Your kitchen likely contains plenty of items that you’ll need to move come moving day. You’ll need to learn how to pack kitchen for moving so that your cutlery, flatware, appliances, food and other items are safe and secure.
How to Pack Kitchen for Moving - For Easy Unpacking
This post is a simple step-by-step guide that will help to make packing for your kitchen for a move a quick and easy process.
Run Down Your Food
Before you move, try to minimize the amount of food you’ll need to throw away. This is a key tip -- especially if you’re moving out for the first time.
- Start by creating a list of all perishable food items and find ways to use them up.
- Keep new food purchases to the bare minimum and minimize your trips to the grocery. The trick here is to buy only essential items you’ll need before the move.
- Arrange all the items in your freezer and refrigerator so you’ll have an easy time finding, using or packing.
Sort Your Kitchen into Essential and Nonessential Items
The secret to a well-planned kitchen is to plan and pack as much stuff as you can a week or so before the actual move. To avoid a situation where you’re short of essentials, separate the things you’ll need until the move. This is one of the first steps to take before a move.
- Toaster and coffee maker
- Plates, glasses, cups, bowls, and cutlery for everyone for say two meals each
- Non-freezer/fridge food that you’ll use up until moving day
- A couple of dish towels, oven mitts, and dishcloths
- Cleaning tools and materials, dish soap, and dishwasher soap
- One or two sharp knives
- One of two saucepans
Get the Right Packing Materials and Supplies
Be sure to gather all your packing materials. For the kitchen, you’ll typically need boxes, permanent markets, cardboard, bubble wrap, cardboard separators for cups and glasses, packing paper, packing chips and tape. Although, you can also look into alternatives for cardboard boxes for your move. You should also know how to pack silverware with the proper packing materials to ensure that nothing flies around anywhere during the move.
Start Packing Your Non-Essentials
- Once you’ve figured out what you’ll need in the last week, you can go ahead to pack everything else.
- Jars: wrap jars individually in packing paper and secure them with packing chips
- Boxed, bagged and dry goods: be sure to avoid packing anything heavy in boxes with these goods as they may split open and get damaged
- Cans: Avoid overpacking boxes as they may get too heavy. Consider putting a bottom layer of cans then pack lighter items on top
- Take any furniture apart and keep the fixtures safely in a labeled sandwich bag before securely attaching it to the furniture.
- It’s also important to secure your cutlery into various types.
Tips and Advice
- You want to keep some snacks available for those sudden hunger pangs.
- Pack kitchen items and boxes onto the moving truck last as they’ll often be the first things to unpack.
- Once you’ve moved in, be sure to start by installing your fridge and freezer so you can re-chill your perishable food.
Bottom Line
With those tips on how to pack kitchen for moving, packing can be a painless experience. The trick here is to spare some time to plan. Read through the items mentioned and print them out so you have an easy way to reference the next time you need to pack your kitchen for a move. If you’re still feeling wary about the big move on your own, you can also hire professional movers to enjoy the benefits of not having to do everything on your own.
