Moving With Children - Packing Memories

 As I mentioned in my last post a few weeks ago, when we were just beginning to pack, moving can be difficult for children, especially if you've lived in one place for most, or all of their lives.  Memories don't always fit neatly into boxes - not all of them anyway.  So, keeping that in mind, we were careful to make a big production of taking along whatever memories we could.

Like the height chart on the wall...

...which we copied onto a couple of yardsticks, to be hung on the wall of our new house (an old idea from Martha Stewart).

 Or, picking seeds from favorite plants from around our yard, to plant at the new place.

Carefully removing, and rolling up artwork, like the wall-sized T-Rex mural (we downloaded from Art Projects for Kids, printed, colored, and assembled for hanging, five years ago).

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And of course, making a Plaster of Paris copy of the hand prints the children had placed in the concrete next to our driveway.

The Man of the House built a wood frame, held together with screws, around the hand prints.  I slathered the cement with Vaseline, and sprayed the wood with a baking spray mixed with flour.  Then, we mixed up the plaster of Paris, and poured it into the frame.

Once it was set, we unscrewed, and removed the frame.  It came right off, but it took a couple of taps with a rubber mallet before we could pop the plaster off of the cement to reveal the mirror image copy, ready to be wrapped, and placed carefully into the truck.

I was surprised it worked as well as it did.  The Vaseline (a tip I found on some help board, or other) was messy, and a pain to wipe off the mold, but it did keep the plaster from sticking to the cement.

It was extra work paying attention to all the little details in the middle of a move, but it was big deal to the children, and really helped to calm some of their regrets about leaving the house behind.