From moves to the next town to several international moves over the last five years, we’ve certainly seen our fair share of new houses and removals vans that’s for sure. Needless to say when it comes to moving with kids, I’m a bit of an expert.
This infographic from Volition Removals London offers some great tips about moving with children and I’d certainly agree with all the points raised.
I’d definitely go with telling the children early, although how early really does depend on how old they are. Our recent move saw us involving the teen from the very beginning. Seeking her opinion on whether we should move, what she thought of the location, how she felt about moving away from her school and her friends and luckily for us she was thrilled at the prospect. Our three year old didn’t find out we were moving until two weeks before we moved and if I did it again I’d probably leave it for at least another week, if only to save us from the constant sound of ‘Are we moving today? When are we going to our new house?’ all day long!
It’s funny, I was most worried about the teen settling in and even wanting to move in the first place, yet she has been the easiest by far. She wanted to go and she loves it here (although she doesn’t start school until Monday so that may well change given a week or two!), yet the little one keeps asking to go ‘home’ and keeps saying he wants to see his friends. Which leads me on to my second tip. Keeping things as ‘normal’ as possible, including any routines. In hindsight he should have gone straight into a new nursery and straight back into his normal routine, but it just wasn’t possible. I didn’t even have a car until today and we’re miles from his new nursery (which he’ll be starting next week – woohoo!). I’m hoping once he gets back into a routine, even if it is a slightly new one, he’ll settle down a bit and of course make new friends.
Over the years I’ve moved all my belongings in my tiny little car from one house to another (and with a baby in the back, I must have been nuts!), hired a van to drive myself (all my stuff fell out as soon as I opened the door), hired a man with a van to do the hard work for me, used removal companies that even unpacked everything for me and others that left my stuff outside in the rain and didn’t even carry it in (it was a door to door service apparently). Needless to say I wouldn’t recommend doing it yourself. Moving is stressful enough without attempting to ram your belongings into a convoy of cars or into the back of a hire van, add kids into the mix and you’ll be hunting for the wine you stashed in your car for later before you even attempt to unpack. Book a removal company to do it for you and save yourself any added stress. Even better leave your other half in your new place to tell them where all the boxes should go and head to the park with the kids and escape for an hour or so. You’ll come back to everything where you want it and you won’t have had to shout at the kids once to stop laying in the doorway or to leave the poor removal men alone (my 3 year old has a habit of showing everyone who comes into our house his extensive collection of toy cars).
One thing you definitely need to do is make sure you pack a bag for each child (and one for you containing tea bags/coffee/wine/chocolate to see you through until you unpack everything – make sure you know where the kettle and the corkscrew are too – you’re welcome) containing their favourite toys, a change of clothes, nappies, wipes, snacks and a few things for them to do while you unpack. Think colouring books, stickers (stickers are pretty much guaranteed to buy you at least an hour while they cover everything in sight, including themselves and the cat in them), playdough, a new book, maybe even a new toy they’ve been asking for.
Oh and make lists. I pretty much had a list of my lists going at one point, but I haven’t forgotten anything -yet! Above all don’t make things any more stressful for yourself than you have to. Forward planning and getting help where you need it is always going to the best way to move when you have little ones in tow.
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