Hasta La Ideas

I’m not sure there are words to fully express my feelings of loathing about moving. After a week of boxing up our things, moving the things to the new house, and starting to unbox our things, my animosity about moving has only deepened.

I’m of the opinion that if you can afford it, you should have professional movers handle the entire process for you — packing, moving, unpacking. At the very least, have professionals take care of the moving part. Your body and mind will greatly appreciate not carrying boxes and fighting with large pieces of furniture.

Our move is actually happening in two parts, and we decided to only get movers for the second part. Since we are selling our old house, we needed to leave some furniture in it to stage it. Staging a house is when you make it look like a home that belongs in a magazine or catalog — no personal items, no clutter, and nothing in the cabinets or storage areas. Our real estate agent told us that staging a home can improve the sales process because it allows people to see the space in use, but also imagine their lives in the home.

As a result, our dining table, chairs, bookshelves, and other large pieces of furniture are still in the old house. These items will remain there until someone buys our place, and then we’ll have professional movers come and do the heavy lifting for us.

Unfortunately, this means we handled the first part of the move on our own. We carried boxes and boxes and boxes out of our old house, into a van, out of the van, and into our new house. I’m honestly surprised I have enough arm strength after carrying so many boxes to type this post.

The following are lessons learned about moving from this experience and the 14 times I’ve moved previously:

• As previously stated, if you can afford it, hire professional movers to take care of the move for you.
• If you can’t hire movers, the first thing you should do is have a lot of drinking water and food on hand. You don’t want to get dehydrated or hungry during this process. You need as much energy as possible to keep you going and in a good mood.
• When loading a moving truck or van, I like to put the heaviest objects in a U-shape against the sides and back wall of the space. Mattresses, couches, dining tables, and dressers are the things that I usually load first.
• Use blankets to wrap the objects and keep them from being damaged.
• In the open space at the center of the van, I stack the heaviest boxes in a single layer on the floor. Then, I build up boxes from heaviest to lightest and from back to front. Since you tried your best to get absolutely everything into boxes, you shouldn’t have much left after creating your tower of boxes.
• Play a game of Tetris and fit in the last, unboxed items. Again, use blankets to wrap these items to protect them from damage.
• Get a large padlock and lock up the truck.
• When you arrive at your destination, plan to unload the truck in the opposite order, starting with the unboxed items and finishing with the large furniture.

Be sure to check out our article “Moving: How to pack your home” and the comments for advice on packing. The next article in this series will cover the more pleasant, yet still mentally demanding process of unpacking. Also, please share any advice you have about the actual moving stage in the comments to this post.

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