car that wasn'5 being driven in the garage- I stashed some in there. I've also put them in the trunk of dh's car.

[alisoncooks]

DH currently has a toy hiding in the floor of his truck, under a sweatshirt. :p

[Rachel]

At the store. Kidding, sort of. I put them in the top of my closet too but I don't do much early shopping and usually put presents under the tree as they arrive in the mail.

[Wheres Toto]

We have a small house with no closets, no basement, no attic.  We usually stored presents in the trunk of the car or in a plastic bin in the garage.  The garage only works short-term because it is not completely bug or critter-proof and gets damp.

 

None of my kids believe anymore so I'm not sure what we'll do this year.  I'd be tempted to just put them under the tree wrapped as soon as we get them, but we are starting to leave them home alone for 30 minute here and there, and I"m not sure I trust them to resist the temptation.  And I DEFINITELY don't trust our dog to keep his nose out of things and the kids to pay enough attention to stop him if they are alone with him.

 

Last year our tree was on a table with a blockade around it because of the dog.  That may work if we decide to put gifts out.

[Guest]

We always hid them in our son's closet.  Given the number of clothes on the floor, it was evident he would never look in there.

 

 

[73349]

My closet.

[heartlikealion]

Right now I have a few in my tiny master closet and a few wrapped in the corner of my room. I even have one unwrapped box hidden under a large shirt just because I haven't figured out where to put it.

 

We spend the holiday with our parents so I usually send several gifts straight to their homes. We give them a heads up and they set the boxes aside. We wrap later.

 

Yeah, I vote for possibly just wrapping early.

 

So far no one has attempted snooping that I know of, so that helps.

[Janeway]

Trunk of the car mostly. What doesn't fit there gets stashed in other places. I actually stuck a bike behind stuff in the garage and draped a sheet over it and no one noticed.

[Jacquelyn in NC]

In our closet, either in a box/tote or covered with a blanket.  The kids know not to exploring in there after Halloween.

[Amira]

My mom would put gifts in boxes in the garage and label the boxes to make it look like boring things were inside.

[Artichoke]

In the attic.  

[Starr]

I keep them mostly in my room. But i tell them about their Nana's worst Christmas when she looked at all her presents and had to pretend come Christmas.  And them I tell them where they are if they want to look. No one ever looked as far as i know. ;)

[zoobie]

We always hid them in our son's closet. Given the number of clothes on the floor, it was evident he would never look in there.

This. Is. Brilliant. :rofl:

 

We hide them in our closet, in a coat closet, DH's vehicle, and in my sewing crap.

[gardenmom5]

I've had multiple places over the years.  and there can still be things multiple places.

 

unfinished basement when the kids were really young and didn't play down there.

I think I may have even had stuff at my moms.  (i know she had stuff at my grandmother's when I was a kid.)

under my bed

in my closet

laundry room

garage

I don't have an accessible attic or crawl space.    (I have some friend who used their crawl space for storage.)

 

put stuff in apple boxes before ribbons or bows are added.

put it in big garbage bags  to keep out dust.

 

 

now I  have some wardrobes (free off craiglist for the price of renting a truck and total 3miles of milage.) in my garage and put stuff in there.

 

when I still did santa -I got where I had it wrapped with a name tag and put away, so I only had to do ribbon/bows before putting them out.

 

I loved when we didn't do santa anymore and I could put out gifts as they were wrapped.  it is sort of fun to watch the pile grow over the month.  dh and the kids are the ones who put presents out after bed on christmas eve. I want to be done.  I stayed up until 2am once - never again.  that also began the tradition of "no one is allowed to wake mom up before 8am."  (they weren't allowed in the living room before then either.)

[DawnM]

So, I just realized I can't hide anything.

 

My kids can get on Amazon.  They are teens and a lot of times when they need something I just have them go order it.

 

Yesterday I got a package from Amazon.  I came home and it wasn't opened.  I asked my oldest (18) if he knew what it was.  He said, "Oh, yeah, I just went on Amazon and looked at what had been delivered.  It is your Hydro-flask wide mouth lid you ordered on Sunday."

 

UGH!  Guess there are no secrets.

[lynn]

I have a few  places.  In suitcases in the closet, in back of the pantry, I also have a space up in the one of the closets that no one would ever think to look.   

[heartlikealion]

So, I just realized I can't hide anything.

 

My kids can get on Amazon.  They are teens and a lot of times when they need something I just have them go order it.

 

Yesterday I got a package from Amazon.  I came home and it wasn't opened.  I asked my oldest (18) if he knew what it was.  He said, "Oh, yeah, I just went on Amazon and looked at what had been delivered.  It is your Hydro-flask wide mouth lid you ordered on Sunday."

 

UGH!  Guess there are no secrets.

 

You can remedy this if you want. I have a separate Amazon account for this reason. Or change the password and stop letting them order things this time of year lol. Dh gets texts and emails about our orders from our joint account. It'll say the blah blah has shipped. You could enable that on your phone so you know what is coming.

[sewingmama]

Currently...I wrap them and put them in a box in the garage. When I had no garage I wrapped them and put them in a box in my room and taped it shut..so they were hidden in plain sight. My kids think Santa only brings one gift though and the rest are from us so they dont think it weird we were buying and hiding their gifts.

 

My kids are excellent at not snooping though...they love the suprise too much.

Edited October 27, 2016 by sewingmama

[Daria]

I have everything shipped to Grandma since that's where we go Christmas a.m.

[RoughCollie]

For several years, I hid Christmas gifts in the storage boxes for Christmas decorations. The boxes were empty, and the kids assumed they stayed that way.

 

I also hid them in the trunk of my husband's car, at his office, in the basement in boxes marked with something boring (summer clothes, Grandma's stuff, DH's books) as to their contents, and in the storeroom in the garage. (MIL had a yard sale before she moved to assisted living. She literally packed up everything that didn't sell and sent it to me. We had a lot of boxes of Grandma's stuff for awhile!)

[Bambam]

I hide (ha ha ha) them on the top shelf of my closet. I'm not that fond of wrapping, so I generally leave them in the shipping box or bag and just pull them down and wrap later.  Everyone knows where they are, but they also know they shouldn't snoop. When they put my clothes away, I have caught them staring at the top shelf before though. I don't blame them. Sometimes I look up there longingly and wonder what is in those packages. And then I have to take them down so I can remember. 

[DawnM]

You can remedy this if you want. I have a separate Amazon account for this reason. Or change the password and stop letting them order things this time of year lol. Dh gets texts and emails about our orders from our joint account. It'll say the blah blah has shipped. You could enable that on your phone so you know what is coming.

 

I have prime so I don't want a separate account.  

 

Honestly, if they are going to peek, that is on them at this point!

[Night Elf]

My mom once told me that she hid presents in the trunk of her car when my sister and I were little. She was always worried we'd hunt for them.

 

I hid gifts on the top shelves of my closet or in the back behind clothes.

[heartlikealion]

I have prime so I don't want a separate account.  

 

Honestly, if they are going to peek, that is on them at this point!

 

Irrelevant. I have prime as well. I get the shipping perk on my account, I have it linked somehow to do that. And when there is a coupon like 10% off a book, it's per account.

 

[TheReader]

I feel like either I have the most trustworthy kids on the planet, or else I'm totally naive and blind to their peeking, LOL! 

 

We buy all through the season (starting in say, October...) and everything goes in mine/DH's walk-in closet. We don't put the tree up until after Thanksgiving, and we don't wrap presents until after our middle son's December birthday, but then once his bday passes, we wrap and put out the gifts that get wrapped (for everyone, not just the kids). In our house, Santa brings some presents, and mom/dad/siblings bring some; the Santa stuff isn't wrapped and shows up on Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning; the mom/dad/sibling gifts to each other get wrapped and set out. 

 

The boys have been told from very early on -- if you guess/figure out your gift, you lose it, so they just don't even peek or try to guess or anything. That was my rule, my dad's rule, probably his dad's rule, etc. so we just passed it down. Of course, we've never had to enforce it, and we are pretty loose with the definition of "guessing" -- obviously good-natured speculation, hoping, wishing, "maybe it's....." is fine; picking up the box, squeezing, shaking, actively trying to really, truly figure it out/find out before Christmas -- that's what we're discouraging, and what they'd (theoretically) lose a gift over; none has ever tested it, so we've never had to enforce it. 

 

But beyond that, they don't randomly go into our room anyway, and certainly never into our closet. But now I'm wondering if I'm just blind to that and maybe when I'm gone they are going in and peeking.....

[Guest]

I get 99% of everything from Amazon, so when I get a box, I open and look at the items to make sure it's all there and right, and then re-seal and stack in my master bedroom closet. My closet is pretty fully for the remainder of the year, but pretty safe. ;)

[Cindy in FL.]

Yikes!! I'd lose my mind! I can't trust my memory, if I don't put some sort of visible tag immediately I have to unwrap it to see who it was for :(

I usually assign a different wrapping paper for each of my children and make myself a note of which belongs to each one. I also keep a running list of what I've gotten for each one so I can have some degree of equity.

[Pippen]

Suitcase

Friend's house

Storage boxes with boring labels in utility room or garage

Underneath their own beds

Camper

[zoobie]

You can remedy this if you want. I have a separate Amazon account for this reason. Or change the password and stop letting them order things this time of year lol. Dh gets texts and emails about our orders from our joint account. It'll say the blah blah has shipped. You could enable that on your phone so you know what is coming.

I order gifts for the kids now using DH's sub-account on our Prime.

[AimeeM]

I feel like either I have the most trustworthy kids on the planet, or else I'm totally naive and blind to their peeking, LOL! 

 

We buy all through the season (starting in say, October...) and everything goes in mine/DH's walk-in closet. We don't put the tree up until after Thanksgiving, and we don't wrap presents until after our middle son's December birthday, but then once his bday passes, we wrap and put out the gifts that get wrapped (for everyone, not just the kids). In our house, Santa brings some presents, and mom/dad/siblings bring some; the Santa stuff isn't wrapped and shows up on Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning; the mom/dad/sibling gifts to each other get wrapped and set out. 

 

The boys have been told from very early on -- if you guess/figure out your gift, you lose it, so they just don't even peek or try to guess or anything. That was my rule, my dad's rule, probably his dad's rule, etc. so we just passed it down. Of course, we've never had to enforce it, and we are pretty loose with the definition of "guessing" -- obviously good-natured speculation, hoping, wishing, "maybe it's....." is fine; picking up the box, squeezing, shaking, actively trying to really, truly figure it out/find out before Christmas -- that's what we're discouraging, and what they'd (theoretically) lose a gift over; none has ever tested it, so we've never had to enforce it. 

 

But beyond that, they don't randomly go into our room anyway, and certainly never into our closet. But now I'm wondering if I'm just blind to that and maybe when I'm gone they are going in and peeking..... I don't think either is necessarily true. The difference is just in the family dynamics. My kids do not "randomly" go into our room - but our room is on the main level of the house and the children have always been allowed to play/hang out in our bedroom during the day. Same with the rooms upstairs (like the guest room). Occasionally our 7 year old son goes into the guest room to get "peace" from his autistic 4 year old brother (lol) - and then, of course, it's used for guests, too.