Parents can make moving easier on kids

Here are tips for keeping an upbeat tone if you're moving this year:

One mother was certain that a move from Virginia to Maryland was going to be traumatic for her 2-year-old daughter.

"It was more stressful thinking about how she would react than how she actually reacted," says the mom a month after the move.

The child's first question after arriving at her new home: "Where are the pretzels?"

What helped: Packing up the child's old bedroom last, and later setting up her new bedroom first. Plus, even at 2, the little girl is able to Skype to stay in touch with her buddies. Mom learned that as long as she was upbeat and looked on the move as an adventure, her child was fine.

Moving to a new community can be one of the most stress-inducing experiences a family faces, according to the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry. Generally, the older the child is, the more difficulty he or she will have with the move because of the increasing importance and longer length of friendships.

One family, stuck between two locations with an unsold house in Tennessee, has taken a leap of faith and let their two boys try out for what's most important to them: soccer. Once the family moves, the boys will have an instant roster of friends come September. Their parents are hopeful that everything else will fall into place in North Carolina.

To make the move easier on children, getting them involved in activities is important, the psychiatry academy suggests. Also:

Ideas from parents to bring a bit of levity to the tough job of moving:

Two books about moving for the preschool set:

A resource for parents

"Moving With Kids: 25 Ways to Ease Your Family's Transition to a New Home" (Harvard Common Press, 2007) by social worker and mother Lori Collins Burgan. Tips include "giving kids a sense of control and involvement in the move, making the physical move less stressful, and creating a sense of belonging in a new home."

Betsy Flagler, a journalist based in Davidson, N.C., is a mother and teaches preschool. If you have tips or questions, email her at p2ptips@att.net or call Parent to Parent at 704-236-9510.