Label and Diagram Your Holiday Lights to Speed Setup

Hi, everyone. This is Lara Hammock from the Marble Jar channel and in today’s video, I’ll make the case for diagraming and labeling your holiday lights so that there is less thinking and time spent setting up  each year.

I am not going to pretend to be some kind of holiday light expert, but hats off to those who REALLY do it up each year — I love amazing displays.  I have a very modest set up, but every year I bring out the bin of lights and garlands for our outdoors and I have to re-remember how I have set everything up in the past.  You know — which cord went where?  And what did I plug into this?  I have a world class terrible memory and because I’m slightly ADHD, this process takes forever since there are too many things happening with the whole family decorating and I end up in kind of an unproductive loop.

Once I got it totally figured out this year, I decided I didn’t want to have to do all of that mental work again, so I spent a little time diagraming and labeling so that I could save countless hours in  future years.  The first thing I did was take a picture of the finished product.  You may need several photos depending on how elaborate your lights are and how much area they cover.  If you need several photos, I would label them 1 through whatever.  Okay, next I diagramed my photo using the Markup function on my iPad.  To use this, go to your Photos, click on edit, then the 3 dots, then markup.  I used a color that was a contrast to my photo — and I indicated a letter for each light string or extension cord.  I also drew an arrow to each plug where 2 light strings were connected. 

Once I did this, I made a little key below.  I keep all of my notes in Evernote, so I pasted this edited photo into an Evernote note and then put a description next to each letter.  For example, A refers to an extension cord. I also included what it is plugged into, so this extension cord plugs into the dimmer control which plugs into the outdoor outlet.  B is a string with 200 lights that is plugged into A and wrapped around the column at the top.  I include this kind of detail if I think it will be helpful next year.  C is a light string with 300 lights that plugs into B.  You get the idea. 

Okay — now that I have it all diagrammed, I labeled each element with the correct letter.  Since i just have one photo, I’m going with the straight letters, but if you have multiple photos, I would label the cords 1-A, 1-B, 2-C, and for photograph 2 — 2-A, 2-B, etc.  For labeling, I used green electrical tape, but you can use masking tape or whatever you happen to have that will withstand the elements.  I made a note to myself that my labels were located on the plug end of the cords, which actually ended up being a good thing since that is where manufacturers tend to put the safety label.  I just put my label on top of that one in most cases.  Otherwise, I wrapped it around the cord close to the plug and labeled each by letter with a black Sharpie.  I did this  once all of the lights were put up since I’d never remember where everything went after I took them all down. 

Okay — now that all that is done, I’ll have a nice diagram and labels for my set up next year. BUT, how will I manage to remember that I’ve done all of this organizing work this year?  I print out a copy of the note and tape it to the top of the bin where I store all of the outdoor lights and garlands.  Your memory might be much better than mine, in which case, you won’t need all of this help, but I think it’ll cut my set up time in half or more the next time I decorate.  Let me know what you think.  Comments are always appreciated and thanks for watching!