If you are like me, then you are probably trying to do everything you can to get ready for Christmas Day. This includes baking, decorating, putting gifts under the tree, mailing cards and the most important thing, shopping!

Stores are completely crowded as the days get closer to the holiday season, which means the hustle and bustle can create a situation where people are more vulnerable to becoming victims of thieves and scammers. Its not unusual for petty thief crimes to increase during the holiday season as stores become more crowded and shoppers become distracted by sales and bargain deals to think about the dangers may be lurking behind them.

Because of this, one police department is doing their best to spread the word about what can be done to deter criminals. In a recent Facebook post, the Windham, New Hampshire Police Department shared their advice on how female shoppers, in particular, can protect their valuable property in crowded stores and parking lots.

Windham, NH Police Department via Good Housekeeping

The police department posted the above image, along with helpful tips on how to safely leave stores with cash-in-purses and identities intact! They wrote:

A holiday shopping safety tip for women. When using a shopping cart as you browse through the store, keep your purse zipped or closed and secure it to the cart by clipping the child safety belt through the strap(s).

This will help in preventing someone from taking advantage of your distraction and running off with the purse. For those carts that don’t have the child strap, keep an inexpensive carabiner clip attached to your purse strap. Simply clip the carabiner to the cart and your purse is more secure. HAPPY SHOPPING!

Good call, right?!

Keeping a carabiner clip on your purse strap isn’t just handy for easy-to-access keys and hand sanitizer, it can also help you keep your goods protected. As a bonus, the clips come in a variety of different cute colors and designs, which means you can actually color coordinate your clip to match your purse. See—no excuses!

More holiday safety tips

You shouldn’t just be protecting your purse during the holiday season; you should be protecting your home, too!

If you are planning on leaving town on vacation, make sure that you secure your home as best as possible before you head out. Make use of an alarm system if you have one, ask a neighbor or trusted friend to pick up your mail every couple of days, and never, we mean NEVER, make a social media post stating that your entire household has vacated your home.

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Now, that last one might be a hard one to pull off, considering so many of us subscribe to the idea of “if it wasn’t posted, it didn’t happen”, but sharing this type of information with your hundreds or thousands of followers means that it could get into the wrong hands, making your home at risk for a burglary.

So, the next time you have the urge to post when you are out of town, do your best to wait until you get back to share your stories and photos. It’s a move that will not only make your property safer, but it will also force you to live in the moment on your holiday vacation—something we frankly ALL should be doing!

We’d love to hear your thoughts on all things holiday safety. Have you ever had your property stolen from a crowded store? Do you have any tips of your own for keeping your purse safe? How do you secure your home before leaving on a vacation?