10 easy ways to decorate your hotel room for the holidays

December 4, 2020 By

The Pit Stops for Kids crew will be spending the holidays in a Tahoe vacation home this year, so I’m making plans now to make our stay as festive as we’d enjoy at home. If you, too, will be spending your winter holidays away from home, we have 10 easy ways to decorate your hotel room for the holidays…or any condo or vacation home!

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  1. Decorate condo or hotel room windows or porch with a string of battery-operated Christmas lights. Find these at your local dollar store! Tip: you can wrap them around the handle of strollers or even around ski helmets to be festive on-the-go!
  2. Buy a local wreath or garland. Once you’ve arrived at your destination, explore your immediate area by looking up a farmer’s market or holiday bazaar, where you can buy a locally-sourced wreath for your condo or vacation home door.
  3. Check condo and vacation home storage closets for decorations. Most will have a stash of holiday decorations stored in a utility closet or pantry. Ask the home owner or lodging association if it’s ok to put these up (and take them down). I’ve never been told no!
  4. Bring a holiday-themed tablecloth and candles for the table. It’s a small touch, but it goes a long way!
  5. Buy a permit and cut down your own tree upon arrival. Going somewhere rural? Look up where to buy a Christmas tree permit before you leave home, and stop by for it en route to your condo or vacation home. Your first vacation activity can be a hike through the snowy woods for your own tree!
  6. Decorate your cruise ship cabin door. Buy or make your own holiday magnets for cruise ship cabin doors, which are magnetic. The practice can get quite competitive, so bring your A game!
  7. Play holiday tunes. Don’t underestimate the power of music to set a holiday mood. Bring a portable speaker and sync it with your smart phone or an iPod set on a holiday radio station.
  8. Have a small tree delivered. Don’t have time or space for a regular-sized tree? Buy a small, live potted tree to use as a table-top centerpiece. Purchase at a local nursery, and decorate with a select few of your favorite ornaments from home, or order one.
  9. Bring holiday bedding. Kids love curling up in their very own holiday-themed sheets and blankets, and these decorate the room, too. Bring your own bedding from home, or make a gift of new holiday bedding, which is easy to bring to a condo or vacation home.
  10. Decorate yourselves! Buy the family holiday-themed pajamas to wear, or a matching set of Santa hats. When you’re all dressed up for the holidays, the feeling of celebration will live in your vacation home, hotel room, or condo with or without the decorations.

Remember: in addition to decorating your temporary living space, you’ll want to safeguard your actual home while you’re away. During our absences, we ask a friend to check on our house regularly, leave porch and holidays lights lit, lower heat and unplug appliances, and let ask multiple neighbors to watch our home.

Holidays away from home: Tips for preparing kids

December 16, 2015 By

At least every other year, we travel during the holiday season. This means my kids are pretty accustomed to celebrating holidays away from home, and as a parent, I’m pretty good at making Christmas special…wherever we are. This year, we’ll be celebrating Christmas Day in Italy. In the days leading up to the holiday, we’ll be renting a HomeAway apartment in Paris. Here’s how we’ll celebrate the holidays away from home:

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Think of your trip as a gift in itself:

Older kids and teens should be able to appreciate that a family trip during the holidays costs money and can be considered a gift in its own right. To help kids take ownership of this gift, allow them to plan a portion of your vacation, pick one special activity each, or otherwise engage in the planning process. Spend a day doing each child’s special outings or attractions, if possible. As an alternative idea, gift kids souvenir money (in the currency of the destination) and don’t put any restrictions on how they spend it.

Help kids feel oriented by ‘rerouting’ Santa:

A recent study by HomeAway has shown that 84% of families will spend the holidays together. But traveling to be with family can have its difficulties. It’s hard to change the way gift-giving works in your family if you have Santa believers among you. And kids can feel genuine worry that Santa ‘won’t find them’, causing unnecessary stress during a happy vacation. HomeAway has solved this problem with their ‘Rerouting Santa’ microsite. Check it out: RerouteSanta.com. Just tell Santa where you’ll be, and he’ll find you!

Consider gift-giving in a new way:

For our upcoming trip, we simply won’t have room in our carry-on luggage to bring gifts halfway around the world. Instead, our school-aged kids (and we parents) will be gift-giving on the go. We’ll each draw a family member’s name, and shop for them while we travel. We’re focusing on smaller, stocking-stuffer type gifts in order to keep the ‘stuff’ we haul around manageable. If you have more space, such as a car trunk, you could adapt this system to include larger gifts.

Alternatively, parents can gift kids with one smaller gift per day during their trip, instead of all gifts on Christmas morning. For those celebrating Hanukkah, this ‘new’ system will feel even easier to implement. Gift kids with small toys, crafts, goodies, and games they’ll use during your travels.

Bring holiday decorations:

I love bringing decorations with me on trips when possible…so much so that we have an entire post on decorating your home rental, condo, or hotel room. It’s especially easy to decorate a HomeAway house for the holidays: ask the home owner if there’s a stash of holiday decor you can access…chances are they’ll leave them out for you or decorate before your arrival. We like to bring small strings of lights operated on battery pack (these can even be adorned to strollers or backpacks!).

Ask your home owner for seasonal events and tips:

We asked our Parisian hosts for their top holiday events in Paris, and almost immediately, I received an emailed list of events and happenings during our stay. Inspired, we did the same for our Italian hosts! Plan to attend at least a few holiday events in your destination to add cheer and keep ‘normalcy’ for kids who are used to plenty of seasonal hoopla in their home town. Some of the best activities include parades, holiday window shopping, and light displays.