The Popular Kitchen Item That Could Be The Answer To Your Christmas Tree Storage Woes

We may never understand the physics of Christmas trees and the boxes in which they arrive. The new tree fit well before we took it out and enjoyed it for the season, but now that it's time to put our Christmas tree away, the box has clearly shrunk. No amount of compressing branches or rearranging the parts will ever make that tree fit in the box again. On top of trying to store the tree, there's the whole process of taking it apart –- what a hassle. When the Christmas season has passed, we need an easy way to put our tree away until next year. Cling wrap could be the answer to our biggest post-holiday problem.

You may have stocked up on cling wrap, which many of us know as Saran Wrap, over the holidays for shuffling food between parties and extra food storage. You can put that extra cling wrap to good use, but if you don't have any leftover, it's worth buying a few rolls to store your Christmas tree. If you have extra plastic wrap from moving — like this $20 roll of Duck Stretch Wrap from Target — that's even better because it's wider, thicker, and tends to be more durable for long-term storage.

Instead of fighting the battle to get your tree back into the box it came in, you can just send that too-small container to recycling and wrap your tree with cling wrap instead. The beauty of this storage process is that you don't even have to take your tree completely apart. Unless you have a very large tree, just keep the pieces together and pack the Christmas tree stand with the rest of your Christmas decorations.

To take advantage of the adhesive features of cling wrap, fold up all the branches of the tree. You don't even have to completely un-fluff all the branches because that will happen as part of the wrapping process. Lay your tree on the floor, and go around the base of it with the cling wrap so it sticks to the metal. Slowly work your way around the tree, bottom to top, overlapping the cling wrap so it stays secure. Give it a little tug every once in a while to keep the tree snug in its winter cocoon until you're ready to celebrate again next year.