We are about 5 weeks into the school year and I’m just going to come right out and say it:  “aaaaahhhhggggghhhhhh!!!!”   Am I the only one who gets overwhelmed with all of these PAPERS?  This year, my 3 children are at 3 different schools, with 3 sets of fundraisers and activities and assignments and permission slips and health appraisal forms and and and and……

I was going a bit insane.       

So I needed to come up with a plan.  My kids are all young enough that they need a little help from mom keeping track of all their stuff… but these aren’t things I want clogging up my own A5 planner or even my digital calendar.  For example, I might need to remember that my daughter has to wear pink for Wednesday’s assembly at school, but that doesn’t  affect my schedule or the list of things that I want to accomplish on Wednesday. What to do?

I decided I would keep a simple kids-only calendar that lives right in the kitchen where we could jot all the deadlines and important events to remember.

I started collecting my thoughts regarding exactly what we need to keep track of and for us things fell into 3 main categories:

1. stuff that is DUE.   like… hand this paper/assignment in TODAY or else.  (i.e. turn in field trip money / turn in book report / fundraiser orders due etc)
2. stuff that is happening in school today (i.e. wear pink for the assembly / field trip / crazy hair day / quiz )
3. after school activities (games / practices / religious education / other commitments that might affect how we manage our after-school time)

It just so happens that many of the popular planners have days that are divided into 3 chunks, so this worked out great.  I went shopping and came home with a BIG Happy Planner (undated) and got busy setting things up.

I considered buying a dated calendar to save me the trouble of stamping or writing in the dates each week, but to be honest, the one with the cover and design that I liked best happened to be undated (and on sale!) so I went with it.  No biggie.  Isn’t she a beauty??

I promised myself that I’ll keep decorating to a minimum and make sure that this calendar is functional and easy to read for both me and the kids.

MONTHLY SETUP

These planners come with Month-on-two-page spreads as well as the weekly pages.  I wanted to keep the monthly view VERY simple.

I stamped in the dates using Versafine Smokey Gray ink and my Felicity Jane Daily stamp set. 

As for content – I kept it very high level.  I included sports, activities and due dates for larger projects (like big month-long book reports etc).  I created a color code for my kids and stamped small icons in the corresponding color for each child.

WEEKLY SETUP

As I mentioned, the weekly pages in the planner I chose have vertical columns for each day that are split into 3 main boxes.  I think I’ll be creative in how I decorate each week (colors and stickers etc) but I am going to try to consistently keep the top box for their “what’s happening at school today” section… the middle box will be items that are DUE… and the bottom box will be for after school events.

The first week I decorated (Oct 9-15) I used only stickers and a pen.  I had picked up a Mambi sticker pack (Student edition) and it has SO MANY perfect stickers for my needs!  I added a whole row of stickers that say “due” to the middle boxes, there was an “after school” sticker for my bottom boxes, tons of decorative stickers – a great find!  My weekends aren’t nearly as full so it’s a good spot to decorate or create a little box for upcoming events like I did here.

I wanted to get the whole month set up in advance so when my daughter comes home and says “I have to bring in a rock for science class next Friday”, I can flip ahead and write it in (and NOT have to add that to my own personal calendar/to do list, which is full enough as it is!)

So I set up just the framework for the next few weeks – playing around with different stamps and stickers, giving each week its own look and using lots of my supplies, but definitely keeping the basic structure simple and consistent so we don’t miss any deadlines!

I’ll be sure to share some pics of these pages on my Instagram account as they fill up, and of course additional layouts in the future.  I am sure this will evolve as we begin using it, but I am already de-stressed just knowing that I have a central place to house all of this information and not worry about forgetting to send in the pizza money!

To all of you moms out there – I feel you.  There is a lot to keep track of!  And for others it may be their own student calendars… or work tasks vs home… or maybe a separate calendar for volunteer work or creative endeavors.  This concept could be applied to any facet of your life that needs a little side-organizing!

Hope you all have a terrific day, and may your permission slips be few this week! ha!

xo,

Tricia