How To Keep Children Occupied When Moving Home

 

Let’s face it, moving house is stressful. Even more so if you are constantly having to entertain young children and prevent them from getting bored while you endlessly pack box after box of your worldly possessions.

If you have any family nearby it makes sense to ask them to watch the kids for a few hours or an afternoon so you can crack on with packing. With no distractions it is surprising how much you can get done in a short amount of time.

However, this isn’t always possible, especially if you live far away from your nearest and dearest. Don’t worry though, the information below will help you keep your kids entertained throughout the moving process. The first step is to get them excited about the big move!

Get Your Kids Excited About Moving

Before you even begin dismantling furniture and packing boxes you should sit your children down and explain to them exactly what is going to happen.

Remember, focus on the benefits of why you are moving. Explain to your children that they will have a bigger garden, a larger bedroom or maybe a bedroom all to themselves in their new home.

Maybe their new home will have a den or a dedicated games room. If it does, tell them and get them excited about it! The more excited they are the more receptive they will be when you ask them for help because now they want to move into their new home as much as you do.

Let Them Wrap Their Own Belongings

Get your kids involved in the move by letting them wrap and box their own things. A great tip here is to wrap everything in bubble wrap first. Kids love bubble wrap and will happily spend a few hours wrapping their toys and popping bubbles at the same time. Just make sure you stock up on bubble wrap before moving day, you won’t want to run out! It is important to note that you shouldn’t let children wrap or handle anything that is fragile or anything that could hurt them. Prepare easy things for them to pack such as soft toys or board games. While they are happily packing away in their room you can focus on packing and boxing up the rest of the house.

Decorate The Boxes!

What do you do once your children have packed all of their belongings and there is nothing left to pack? You guessed it, let them decorate the boxes!

Make sure you keep a set of felt tip pens or crayons to one side so they can begin drawing and colouring once all of their boxes have been packed.

Ask them to draw what they have packed in each box. This can be especially helpful when un-packing because you will know exactly what is in each box. More importantly, it will keep them entertained for a few more hours!

Have An Emergency Entertainment Box On Standby

Eventually, it is inevitable that your children will get tired and restless, especially if they have been packing and colouring boxes all day.

This is where your emergency entertainment box comes to the rescue. Do your children enjoy playing games on the family tablet? Or do they have a favourite portable video game they love to play? Maybe a favourite book or comic?

Whatever it is, keep it close in the emergency entertainment box but only bring it out as a last resort. You want to keep them involved in the move for as long as possible.

Great! You are all packed and on your way to your new home. However, once you arrive you then have to un-pack! Don’t worry, we can make this fun for your children too.

Do Their Room First

Get them excited again and let them un-pack their toys and belongings first, they will soon remember how much fun they can have with un-popped bubble wrap!

Get them involved and ask them to draw a layout of their bedroom and list where they want all of their favourite toys to live. If you don’t have any paper to hand simply dismantle a cardboard box, flatten it and use it as a canvas to design the ultimate bedroom.

Kids love this because they can use their imagination and come up with all kinds of wonderful, crazy ideas!

If you follow this advice on moving day we promise your children will be kept entertained for hours, which will give the adults more time to pack up the rest of the house before moving to your wonderful, new home.