Well Planned Life

Like most people and most blogs, it’s time to talk about New Year’s Resolutions. I usually make them, but also like many people, I quickly forget about them, or at the very least, ignore them. I start off with the very best of intentions. They quickly fall flat. Some people are very good at keeping track of their goals and resolutions for the year. They make actual lists and keep them in their planner and as the year progresses, look back on them to see where they are in the process of completing them. I have never done that. Sure, I come up with a few things I’d like to do or change for myself, but I don’t keep an actual list, and I certainly don’t check back on it as the year progresses. This year, taking my cues from my Philofaxy friends , I think I will try to keep a list, look back on it throughout the year, and update the list as much as possible to make sure my main goals are sought after. I’m not going to beat myself up if something doesn’t get done, or if it isn’t done perfect...

All Christmas activities have come to an end for me and my family. The past month has been a whirlwind. Actually, everything since the summer has gone by way too fast. The fall is my favorite time of year and it’s at that point that everything just flies by. One reason is because of all the fun fall activities we engage in, and then come the holidays, which is always a busy time of the year. It seems as if almost every weekend from Labor Day to New Year’s Day is filled with one or more activities. My Filo is very busy and very colorful with all those plans (I use different colored pens for different activities – more on that in another post). And after all of the running around, the staying up late to get everything done, and the last minute details of all things Christmas, I am more than happy to have some time to myself. I look forward to the quiet and the mundane that the first weekend in the New Year brings. But with this, comes the dismantling of the Christmas tree, the putting aw...

There’s been a lot of talk over at the Philofaxy blog regarding planners used specifically for work. Many planner users have an A5 for work, while using a Personal or Pocket sized planner for their personal lives (or comparable sizes if they're using something other than Filofax planners). I am one of those people who use the personal size for my personal life, which, let’s face it, is more active than my work life as far as planning events in my Filo goes. My work life doesn’t require a Filofax. While I’m sure I could find many uses for one at work, I keep to a general monthly calendar – At-a-Glance’s Monthly Planner . There are a few reasons for this: 1. I work at a non-profit and while they do buy everyone a calendar every year, the cost must be kept to a minimum. 2. At work, I spend approximately 90% of my time in front of a computer. So I’ve been using my Google calendar to keep track of the few meetings and the many tasks and deadlines I have. It’s easy to just open my calen...

Welcome, welcome, welcome. How did my obsession begin? Growing up my father was rather unorganized. He would put random items in random places, and then yell when he couldn’t find these items. The rest of the family had to help him retrace his steps and most times one of us could always find the missing object. After one too many times of this scenario, I vowed to always know where everything is – I would put things away in their proper place right away so as to never go on a wild goose chase to find something. This has served me well. However, this did morph into an obsession at the opposite end of the spectrum. I can tell when someone has been through my things – when I was younger I could tell when my sister had been in my room or had taken something from my closet – I could see footprints in the carpet, the hanger was backwards in my closet, something was out of place, etc. Now that I’m married, I’ve had to give up on all of that a little, or at least let most of that go – my husba...