What is the Best Way to Pack Clothing for Moving?

When moving, packing and planning is essential in order to stay organized. The best bet is to create a time frame so that you can wrap and pack items - starting with items that are rarely used. These items may include clothing not worn in the present season, pictures and paintings, kitchen items, ornaments and books. Closer to the time of the move, you can start packing things which you will not need to use in the few days before the move. Keep back just enough pots, pans, crockery, cutlery and glassware for your family’s needs for a few days and pack all the rest of these items. The same goes for bed linens and towels, clothing and personal hygiene products like soap, shampoo, toilet paper, toothbrushes and toothpaste.

This plan will give you a little breathing space in the run up to the final packing stage, which will be done right before the movers come to take your boxes away. At the last minute, pack up all the items which you have kept back and mark the cartons clearly as to what is in them, because once you are in your new home, you will easily be able to locate these cartons. Thus, you will be able to unpack just a few cartons immediately and have all the basics you will need to make up the family’s beds and feed them; and their clothes and personal hygiene products will be immediately accessible.

When it comes to packing the family’s clothing, there are a few rules and tips which will be very helpful. The first law of clothing packing is to pack the items in the correct sized boxes. As clothing is not that heavy, you can use large moving boxes and they will not break or be too heavy to move, as would be the case if you packed a large number of heavy books into a large carton. Use the largest boxes for the largest items of clothing, like coats. Medium sized boxes are ideal for most of the other items in your family’s closets; and you should pack small items, like socks, underwear, scarves and accessories into small boxes. If you do not fill the largest cartons completely, use the space to pack in these small boxes.

Another good tip when packing clothes is to mark each box with the name of the person to whom the clothes belong and the room in the house which will be theirs, so that the movers can leave the boxes in that family member’s own new room. Label cartons as main bedroom, smallest bedroom, second bedroom, etc. This will eliminate the chaos when the moving companies are shuffling moving boxes throughout your new home.