I have always been a lover of planners, calendars, sticky notes, to-do lists and anything else that helps me with planning and organizing my life! I’ll even let you in on a little secret… tucked away in a safe place, I still have all of my planners dating back to college! Please don’t judge me!
But listen… when I became a Mom, planning and organizing my life became infinitely harder! Like, the things that I used to pride myself on were now a hot mess. My Iphone calendar, hard copy calendar and pocket size, carry-in-my-purse planner were not synced up! (Everybody uses 3 different calendar versions…right??)
Planning & Organizing as a Mom is Harder!
Planning and organizing your life as a mom is so much different than organizing your life as a college student or planning your day once you enter the full-time workforce. As a mama, not only do you have to plan your own schedule, but you also have to plan your kids’ schedule and coordinate schedules with your husband and daycare, and sometimes even Mimi and Papa.
As a mama, there are a ton of things that are much different when it comes to planning and organizing life. Let’s look at some of the biggest differences that I’ve come to realize since having my twins.
- You cannot get out the door in 30 minutes anymore. No ma’am! Don’t even attempt this!
- You now have to plan and schedule all of the little self-care things that you just did before. Like getting a pedicure, grabbing coffee with a friend, massages, all of it.
- You will literally have doctor appointments on the regular now. Baby well-care checks, dermatology appointments because your skin is a hot mess with all of the crazy hormonal changes, endocrinology appointments because, well hormones again, and just when you think you don’t have another appointment for an entire month, someone is bound to get sick. It’s too bad doctor’s offices don’t offer frequent flyer miles!
- Boys need haircuts monthly! Who would have known…
- You now have to ask your Mom to go out again.
- You will plan your life around nap time, snack time, and bedtime.
- Getting together with friends requires a minimum pre-planning period of 2-4 weeks. Also, something is bound to wreck those plans last minute. You may want to just reschedule your wine night when the kids go off to college.
- Cleaning the kitchen, washing bottles and doing laundry will require more time than you ever thought possible.
- Time to plan is now also something you have to plan.
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Planning & Organizing as a mom requires a new strategy
So a new strategy was in order when I realized that my previous planning and organizing habits just weren’t going to cut it anymore!
First of all, I needed to round up my calendars and allow them to live in one place only! Then I needed to live and die by that!
As a Mom, you just cannot keep up with everything if it’s not: A- written down and B- easily accessible. What I found, though, is that there is just too much for one master calendar. There simply isn’t enough space! I searched and searched for the perfect planner. I knew what I wanted, I just couldn’t find it! So now what?!
Are you ready for the solution??? Keep reading, mama….
the all-in-one-mom planner solution
You probably already guessed it, but I made my own planner and calendars! And, because, Mom life is hard enough as is, I’m sharing everything with you for FREE! Yay!! So just subscribe below and I’ll send them right to your Inbox!
Planning & Organizing: The Process
So how exactly do I use all of this stuff to organize and plan my life as a mom? I’m glad you asked…
First of all, you are going to need my blank monthly calendars (I use FOUR blank monthly calendar sheets for each month), my weekly goal sheet, my weekly meal plan sheet, and my daily time blocking sheet. Did you already subscribe above to get my sheets for FREE? If not, scroll back up, and do that!
Monthly Planning & Organizing
I always start with monthly planning. At the end of each month, I sit down and plan out the following month. This is when I use my four blank calendar sheets. They go at the front of my planner!
You will start with your Master Calendar. Next, I complete my workout calendar, then my work projects calendar and finally my monthly meal planning calendar. You can adjust the number of calendars and the focus of each calendar to suit your needs.
You will want to complete your calendars in a specific order! The Master calendar needs to be completed FIRST! You will use this calendar to help you complete your other calendars. For example, if you know you have parent-teacher conferences on Monday night, you will want to plan a quick and easy dinner option for that night!
All in all, my monthly planning takes about half an hour! Be sure to add to and adjust your calendars as things come up throughout the month or when things come up for next month too. This will make the monthly planning process go much more smoothly!
1. Master Monthly Calendar– I use this to keep track of our family’s combined schedules. So I write work schedules, doctor appointments, evenings out with friends, play dates, everything! If it takes us out of the house, it goes on the master calendar!
PRO TIP:
I also have a calendar that stays at home. My planner travels wherever I go, but Thomas can look at the calendar at home if he needs to know what we have going on on a particular day!
2. Workout Calendar– This calendar lists what workouts I should be doing on each day. It is so easy to check it off on this calendar after I complete it, and I never wake up wondering what workout I’m supposed to push play on for the day.
I complete this calendar second. I know I NEED to get my workout out in at least 5-6 times per week. If I don’t, I notice a huge shift in my mood. In order to be the best wife and momma I can be, my workout schedule takes priority!
3. Work Projects Calendar– For me, this includes my dental hygiene work schedule as well as my blogging schedule. I plan out my blog posts for the month with this calendar as well as my social media posts. For example, I know that the day after I publish a post, I will post about it on Instagram and Facebook.
Your work life probably looks quite a bit different than mine. Whatever your work life looks like, this is where you’ll record important dates and projects, deadlines and progress check-ins.
4. Monthly meal plan– Now, this is very skeletal at the beginning of the month. For example, I may plan for the week:
Monday- Beef
Tuesday-Chicken
Wednesday-Veggie
Thursday-Beef
Friday-out
Then at the beginning of each week I sit down and plan our meals in more detail.
PRO TIP: Complete your monthly meal plan LAST! That way you can plan around ALL of your other activities and obligations!
Weekly Planning & Organizing
On Sunday evenings, I sit down to plan out my week ahead. At this time, I review my master calendar and discuss with Thomas what obligations we have for the week. We map out daycare pick up schedules accordingly. I will jot down on my master calendar who’s picking up the kids if it varies at all from the norm.
Then I bust out my “Weekly Goals” and “Meal Plan” sheets, as well as my “Time Blocking” sheet. I start with my “Weekly Goals” first.
My Weekly Goals
My weekly goals sheet has 3 main sections: To-Do, Weekly Goals, and Reminders & Notes.
To-Do:
I write down everything I need to get done this week! This is just a checklist. For example, I may need to buy a birthday gift or return something to Target, or send something out in the mail. Maybe the phone bill is due this week, so I need to pay that. Just this last week, I noticed that the window sills were starting to build up a little grime, so I need to go through and wipe down those. Anything that needs done this week gets written down here!
Weekly Goals:
I have BIG GOALS this year, friend! And I am committed to being part of the 8% of people who actually accomplish the goals they set for themselves at the beginning of the year. So, in order to do this, I have to break down my yearly goals into monthly goals, and my monthly goals into weekly goals. Where do I need to be by the end of the week in my blog? In my fitness? This section is intended for just that! This is where I keep myself on track and honest!
Reminders & Notes:
This is where my brain dump happens. Sometimes, when I sit down to do my weekly planning on Sunday night I think “Ohhhh! I need to do such and such next week!” Well, because I have mom brain, I will write this down in the reminder section so I don’t forget it for next week.
This is also the place where I jot down phone numbers or emails or anything else that I would write on a sticky note. Because there are NO STICKY NOTES ALLOWED! Those just get lost, friend!
My Daily Time-Blocking Schedule
Now it’s time to plan out when you are going to do all of the things you just listed on your “To-Do” list. If you don’t know what time-blocking is, it is basically just an hour by hour schedule. I use this instead of working off of a to-do list.
What I found is that when I worked off of a to-do list, not everything got done! And, honestly, the things that did get done were the smaller tasks that required less brain power. Anything that required a higher level of thinking or anything that I just simply didn’t want to do, always ended up pushed to next week’s to-do list. With time-blocking, you schedule all of your to-do items, so you know exactly when you will have the time to complete every task on your to-do list!
The first time you try time-blocking, it is going to take you a little bit of time. To effectively time-block you need to include ALL of your daily activities. Here is everything you need to know about time-blocking!
The Time-Blocking Process
First, write down EVERYTHING that you have to do on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Then schedule ALL of them! You also want to include downtime too! Here are just some of the activities you are going to want to include:
Time spent playing with your kids
Reading
Watching Netflix
Exercising
Weekly date night with the hubs
Cleaning tasks
Dinner prep
Monthly and weekly planning
Commute time
Okay, so now that you have ALL of your daily, weekly, and monthly tasks scheduled, you can begin to see when you have free time to schedule in everything else that is on your to-do list for the week.
Once you get the hang of time-blocking, I promise that it gets easier and doesn’t take so much time! My schedule stays relatively consistent Monday-Friday and then I have more flexibility with my weekends. For the most part, I know what hours in the day I have available to schedule tasks that vary week to week.
PRO TIPS:
-You don’t have to schedule yourself every hour! I actually recommend you don’t! Hopefully, after you’ve scheduled out all of your tasks, you still have an hour or two each day that remains unscheduled.
-I always “plan long.” What does that mean? Well, if I think a task is going to take me 30 minutes, I plan long, so I will block out an hour. I would much rather end the day with extra time rather than end the day with tasks left uncompleted!
Weekly Meal Plan
You should now have your “Weekly Goals” sheet completed as well as your daily time blocking sheets. Now it’s time to meal plan for the week!
I always go back to my monthly meal planning calendar and work off of that. You will want to plan all of your meals and snacks at this point. Remember, my monthly meal planning calendar may have only listed the proteins for each meal. Now it’s time to plan exactly what I’ll be making with that protein, as well as any sides that I will be making too.
Once you have all of your meals and snacks planned for the week, you will want to make a grocery list. At this point, I take my meal plan to the kitchen and determine what I need to buy at the store for the week. After I have my grocery list completed, I sit down and order everything on ClickList that we will need for the week.
ClickList, if you don’t know, is a grocery pick up service. I order my groceries through the app on my phone and schedule a pick up time. When I get to the grocery store, I call, and someone brings my groceries to the car and loads it up for me!
PRO TIP:
I try to actually have my meal plan done 2 weeks in advance! This allows me to meal prep on Sunday afternoon for the week ahead! I much prefer this because I plan on Sunday evening and pick up my ClickList order on Monday evenings. So when I pick up groceries on Monday, they are actually my groceries for the following week! This is what works best for me because Monday is my ideal day to pick up groceries. You could also wait until the end of the week to pick up groceries!
That’s really it, my friends! In total, my monthly planning takes about 30 minutes, and my weekly planning takes about an hour. That hour includes my online grocery shopping too!
Here are my parting thoughts and PRO TIPS!
– Be REALISTIC. Mama, you can only do so much in one day! Don’t over schedule yourself!
-Do NOT commit to anything if you don’t have your planner with you! It’s okay to say, “Let me check my schedule and get back with you.”
-You can do ALL of this digitally if that’s your jam!
-I LOVE working off of a hard copy planner! Because I’m using my own planning sheets, I love the Arc System from Staples! The pages can be easily removed and reinserted time and time again! Think 3 ring binder but without the bulky 3 rings! More notebook-like! The notebook and desktop punch below are the only things you need to get started!
I promise these tips are going to STREAMLINE YOUR LIFE! Are you ready to plan and organize your life like a BOSS? If you didn’t grab them already, get all the tools you will need to take control of your schedule and SLAY YOUR DAY!
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This is a great guide to planning and organizing! Iโm obsessed with planning also and have a similar routine as you. I love the idea of using a calendar for meal planning. Thanks for sharing!