Saturday, January 11, 2014

Organising Kept Simple



Every Boxing Day, it's become a bit of a tradition for me to sit down with my new diary while Paul watches the cricket, planning out my year ahead, adding in birthdays and anniversaries and reminders.  I remember doing just that last year and Paul jokingly teasing that paper diaries were so old-fashioned and that I was well behind the times.

Back in my teaching days, my diary was always filled with excursions, due dates of projects, notes from staff meetings, to-do lists and appointments with parents.  When I became a Mum, I still carried one around with me (albeit a considerably smaller style) but the jottings in it became few and far between. Last year, it had barely any entries apart from my four hair appointments for the year. I tended to use and refer to our family calendar more and so this year, I've ditched the diary.

I've decided to use a simple format to keep me organised ... a family calendar and my iPhone.  I finally have my dismal mobile phone situation sorted out thanks to a very generous Christmas present from Paul (goodbye ancient Nokia with a pitiful camera and non-existent history of text messages... hello iPhone5!)  I am hoping to jot down any dates if need be on my phone's calendar function when I'm out and about but will use our family calendar as the 'hub' of our happenings.

I've never been one for elaborate organisational systems. I know that these days, I can sync this to that and have everything I need delivered straight to me on my phone.  Only I don't need to be checking my email more than once each day and when I'm out and about with my little ones, I don't pick up my phone all that often anyway.  While I like to keep on top of things, a simple method paired with simple technology seems to suit my needs best.

Do you still use a paper based diary or has your phone eliminated the need for one?


The calendar I'm using this year is The Elli Blog  free printable version

15 comments:

  1. Amanda, I still use a paper diary...just bought a refill for it last week and discovered it would've been cheaper to buy a whole new diary rather than one to fill the cover i have for it...anyway...

    I like having a diary. I use it for birthdays and reminders, as well as all the info I get when i pay a bill on-line etc.
    I find it's the easiest and quickest method for me.
    I really like my new Samsung phone, but I don't really rely on it for anything except phone calls...and the odd photo
    Lesley
    xx

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    1. The photo taking function on my new phone is probably what I'm most excited about :)

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  2. Yeah for lovely new Christmas presents:) I still love to use my diary as well as a family calendar. The calendar is in the kitchen with a column for each of us were I jot down appointments and excursions etc. Then I have a diary just for me where I write a list of daily things to do, as well as a few short sentences about what I did in my day and something that I am grateful for. The diary for me really keeps me on track on what I want/hope to achieve in my day which has been helpful for me. I do use my phone to jot down notes and things. I hope you are having a wonderful weekend lovely. xxx

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    1. Your diary sounds like a great way of journalling Catherine. I have several notebooks and these for me are filled with to do lists and journal jottings xx

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  3. I don't use my phone calendar at all! I love our paper one that hangs in the kitchen. Everyone can see it, add to it and it keeps us all organised!!

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    1. So far, I haven't touched my phone calendar either... perhaps the 'note function' or something like that more might be more beneficial for me and then I can just add anything to our calendar once I'm at home...

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  4. I bought a lovely diary last year and used it for about the first month and then not again. Such a waste of money. So nope, no diary for me. No calendar either - just my iphone one. I'm sure I'll upgrade to a calendar when there are kids around one day but for now I'm fine with just my phone.

    I hope you are enjoying your new present, how nice to just have a better photo taking device easily on hand at all times.

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    1. I love the camera... my old Nokia had such a laughable camera... a teeny tiny screen where you could barely make out what it was you'd taken a photo of :) So this was a HUGE improvement for me :) I was always grabbing Paul's phone if we were out and about to take snapshots if I didn't have my big DSLR camera with me :)

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  5. Yes I too have phased out the paper diary in favour of my phone and family calendar.....I do miss the diary though just seemed silly duplicated the info so many times. Xxx

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  6. I always buy many diaries and notebooks....I love them.
    Most of the year, they stay relatively empty, but I still jot dreams, wishes and hopes in them at the start of the year....its nice to look back at them at the end of the year (where I usually just transfer them over to my new diary!)
    Heres to a Happy New Year!!! x

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  7. I still use a hanging family calendar. It's the only way for me!!!
    I hope 2014 brings, you, Paul and the girls much happiness.
    Liv x

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  8. Hey Amanda, you might have convinced me to try a family calendar! Since diary days passed with the end of uni, and motherhood brought the habit of a work Outlook calendar to a halt, I've been making do with scraps of paper and random notebooks, along with various phone calendars. Now that I also have an iPhone I like to use that for important dates or meetings which I need a "ding ding" alert for! But I've thought a family calendar might be useful for daily to do's and kids stuff. I'll give it a go!

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  9. I still use a hardcopy diary to carry around with me which also has my personal notes and to do lists, budget etc in it. And I have a calendar for the house where I write Birthdays, date night, parties, etc so that Mr P has no excuse to not know our plans ahead! I dont use my phone calendar so you are one step ahead of me there but just be sure to backup as I have heard some horror stories of people losing all their info when it does an update :)

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  10. I too love sitting down over the christmas holidays with my new diary and planning the year ahead. I'm a bit of a diary/ calendar junkie though and have everything synching between my laptop, ipad and phone and a hard diary (the hard diary being my favourite) but I still seem to miss birthdays and double book myself. Trying to be more organised this year :O) I just wrote a post last week about it with lots of links to printables and organisers.

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  11. We have a monthly A3 sized kikki k calendar on the wall - its mainly for all the kids stuff and then the Doc and I race to put on any night committments cos of the first in doesn't organise the baby sitter rule!!
    I use my phone a bit for the reminders really - that day before alert has saved me a few times!

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