Household Planner: Beside our sink, between the soap dispenser and the basket of sun-bursting tomatoes, Motivated Moms, in a frame. After each meal's clean up, we each try to tackle one job on the list. (Available as an e-download now for only $4. I just cut the papers to fit the frame and placed by sink central. The day's tasks are easily at hand.) I also jot down on this list any extra chores I notice as I work through the house; then it is recorded and someone can choose to work that area through.
Personal Planner: In a blank journal, swirl the day's personal lists around simple things, snipped from hand me down magazines. See the beauty in the everday, poetry in the ordinary, holy in the common. A place the record the dinner menu, personal reminders, a child's funny line. Memories for the years. (Note: the Motivated Mom's daily list as a check on the personal list.)
Here is my place to write each day's verse, as we endeavor to "Order our steps in His Word." (Ps. 119:133) The day's tasks are ordered around His Word; as we return to the list, we return to the verse He has given us for the day from His Word.
(For more visual daily journaling, see Jewel's inspiring, captivating pages)
Learning Planner: A hardback, spiral notebook--pens and script and books inspire--so it may lay flat easily. Then: some adhesive tabs to make my own learning planner based on the brilliant layout from the MomAgenda (as seen here at the Lilting House--go see!)…with several caveats... (This is, essentially, A Planner for UnPlanners):
1. I didn’t label the tabs with all kind of subjects. I only label tabs as I actually find need to jot something down. (So far, I have a tab for: Daily Routines, (Grocery Lists, Items needed for Children,) Poetry Learned, Hymns Learned, Resources to Remember, Books read aloud).
2. I only write a loose skeleton for the day’s outline…no tight schedule. And then as the day progresses, I write in (loosely, only what I want to make note of) what I actually did--like scheduling in reverse. Making a record, leaving the day's traces. I can see what worked some days, what didn’t, what may have been a stumbling point and could be tweaked…and I feel a sense of accomplishment instead of discouragement. Seeing what I did on a day motivates me for the next day. And if I didn't get to "a bone on my skeleton" for the day, I just add it to the next day, moving sticky notes at random.
3. In the children’s squares, somedays I jot in what I’d like to do with each child that day so I remember…or again, I jot in what we actually did together. A record of our days.
How-to: Divide the two-page spread into seven columns; label Monday to Saturday. In the first column, jot down the essentials: Morning Prayers, Exercise, Poetry, Lunch Prayers, Art, Music, Evening Prayers etc. Write down MTWTFS under each of those activities when/if done those days. Under each day's column, jot down what learning was accomplished: what pages in history, what read alouds, what poetry memorized etc..... just a running log of the learning day, as you do it. I lay the "planner" open on the table and just jot down what we do as we do it. (I keep a bookmark in each book we are reading that records how many pages we are supposed to read daily to complete the book within a certain time period.)
Divide the spread in half, and then make rows for each of the children across the week: record special projects each child has tackled, or special times together, or things you want to make note of for each Child, in their own daily space. (click the above picture to enlarge and see further...)
As this planner covers a one week spread, I will often scrawl down prayer requests here, and we can pray together during our morning gathering times for these requests.
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There are, obviously and delightfully, many ways to number one's days. Perhaps a large binder with blank pages might be used to incorporate all three of these planners into one, and then three hole punch the Motivate Mom pages? For me, I like having journals in different spots, where they are needed: Household Planner by the sink, Personal Planner on my desk, Learning Planner in the Learning Nook.
Lord, teach me to make the most of every opportunity, to number my days, to make my plans but let You direct these steps. Each one of them.
Read more on time management: New Days
More great ideas on Shannon's WFMW
