My greatest pet peeve when moving is vague labels on boxes. 40 boxes that say “kitchen” means you have to open every single one to find your glasses.

A perk for self packing is that you can label as much or as little as you want. For me- I labeled very specifically. I don’t need my china until thanksgiving so I really don’t want to have to deal with it immediately. Since it’s labeled correctly that can sit to the side.

I added a color code to get items delivered to the right zone. Moving boxes room to room isn’t too bad as long as they get it to the right floor or zone.

I purchased 3” round stickers and placed them on the boxes.

While I had time and access to supplies I also wrote out labels for each room and another note listing out all major pieces of furniture to be placed in each room.

All of my notes are in a binder along with some scotch tape to put up before the movers arrive to unload. This gives me some inner peace because I can’t be everywhere when they unload and it gets crazy really fast!!!!

A few random packing tips…

DISHES Use dish towels, cloth napkins etc for packing material. I sprung for the specialty packing boxes for China/dishes which include padded sleeves.

HANGING CLOTHES Clothes on hangers, rubberband a few and trash bag.

OFFICE SUPPLIES/KITCHEN SUPPLIES categorize and ziplock bag everything separately. Avoids a big mish mash of stuff and keeps it all organized.

QR CODES FOR HOLIDAY ITEMS AND LONG TERM STORAGE ITEMS use Tote Scan QR code’s- download app and order labels on Amazon. I used QR code’s for all long term tote storage of holiday items etc See blog post on this topic

I opened each one to make sure contents were secure and added paper to the tops if needed. I chose to add a label with one word to help find the tote and then I can scan for exact contents. I added a red dot for the heavy totes indicating they should be on the bottom and to use caution lifting them.

Hope these ideas help you as you pack!

Cheers- Kristen