🎄 Cozy Calm Low-cost Christmas | Week Three: Decorating & Hosting | Entrance & Dining Room

If you're feeling a bit overwhelmed at the thought of guests coming into your home or worried about spending, gift buying, well you are going to love this minimalist Christmas 2025 series. We're keeping things very simple each week. We are cleaning and tidying one area of our house. We are focusing in on some Christmas planning and also we've got a little boost for your well-being. As always, I have fun, easy, simple ideas plus free printables every week. Last week we were working on food and the living room. This week we've got a new area to work on so if you're ready for week three, let's dive in. Diana Denmark here. I'm your routines coach, your little cheerleader here on YouTube and if you missed the beginning of the series, don't worry. As I said, the free printables for week one and two, they're on my blog, you can get them there. Make sure you're subscribed here on YouTube, notifications on because each week we move forward. But anyway, let's get into week three. We'll get straight into it and I think you can see, I hope you can see or maybe guess which area of our house we are working on this week. Fly lady zone one, number one and that is the entryway to the house. Where you come into the house, maybe you come up the garden steps, maybe you've got a porch, the hall, the hallway and the dining room. Let me just get my glasses on because what I would like you to do this week is just spend 15 minutes, don't go overboard, I always use a timer and try and spend 15 minutes at the beginning of the week doing something in this area. I've also got a little list of inspiration for you, I'll put that up here. It's also going to be on the blog post that accompanies this together with this week's printable. But I want to give you some specific ideas because I know when I felt very overwhelmed when I didn't have a system for the house, it was really useful for somebody just to tell me what to do and I'm going to do that. And if you want me to clean along with you, I can't come into your house but I do have body doubling videos in each zone of the house and you can watch those and I'll chat to you. Anyway, for this week what I would like you to do, because this is something I'm doing, declutter the entryway. So have you got shoes, coats, bags lying there? Let's get them put back into their homes because when you come in and there's not a pile of shoes and they're actually on the shoe tray or the coats are in the cupboard, it just makes it feel very calm, very welcoming. Right, number two is to wipe down and freshen, you know, if you've got mirrors, light switches, anything like that, maybe shake out the doormat. So we're just kind of doing a quick wipe down and clean in any of those little areas that don't get covered in our usual cleaning. And the third one is here in the dining room. This is our dining room and I'm going to give the table a really good polish, do the legs, the chair legs. Maybe you need to think about if you have extra people coming in, do you add extra leaves to the table? Do you need to find extra chairs? Let's do that now because, you know, before we know it, you know, next month is going to be here and we've got people coming in. So that's three ideas for you. One, two, three and fly lady zone one. And as I said, next week we'll be moving on to something else. But right now, right now, let's move on to the Christmas planning side of things. And I'll give you some self-care ideas at the end. So our theme, our theme for this week is decorations and entertaining. So here are a few things to be thinking about this week. Check your lights to use fairy lights. I've already put up our fairy lights in the garden. I haven't, we have white, white lit lights and I'm not switching them on yet, but you know, the weather turns bad and I wanted to get it done before the bad weather comes in. So check your fairy lights. Are they working? Do you need new bulbs for them? What about candles? We use a lot of candles in Denmark. I stocked up when I was at IKEA last week. So any of those things, extension leads, you know, check that you've got all those kinds of things so you're not fapping around later. Second thing to think about is what about your Christmas decorations? Do you know where they are? Have you decluttered them recently? Because if you're planning to declutter, do it this week, because this is when the charity shops, the thrift stores, this is when they want them, not after Christmas. And if you want help with decluttering, I did a huge declutter last year. I've gone down from something like eight, eight boxes of Halloween, Halloween, eight boxes of Christmas stuff that have, and now I have two. Go me. Anyway, declutter your Christmas decorations. And also, even if you're not finding stuff to declutter, it gives you a really good idea of what you already have. So you're not tempted when you're out in the shops, because I know already you've seen all the decorations and think, oh, you know, I'll get that. And you've actually got something similar at home. So now that will stop us spending money, said the canny Scott. And on the entertaining side of things in your dining room or in your kitchen, wherever you like to entertain, think about, you know, table linens. Have you got napkins? Do you have a special table cloth that you use? And also, I know many of you are not using this for Christmas. Maybe you're using it for Thanksgiving. Just all those little things that we can look at this week. So we're not in a panic at the end. Serving dishes, serving plates. Do you, are you going to be using special candlesticks or silverware? Maybe you want to do that the weekend, sit quietly when you're watching a favourite film and, you know, polish your candlesticks. Right. And then let's get onto my favourite part of thing, your little wellbeing boost. This week, it's a connection and cam. And if you're wondering, well, why am I telling you to take care of yourself? Because often we think, oh, we've just got to clean the house or we've just got to volunteer at church or the school. You've got to be looking after yourself every day. And these are some small, easy ideas. Don't cost any money. Don't take much time. But just to remind yourself that you're being taken care of. So here are three. And if you've got a better idea, let me know in the comments. Comments are always a great section to get other ideas. Okay. So first one, always love this one, is write a wee short note or message to somebody you haven't seen in a while or connected with in a while. Now, that could be writing a letter. It could be writing a wee card. Usually, I just send like a little message on Messenger, some funny emojis. And I'm not looking for a reply. I'm just kind of sending a wee bit of love out there and saying, hey, I've been thinking of you. You know, how are you doing? So reconnect with somebody this week. Add a little bit of space this week. Maybe you want to start adding some fairy lights around the home or a candle. Change over the centrepiece that you have on your dining table or at your kitchen table. It just makes us feel good when we see that. And the third one, something that really gives me a lot of calm, is getting outdoors and just having that space to breathe. And before you say to me, oh, Diane, the weather here is dreadful. And don't be telling me about bad weather, because I'm in Denmark. We can have four seasons in the space of like half an hour. I am a winter bather, which means that I dip in the sea naked all year long. I'm an ice swimmer. You know, we're out there even when there's ice in the water. And I'm out on my bike all the time in weathers. And in Denmark, we have an expression that is, there's no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothing. So if it's windy, if it's rainy, get bundled up, but get out there. And I'll give you a wee tip. This is something that I learned through the fly lady system years ago. It's like set a timer for five minutes. If you're thinking, oh, I don't want to go outside. Set a timer for five minutes or a timer on your phone or on your watch. Get the kids bundled up, get out there, just walk around the block. And when the timer goes off after the five minutes, you just turn around and head home. And there you've had 10 minutes of fresh air. And why I love getting outside so much is it just gives us that connection to something bigger, that we're not thinking about everything that we have to do or all the dreadful things that are going on around the world. It just gives us that time to breathe. Take a look and see nature, how it's changing outside. Anyway, that's three ideas for you. And as I said, there will be an accompanying chart for this week, your little free printable. It's on my blog, dianedenmark.com. The printables are free and you will see that at the end of each list, let me get this one out. This is last week's from week two. There's a little section here for reflection. It says, why am I doing this Christmas planning so early? And I want you to write down why that is. Is it because you want to be able to welcome people into your home? You don't want to be spending too much money. You want to really enjoy the season. Write that down and let that be your motivation to do something this week. And as I said, we're just keeping it very simple. Next week, we'll be moving on to a different area of our house, different planning for Christmas. Remember to subscribe, notifications on, and just a wee word here, something that kind of upset me. Last week, some company has been using video of me with an AI voiceover to sell. It was for some kind of ad. I've complained about it, trying to get it taken down. But for those of you who have been with me from the start, you know that I never do any sponsored content. I don't do ads. I don't put ads in the middle of my videos. So it's been very upsetting for me. But thank you everybody who brought that to my attention and are reporting the ad when you see it. It is not something that I am ever involved with selling you stuff of any kind. So anyway, back to the hygge stuff. Hope you've enjoyed this week's planning. Let me know what you're going to do for your self-care this week. I'm off to have a nice cup of tea, a nice hot cup of tea in my favourite mug. All I've got left to say is live long and prosper. May the ho-ho-ho hygge minimalist Christmas 2025 be with you and I shall see you very soon with the ra-ra-ra. Okay, bye for now.