As exciting as moving to a new home is, it’s equally overwhelming, exhausting, even for adults. Add moving with kids who have limited experience into the mix, and those angsty moments can feel unbearable.
From personal experience, I know that moving puts a huge strain on your executive functioning, taxing your decision-making abilities at every step of the process.
However, the best way to handle moving with kids is to make plenty of space for them in all phases: planning, preparation, and execution.
Let’s walk through the steps I took for planning, prepping, and moving with children.
Prepare Yourself First
Child transitions are hard enough to handle when we feel on top of the world. It’s even more challenging not to react to unexpected moments of your kid’s big feelings if you haven’t processed the situation and consoled your inner child.
So, while it’s paramount that you involve the kids in the process from the very beginning, that involvement hinges on you having metabolized your feelings about the transition period so that you can play the role of the insightful parent.
Remember that kids are like sponges, absorbing your emotions. Before you tell your child the big news, prepare yourself with some processing and buffer time.
I read all the ‘how to tell your child you are moving’ resources out there, and thought I had readied myself for what was to come. I had not. In the moment of truth, our highly sensitive 7-year-old erupted into a flood of tears, and my wife and I had to dig deep into our knowledge of gentle-parenting techniques to validate her very real, very big emotions of change and loss.
It was time to pull out empathy, understanding, and respect, and save the “it’s our big adventure” spiel for another moment.
Our 3-year-old, arguably of very different temperament and stage, responded to the news with a glib, “Ok,” and promptly demanded a snack.
How to Involve Kids When Moving
Once you’ve reconciled your feelings about the move itself, you’ll have to deal with your anxiety about your children’s reactions, keeping your expectations grounded, patient, and realistic during this time of disruption.
We suggest gathering your entire family for a meeting, where you can tell your kids the family is moving. Your biggest priority here is creating an atmosphere where they can express their feelings, fears, and resentment openly and freely.
Once their emotions have leveled out, that’s the time to invite them to participate in the exciting experience by framing the move as a fun project.
Before moving with kids, we assured our children of three things:
- Their opinions matter
- We’re all in it together
- All their prized possessions will be making the trip, too
Now’s also a good time to remind your kids that they can keep in touch with friends long distance. We know it’s not always an option, but if you can help it, give them advanced notice so they can finish any activities at school that stand out as important to them.
After providing that necessary assurance, we found that involving our daughters in some of the decision-making and including them through the overall moving process increased their acceptance and excitement.
We tend to focus on ways to save money when moving, without realizing that cutting back on family stress is just as important.
Give Your Children Some Creative Control
Since my wife and I had already seen the new place and had a detailed floor plan, we knew the room our children would be sharing.
First, we handed over the reins of creative control. We let them decide their new room’s color and how they would arrange some of their favorite toys, like their dollhouse and their growing collection of MagnaTiles.
Our kids also responded well when we shared our entire moving task list with them. Our oldest even helped keep track of the dates of tasks assigned to my wife’s project management tools.
Your kids will be more receptive if you approach planning as a creative art project rather than as a mundane task. We also examined their bedroom floor plans to decide where they would put their dolls, kitchen play set, coloring books, and picture books.
It was an easy way to give them a sense of ownership in their new space.
We also suggest including them in any plans for neighborhood going-away parties, so they can say goodbye to lots of friends all at once. Tell them about any lifelong friends you’ve left behind in the past, and how you keep in touch.
Moving with kids is easier if you frame it as expanding their network of friends to a stronger friend circle rather than leaving friends behind forever.
Do Kid-Centric Research
If you’re within an hour of your new home, I suggest that you plan a couple of trips to explore and familiarize your kids with the new area. Finding family-friendly neighborhoods and checking out a nearby hub of neighborhood activity, like parks and elementary schools, can greatly impact their comfort level.
You can even drive by the local middle school to show them what the future holds, implicitly reinforcing the idea that their current life will change no matter where they live–that stronger friend circle we mentioned is always transforming.
But school life isn’t everything. Our children didn’t go to public school; we’re a homeschool family, and we were a good 8-hour drive from our final destination. But we still didn’t skip this step.
We gave ourselves virtual tours of local attractions and scoured the websites of what was most important to them: book clubs, social clubs, the local library, nearby hiking trails, and an ice cream shop in town within walking distance.
Get Your Kids In On the Moving Plan
It’s good to get your kids excited about the opportunities, but then let them know it’s not time to party yet–there’s some work to be done, together as a family.
I thought of planning as our secret weapon. Planning the move with kids involves as much creativity as it does attention to detail. While we were planning the details with the moving company and working through our moving checklist, we created a ‘Getting Ready for the Big Day’ project management board for the kids.
It included days for kid-specific tasks, like sorting toys and packing clothes, and fun milestones, like our last family game night and our last trip to our favorite pizza place.
One of the best packing tips for families is to have each child pack a backpack of essentials, including their favorite outfit, picture books, and stuffed animals. My kids needed to know that their necessities would stay with them at all times.Ultimately, our kids’ project management board served as a preparation tool. This visual countdown to moving day and timeline for gathering moving and packing supplies helped them stay on track and keep their anticipation anxiety in check.
Keep Moving Day As Fun As Possible
Goodbyes can be hard. So, a few days before moving day, we had one of those neighborhood going-away parties we mentioned, sharing our favorite memories and taking pictures of all the things we wanted to remember.
Of course, a few tears were shed. But I was impressed by their ability to accept the transition without any angsty moments, and happy to see their excitement for what lay ahead. Honestly, saying goodbye might have been harder for me, despite a child’s limited experience with farewells.
On moving day, remember, you are in control of setting the mood. Do your best to keep stress to a minimum, and have your mental health issues processed beforehand so you can keep things light and cheerful.
While we completed our last-minute task list, we put on their favorite tunes and let them get their wiggles out by dancing in the wide open spaces of our cleared-out home.
Make Transitions a Fun Project
With their activities at school behind them, their favorite books in their laps, and our sights set on our new family-friendly neighborhood and expanding our network of lifelong friends, we hit the road.
With multiple instances of “Are we there yet?” and an unfortunate bout of motion sickness firmly in the rearview mirror, the excitement and the newness of everything were all any of us could focus on upon arrival.
Despite running on fumes, we explored every inch of our new home together. My littlest demoed all her new hide-and-seek hiding places, and my oldest made note of new reading nooks to try out. Leaning into this excitement can go a long way to helping kids adjust to the new home.
The first week was all about exploration and establishing a new version of our old routine. As homeschoolers, we promptly joined a local park meetup. This hub of neighborhood activity helped our kids make fast friends with a local, like-minded family, who were instrumental in getting us acclimated to our new community.
For kids starting a new school, it can be nerve-wracking, but also a chance to make new friends.
We didn’t have to have the new-child-at-school conversation, thanks to homeschool. But we did address the new school life balance and promised to make time for creative art projects and ice cream during this time of disruption.
I’d suggest taking the kids to visit the school before the first day, meet the teachers, and learn about extracurricular activities and after-school project types. To get your children to quickly connect with peers, encourage them to join clubs or teams you know they’ll enjoy.
Routine Is Important When Moving With Kids
I know I touched on this in the previous section, but routine is so important for a child’s blossoming mental health, especially during tough times. Establish a new routine that works for you and your children as soon as you can to provide a comforting sense of stability and buffer time amidst this big change.
Stick to meal times, play times, bath, and bedtime routines. This consistency will help your kids feel secure in their new environment.
If the move has brought big emotions to the surface, a routine can also help you be the calm, level-headed, and insightful parent your child needs. In my opinion, creating a safe space for expressing feelings and being patient and understanding are crucial. But all kids are different, and some may require more buffer time and tools to cope and adjust to their new surroundings.
In short, our move was full of tears, laughter, and learning, and yours will likely be, too. But putting in the prep work pays off! The time and effort you put into planning will help you handle the challenges, cherish the moments, and watch your kids thrive as they embrace their new home and community with open arms.
How SelfStorage.com Can Ease the Transition of Moving with Kids
The key component of a smooth transition when moving with kids is to involve them in every step of the process, while also giving them space to be a kid. The last thing you want to do is expect your children to handle the move like adults, especially if your move includes a long drive.
It may be tempting to unload the moving truck into your new home as soon as you arrive, but keep in mind that your child is emotionally exhausted from the transition and physically exhausted from the drive.
But moving services use a combination of per-day and per-mile fees to calculate the final cost, meaning that once you get to your new home, you’ll want to unload your stuff and return any and all rentals asap.
So, how do you balance keeping your costs down with supporting your child’s transition? SelfStorage.com is here to help.
Pro tip: You can often rent a storage unit for a whole month for the same amount of money a truck rental costs for a single day!
First, find a storage unit next to where you live now so that you can pack and prepare before the big day. You can then use our search tool to find a second unit across the country using the zip code of your new home.
Whether you need one storage unit or two, our Selfstorage.com storage search tool makes finding ideal facilities for self-storage as easy as entering your zip code, filtering the options, and scrolling through the results until you find exactly what you need.
Moving with kids may sound stressful at first, but taking your time and doing it right can actually bring your family closer together. But it’s important to get it all right the first time by staying organized, packing beforehand, and storing your belongings in a safe space during the tough times.Remember – SelfStorage.com can help keep your belongings safe and your living spaces clutter-free during this hectic time. With our intuitive storage search tool, you can find and reserve the perfect unit in minutes, one less thing to worry about on your moving checklist.
