Packing your dishes before when moving is one of the delicate tasks that most homeowners prefer doing personally. Doing it correctly means you don’t need to worry about the chances of your expensive plates or glassware breaking during the moving process.
In this post, we shall discuss how to correctly pack your dishes when moving, and the materials needed for the job to be successful. Your dishes will be protected when you follow this professional guide.
Packing materials required
“Wiggle room” is the name of the game you play when packing dishes. Although some extra space is a good thing, you’ll need as little room as possible during the packing process. Now, this is where the main packing material—packing paper is needed. A packing paper will protect your fragile dishes, and you will need a lot of packing paper if you have a lot of dishes that you need to pack.
However, the list is pretty simple for the other packing materials needed. This should include:
- Dish boxes
- Medium-sized boxes
- Markers and labels
- Packing tape
That’s it! But, make sure you don’t forget bubble wrap—that’s if you don’t want to use a printed newspaper, which is not recommended. Newspaper ink tends to come off on your dishes. Although you can wash it off, there’s a high possibility for it to leave permanent stains.
In case you don’t have packing paper you can use the following items, and they will get the job done.
- Styrofoam plates – these plates are spongy and thick, meaning, they can absorb any shocks created by dashes and bumps. When packing your plates, you can keep Styrofoam been the dishes. The Styrofoam acts as a spongy barrier between the dishes. You can opt to stack your dishes horizontally if you want to get the best from this trick.
- Cloth wraps – this is one of the old tricks for packing fragile items. Furthermore, it’s much safer than using Styrofoam, and it works on all types of dishes. The only challenge with cloth wraps is that they consume a lot of space. You can use socks, t-shirts, as well as other spongy and soft clothes, wrap your glasses and plates individually, and then pack them tightly in a thick box. You can use extra clothes to fill any gaps in the box. This method can save you a lot of money.
Everyone wants to know how to pack their dishes safely to protect them from breaking. What you need to know is that the steps involved are similar for almost all dishes. However, this guide will help to avoid breaking stems on your wine glasses, as well as protect your plates from chipping.
There are five main steps that you should follow when packing your dishes.
- Step 1: Assemble every box correctly, and tape them properly. These boxes can get heavy, and you need to ensure that you use sufficient tape to prevent the boxes from caving under the weight of the dishes.
- Step 2: Use crumpled paper to line each box, and ensure that you create a 6-inch cushion at the bottom of the box. Always make sure you crumple the paper instead of folding it, as this promises to create better protection.
- Step 3: Place your packing paper on a level surface, and then place the dish you want to pack in the middle of the paper. Wrap the dish depending on its specific needs, and then use tape to secure the paper. Once done, place it inside the box.
- Step 4: Continue packing the dishes until the box is almost full. You can use soft fabric or extra balls of paper to fill the spaces in between the dishes. The secret to packing dishes correctly is to use the right order. So, you need to start with the heaviest items, and then pack the light items like glasses on the top of the moving box.
- Step 5: Now, once you’ve fished wrapping and packing your dishes, top the moving box with fabric or balled up paper, just like you did at the bottom of the moving box. This helps to add some extra protection to your dishes. Once done, you can close the box, tape it, and label it correctly. Ensure you write the room where the box belongs to, the contents, and that they are fragile, as well as which way it should go.
Professional Toronto movers, Torex Moving say that you should avoid overstuffing your boxes or packing them too heavy. It’s very easy for one to do so. Therefore, you should be aware of the dishes you are loading into every box. Whenever possible, try to keep every box under 45 lbs.
In case you have a lot of dishes, you can opt to pack your bowls, plates, mugs, cups, and glasses in separate boxes. However, if you don’t have a lot of dishes, they can fit into one box. Nevertheless, don’t forget to detail the contents of every box. This will make it easier for you to unpack since you’ll know what to look for when unpacking.
