Moving can be both an exciting and sad time at the same time, particularly when you have children and your leaving your first family home. Naturally there will be so many memories associated with your home that mean it will be hard to say goodbye. Whether it is the memory of bringing your dog home as a puppy and seeing them skating across the laminate flooring, or those happy memories of your witnessing your daughter pull herself up via the couch and take those tentative first steps you will always associate those memories so closely with your first family home.
Moving can be a tedious task, which is why it is important to jump right in and start planning your move as early on as possible to make sure you have time to collect and pack all your precious family mementos ready for your new beginning. To add structure to this large change we have created a number of prompts to help inform this process to prevent you losing your mementos and family memories.
Step One – Packing materials
First step is to identify the type and quantity of boxes you will require for your move. This figure doesn’t have to be spot on, just enough to get you started. A hot tip is to look for boxes that you can hire as this will reduce the waste and disposal at the end. Unlike some packing suppliers moving boxes by Hire a Box are available for up to three months, meaning that you can start the process early on and ramp up from there. By having your boxes early on you can divide them across the house and use them as prompts in each room to remind you to start placing the items you don’t use all to regularly into them to start the process.
Step Two – Itemise
The next step in the process is to create an itemised list for each room. For each room divide this itemised list into quarters each headed up with one of the below four categories;
- Keep,
- Sell,
- Donate,
- Ditch.
When reviewing the contents of each room these titles will help prompt and inform your next steps and prevents you packing and taking items that you don’t want from your old house to your new home.
Things in the ditch section can be dealt with quickly by taking them to the tip or organising hard rubbish collection from your local council. This will free up space and give you motivation when progress can be somewhat slow. Another positive to this technique is that by doing this early on it gives you time to take the items you think are in good enough condition to donate to charities, or take photographs of the items you want to sell and list them online on Gumtree.
Step Three – Photograph
There will be memories from your home that you will be unable to pack up and transport to your new home. Things like growth spurts which were measured and noted on your door frames. These are something you want to remember and cherish but don’t want to transfer the whole frame to your new home. By photographing these it enables you to take them with you as well as paint over them without any regret.
Similarly people often talk about the garden or house layouts when reminiscing, therefore it could be a good idea for you and your family to take some snap of the family home before you start packing. Providing a permanent reference point.
Step Four – Packing
Once you’ve carried out the aforementioned steps you can now commence packing. Aim to focus on the items you use least first, as there is nothing more annoying that unpacking an item to use it.
Another great tip is to label all sides of your moving boxes with both the contents of the box and the room it relates to. This will allow you to see the contents when it’s stacked in a van or from any angle in which you are carrying it.
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