If you aren’t following me on Instagram, you are missing out on daily inspirations for your home & garden. I post fun reels showcasing my recipes along with local small businesses! Everyday I share the things that will inspire you to do something special!
Join me there so don’t miss a beat with what is happening here at For Dragonflies And Me.
In today’s podcast I get to introduce you to one of the most remarkable women I have the blessing of knowing & calling a friend!
I met Kat back in 2012 when I was just starting out on my writing journey. After a wonderful conversation with her, I was off to one of her writing groups. At my first group meeting I was in awe at how wonderful she and the group were. How welcoming and the information, guidance, and encouragement I received cannot be expressed in words… I was so touched. To this day I truly feel Kat helped give me the legs to stand on and go for it! I started Rocking My Path.
Soon after I started attending the writing group I began blogging for The Detroit News, other online publications, and even a couple magazines.
And that is what we are going to focus on during this segment of For Dragonflies And Me. Today Kat & I are going to talk aboutMindset & Motivation and her Rocking Your Path world! You’ll learn how she guides people to grow in their solo-entrepreneurship!
“My passion is helping time and cash-strapped solopreneurs build a profitable home-based business.
I especially love helping clients break free from despair, leaking money, or making little at all.
What about You? What keeps you up at night, tossing and turning trying to figure out how to get past all the obstacles life throws at you?” Kat Sturtz.
“Marketing is necessary but it needn’t leave you feeling stuck between Heaven and Hell. And it doesn’t need to be expensive, hard to do, or leave you feeling icky at the end of the day either. Not when you follow the marketing strategies, tactics, and advice I love most. Top on that list: If you don’t like being marketed to in a particular way then don’t use that method in your own marketing. Doesn’t matter if it’s being touted as the current best tactic to use. If you don’t like it, it’s likely your target niche doesn’t either.” Kat Sturtz
…and we will also chat about a wonderful organizational tool, Trello. I am currently taking that course & will have a blog coming up all about it!
Be sure to join the group for this event on Facebook so you don’t miss a beat! See you there!
“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.” ~ Anatole France
Welcome to Day 3 of my new Organization series! Today we’re going to discuss the importance of using a journal and day planner as well as calendars. I am also excited to provide information on a NEW tool I’ve been using to help keep me organized! Read on for more!
Many of the topics I discuss in this series I learned from an incredible lady named Marla Cilley, A.K.A. The Flylady. Her book, “Sink Relections” taught me how to incorporate all this lessons. It was from the inspirations from her book how I developed my P.M.S. concept! So now lets get into today’s topic!
Let’s recap the previous post. Now that you’ve created your lists of tasks, it’s time to put them down onto paper or a spreadsheet. I started using an incredible program called Trello. It is a functional program that grows with you and your projects. You can use it for both work and personal life. I have 2 accounts- one for my For Dragonflies And Me and one for my other business, Food Trucks To You. I’ll be sharing more on this in my next blog post, and providing you with information on an incredible course I used to learn this great time saver.
You should now be at the point where you’ve created and P.M.S.’ed your lists and routines. Now you need a place to keep them so they stay organized and are easily accessible.
That brings us to today’s topic on how to utilize journals, day planners & calendars.
This is where a journal, day planner and calendars come into play. Using these tools will help you keep on track with visual ease. I could never keep up with my many ‘hats’ without them.
What’s the difference?
My journal is primarily used for household tasks and responsibilities where my day planner and calendars keep my work related projects scheduled.
Your Journal
First lets look at the journal. It can be as complex or simple as you the designer want it to be. Be aware that it’ll evolve and grow along with your children and as home renovations occur.
Day Planners & Paper Calendars
I purchase a new day planner along with a desk calendar every year. I live by my day planner and calendars because they allow me to visually see what I have going on and aid me in planning ahead through the year.
GoogleCalendars
I also utilize my Google calendar which aids me in scheduling personal & work appointments including Podcast & YouTube recording times with guests. I love that I can access my calendar from my phone for easy reference.
Incorporating the use of all these elements keeps me on task.
Let’s take a look at how I utilize my journal. Be aware you don’t have to have it set up like mine, It can be as complex or simple as you the designer wants it to be. The important thing is it fits your lifestyle and needs. It will evolve and grow with your family & as home renovations occur.
I thought it would be helpful if I explained how my journal is set up, so here we go.
I use a leather-bound 1 1/2 inch 3-ring binder for my journal. It’s filled with top loading plastic sleeves and side tabbed divider sheets. It’s broken down into the following Sections.
Zones refer to each room of your home and is where you’ll put your room-by-room detailed cleaning routine lists. With this concept of zone cleaning, spring and fall cleaning can almost be eliminated.
Daily Routines holds my morning, daily, after school and evening routine lists as well as each day of the week’s schedule of routines that get done. This is where the example of my morning routine I shared with you last time would be placed.
Here’s an example of my Monday Routine: *Purge magazines and newspapers
*Fill bird feeders
*Bathroom (this is where you’ll go to your Bathroom Routine)- tub, sink, toilet, floor
*Wash all area rugs and throw blankets in the laundry
*Kitchen floor, sweep, dishes
The Daily Home Blessing is my Mission Statement. I’ll share this in an upcoming post!
Zone’s:
My Sections are in this order: Zones Daily Routines Daily Home Blessing Menu Plans & Grocery Lists Tools Personal and Activity Frequency List
Pro Tip: Having a menu helps in grocery shopping and meal prep. I will go into detail on menu planning and grocery shopping in an upcoming post… so stay tuned.
Menus & Grocery lists. I like to spend about an hour once a month creating our monthly menu. I of course ask for input from Dave & the boys so everyone is happy!
Generally I try to design the menus seasonally.
Spring & Summer menus focus on the fresh produce we’re growing and that’s available at our local farmers market.
The second is Fall & Winter which features what we’ve canned, frozen and what’s in the root cellar along with what we may have left in the garden & again what is available at the farmers market.
…and now for your personal touch!
My Personal section holds things that inspire me. I have several poems on mothering, being a good wife & person in general, cartoons, drawings from the children and cards from friends and loved ones.
Frequency of Activities section simply holds a list of how often I want to do particular tasks.
*Each section has a Title Page. I have family photos, pictures the children have made, poems, cards and other special things to me.
As I said, your journal is exactly that- yours. Let it be a reflection of what you love, who you want to be, your faith and your passions!
Day Planners & how I use them!
As a writer, and now having both a Podcast & YouTube channel, I have multiple dead-lines for articles and projects which cannot be forgotten. I keep a list of the magazines, other blogs for inspiration in my day planner in the sidebar on the Month-at-a-glance page. I write the topic for articles & when they need to be published along with the due date. Having these visible on this page makes it really easy to organize my writing time through the month.
All my appointments are kept in this part of the planner as well.
My newest tool is an online organizer called Trello!
“Trello is a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. In one glance, Trello tells you what’s being worked on, who’s working on what, and where something is in a process.
Imagine a white board, filled with lists of sticky notes, with each note as a task for you and your team. Now imagine that each of those sticky notes has photos, attachments from other data sources like Jira or Salesforce, documents, and a place to comment and collaborate with your teammates.
I use it both singly & collaboratively! Here is a screenshot of my home page. I will be devoting a blog on this! So keep posted!
More on Day Planners
I purchase a new day planner along with a desk & wall calendar every year. I live by my day planner and calendars because they allow me to visually see what I have going on and aid me in planning ahead through the year.
On the Daily Pages of my planner I keep more detailed information. Here are some examples
*On office/desk day I’ll jot down all my phone calls that need to be made.
*I put down what’s for supper if it requires something needing to come out of the freezer, like meat.
*I’ll add extra chores to be done that may not be on that day’s routine. For example, during the canning season my kitchen gets a bit more messy. The day we do apple sauce I may want the floor washed or the cupboards wiped down when we clean the following day.
*Errands, appointments, birthdays and anniversaries also go here.
This is my favorite spot because I love the feeling of accomplishing my tasks and seeing them be crossed off the list!
The Desk & Wall Calendars!
My desk & wall calendars are basically large visual aids at a glance. It is also where Dave & the kids can leave me notes of anything they have coming up including field trips, teacher notes, vacation dates, etc. I then add those details to my planners.
Well… now you have some great ideas of how to create your own journal and an outline on what to include in your planners and calendars. Go ahead and start working on these until I get back with the next article in the series… How to utilize Trello and an incredible opportunity for a course I’ve taken! After that we will look at how-to do a ‘walk through’ and then the how-to on Zone Cleaning!
If you’d like to see more photo’s of organization, stop by & follow me on my Pinterest page!
If you aren’t following me on Facebook, go on over & give a LIKE & Follow me for daily tips & tricks for your home & garden!
If you enjoyed this blog , please LIKE, Follow, Share & leave me a comment! I love your feedback!’
Happy Day, Jean
Copyright Policy
All text and images on this site are copyright of For Dragonflies And Me. Unless otherwise noted, you may not use this content without written permission.
“For every minute spent organizing, an hour is earned.” – Anonymous
January is a time of reflection and renewal. Much like spring, (but with snow and cold), many of us reflect over the last year with a bit of regret, but also so much happiness with our growth!
Every spring & fall I jump into purge and organize mode. It’s out with the old and in with the new. Through the month of January I will be discussing some basic how-to get organized, but not just get there. I’m going to help guide you how to STAY there in preparation for the upcoming spring.
You can definitely get ahead of the game if you’d like, after all if you deal with the winter blahs like I do, organizing always puts me in a much grander frame of mind!
It’s time to regroup, pitch and toss the junk and tidy up what stays. Organization falls into one of my ‘love’ categories… everything has its place and everything in its place.
Collect moments, not things.
This will be my third go around with this organizational series, but each time I have new ideas and ways to help guide you to an organized and more peaceful life. Yes, organization does bring peace over the chaos of clutter.
Many of the topics I discuss in this series I learned from an incredible lady named Marla Cilley, A.K.A. The Flylady. Her book, “Sink Relections” taught me how to incorporate all this lessons. It was from the inspirations from her book how I developed my P.M.S. concept!
Here’s a breakdown of topics I’ll be discussing through the month of January. Just for fun, I’ll be going back and forth from here to my Podcast to add interest & fun. I may even bring on a guest who is a champion organizer.