Hi guys, welcome back to my channel. In today's video, I'm going to be sharing with you the
best packing hacks for moving house that I've found. I have been speaking to all my friends
and family. I have scoured the internet and found some amazing hacks. And even though
we still don't have a move date, it is going to happen very soon, and I am packing up the
house. I'm carrying on and manifesting this move so that it does happen. And these hacks
are so good, I still thought it was worth sharing them with you. So I hope you really
enjoy them. If you do, give it a big thumbs up, and if you're new to my channel and you
like hacks, please consider subscribing, because I make so many hack videos. And if you clicked
on this thinking it was packing hacks for a holiday or a vacation, don't worry. I have
made that video before, and I will link it in the description down below. So if that's
what you were hoping for, you can go and watch that video. And with all that said, let's
get into my hacks. So first off, if you're moving house, you
are going to need boxes, and as a guide, I found online that you should average 10 boxes
per room, and then an extra 10, as well. So you can roughly work out how many boxes you're
going to need. And so many people have said to me, "Don't pay for boxes." There are so
many supermarkets, shops, friends, family that are trying to get rid of boxes. And if
you go to the supermarket and you just ask, they will give it to you. Of course, you may
be using a removals firm. We actually are going to, and they will supply the boxes.
But if you're doing it yourself, make sure you don't pay for them.
And with all the free boxes that you do get, you might find that they don't have handles.
So a really good hack is to take an X-ACTO knife and just cut two slits in it and create
your own handle. This makes it so much easier to carry, and you can either do it in a triangle
or a rectangle like this. I personally found that the triangular way, actually, it was
a lot easier and worked even better. And a huge tip that so many people told me
when I said I was moving was to start decluttering now. We've been quite fortunate that during
quarantine, we have had time to declutter like crazy, but you would be amazed at how
much you can accumulate over the years. We've actually got a [inaudible 00:02:10] at the
moment to make sure we don't move with any unwanted things.
And once you have gone through every room and donated or got rid of things that you
don't want anymore, it's time to get packing. And a really cool packing hack is to use a
vacuum pack bag. You can pick these up so cheaply from Poundland or Amazon and various
other places. I'm sure you guys have seen these before, but you basically put your belongings
into the bag, close it up, and then using your vacuum, you suck out all the extra air
that is in the clothes, around the clothes, and you wouldn't believe how much this goes
down. It makes it so much smaller, and it also protects your clothes.
And something really cool, which I didn't realize you could do, is you can create these
yourselves. If you just have a bin bag, you can put in things like large jumpers or chunky
knitwear, or even duvets or throws or blankets, and then just stick the vacuum into the black
bag, hold the edges around it, and it works so well. I was shocked when we did this at
how much my big, chunky knitwear shrunk down. And when it comes to hanging clothes, a lot
of removal companies will actually have railings in their truck or even big boxes that have
railings in them, and they'll just grab your stuff on a hanger and then stick it into the
truck. But if you want to protect your clothes from any dirt when they're being handled,
a cool hack is to just stick a bin bag up from underneath them and tie it at the top
where the hangers are. You can do this in groups, maybe 10 items at a time, and it just
means they're that bit more protected. And this next hack I thought was completely
genius, and that was to pack a basket or box or handbag, whatever you have, with essentials
for the bathroom, so that when you get to your new destination, if anyone needs to use
the loo, you'll have things like hand wash, a hand towel, first aid kit, maybe even toothbrushes,
toilet roll, and essentials like that. So whether it's you or your removal men, anyone
can use the loo straightaway. And you want to pack that into your car, along with a little
suitcase with your essentials for the evening. You basically want to pack a bag like you're
going away for a night, because when you move all of your worldly belongings, it will make
it quite difficult to find things like pajamas, your child's favorite blanket, and so on.
And you can even do an essential box for your kitchen. So you might want to pack things
like your kettle, some coffee, some tea, some mugs, so that you can have that, maybe some
bowls, some plates to eat off of, a surface spray, a cloth in case things need to be wiped
down straight away, some tea towels, anything essential, maybe even your chargers, because
you don't want to be scrambling around, looking for those. And pack these essential boxes
in your car, so you know exactly where they are.
And this next hack is a really cool way to help protect your plates that little bit more,
and cushion them with party plates. I always have so many of these leftover in our garage
from birthdays and various events. So as you can see here, I'm just putting them in between
our plates. This is so quick and easy to do, and just gives them that bit more padding.
I've also seen people online using coffee filters for this, as well.
And when it comes to packing photo frames or any artwork that you've had framed, make
sure that you pack it in your boxes horizontally rather than vertically. When you pack frames
on top of each other, there's more chance of them breaking from the impact of everything
on top of them. Whereas if you pack them horizontally and then make sure you really fill up any
of the gaps within the box, then they will be more protected. And you can use things
that you just have around the house. It might be clothes. It might be towels. Here, I'm
using this big, giant fluffy throw. And I saw one quote online that said, "If it don't
shake, it don't break." So give your box a shake, and if you hear anything, you might
need to pack it even tighter. And of course, label your fragile boxes with fragile tape.
I was really pleased that I managed to pick up a huge roll of this from Poundland.
And while we're talking about tape, a really good hack is to make sure that you fold over
the end before you put it onto your box. This will save you so much time because it will
be easier to take the tape off when you get to your new house. And more importantly than
that, it will save your manicure, because you will have a lot of boxes to open.
And I don't want to sound like a health and safety expert here or anything, but if you
have scales at home and they're really easy to use, consider using them to weigh your
boxes when you're packing them. I found an article online that said ideally your boxes
won't weigh more than 15 kilograms or 30 pounds. So if it's easy enough, stick them on a scale,
and you could maybe save someone's back. And for heavier items like books, a really
good hack is to use your suitcases. Suitcases can be wheeled and they can also protect and
store your big items better than boxes can. And I found so many hacks online of just really
clever ways to use things that you already have. A great way to pack up your sharp knives
or sharp scissors is to use an oven mitt. You can pack these in, and then they are protected.
They're so very padded, and this is just such a genius one that works really well. And another
one I saw was if you're packing glassware, wine glasses, maybe champagne flutes, or just
glasses in general, consider using your cozy socks. Or in this case, I was using Matt's
socks, as well. These fit over champagne flutes really easily and give them a little bit more
padding so that I don't have to use as much newspaper. And just generally using everything
and anything that you have available, handbags, plastic bags, baskets. Here, I'm using a big
pot to pack up some of the things from our pantry, like our spices, and this worked so
well. And of course you'll want to label your boxes,
because you might have four or five other people helping you, and they will need to
know where to put the boxes down, and you really don't want to get it in the wrong place.
So you can either do it the traditional way, or I've seen some really cool things online,
where people actually color code the boxes. So maybe you make red for kitchen, yellow
for bedroom, blue for loo, whatever it is, you can color code it. Or you can just use
simple labels where you write what is actually in the boxes on it, so it's just really straightforward
and easy to find things at the other end. I think that's the main thing that you want
to do. And this next hack is such a good one. If
you've spent loads of time curating some shelves in your home and you want to set them up the
same when you move, just take some quick photos so that you can reference them and set them
up the same when you get to your new house. And when you are taking things down, like
shelves or toys or beds or drawers or anything, make sure that you save the screws and anything
else, wall brackets or anything, and put them into a little Ziploc baggie and tape them
to the item so that you don't lose them. You can just write on the bag what they're actually
for and make sure on move day that you have some screwdrivers close to you. I'm actually
sticking them into this bag, but you could put them into your handbag, but you'll want
to, I think you'll definitely need screwdrivers on the day, because you may have to take down
some last minute light fixtures, or you may want to start building things when you do
get to your new house. And the last hack I thought was a really good
one for those bigger items, like your table legs or your kitchen stool legs. Consider
putting some newspaper onto the bottom of the legs and then taping them. This way, when
you do get to your new house, it will be easier to slide these across the floor without scratching
your brand new floor. All right, so this is it for this video. I
really hope you enjoyed it. Let me know in the comments below which one was your favorite,
and I'll see you in my next one. Bye, guys.