Tag: organization

The Live Rich Planner

Published on by Kim

Are you looking for a full-fledged planner? Do you like decorations in everything you do? Well, the Live Rich planner may be for you. A friend shared with me how it has been working for her, so I thought I would pass along the possibility for all of you.

The Budget Mom designed this planner “to encourage you to plan, attack your goals, dream big, and be creative. Most importantly, this planner was created to make your life easier.” Each planner comes with two sheets of stickers for you to customize your pages with a little fun. Erasable colored pens would round out the visual interest nicely.

The planner comes unlabelled, so you can start whichever month you would like, as well as label your weeks to start on whichever day works best for your routine. You have a page with the month spread, for big picture planning. Then you have a set of spreads for each week: one for a daily personal plan, one for meal planning and tasks, and one for finances. You can keep track of your time and tasks and projects and spending and goals all in one book.

Both the task and finance spreads are pretty in-depth, with plenty of flexibility for how you use them. You can have your meals laid out on the same page as your shopping list. You can record your grocery store spending in the same book as your meal plans and task list. You can sort your housework into a task list by day.

Different sections encourage you to write down your goals. There is also a small section encouraging you to make a stretch goal, and there is space each week to write down your wins for motivation.

Because the planner includes so much, it is pretty big. One option would be to keep it on a book stand on your desk or kitchen counter. This would keep it handy and visible, and you could set reminders for yourself to add items that may come up when you are away from home.

Pros:

  • Two sizes available
  • Super flexible — start whenever, label weekdays however
  • Covers so many bases of life
  • Big, plenty of space to write and decorate
  • Focus on goals and habits — encourages getting creative with goals
  • Entire year stays together, if you like to have a year to review
  • Durable construction — heavy duty paper and strong plastic binding
  • One pocket folder in back of book for loose papers

Cons:

  • If you don’t intend to use most of the pages, this would not be a good choice for you
  • Large size is pretty big, so hard to carry with you
  • Price: $48 + shipping

The 3 Step Planner

Published on by Kim

This is not a paid endorsement. After recommendation from a friend, I simply wanted to check out this planner and share thoughts with you.

The planner is full page sized. You order a new one ($29) for every six months (available here), and the design is sleek and simple. If you like florals and embellishments, this will not fit the bill, but I enjoyed the purposeful absence of visual clutter.

There is plenty of room to write, and the system is week by week — which is my preferred way of dealing with my schedule. Big win on the first page (instructions) where the user is encouraged to put future tasks out on future weeks as soon as they come up, instead of trying to remember them until then.

Before each month you have the opportunity to list your 5 “non-negotiables” or priorities. That is a good opportunity to pause and think for a minute before diving into the details.

There is a full month spread, so you are able to keep track of big schedule stuff at a glance, but then the pages turn to the 3-step process for each week. First, write out everything you need to do for the week. Then categorize it on the next page.

Finally, you turn to the week spread and schedule your tasks and time commitments. I found that two different colors works best for me in this format, to keep appointments with others (a little more inflexible) and my own time allocation (much more flexible) separate. Erasable pens are my choice here also. Things change!

These three steps do require you to write the same things 3 times each week. If that inefficiency is not helpful, you could easily skip the dump page and put everything directly in the categories. Since there are only 3, the sorting will not be overwhelming as you go.

If you need to push anything to the next week, that is easily done. Otherwise, you will complete your planning at the end of each week for the next week. Step-by-step, you march through the year.

Pros:

  • Simple, simple, simple
  • Plenty of space to write
  • Focus on priorities
  • Weekly reset built in
  • Super flexible
  • Did I say beautifully simple?

Cons:

  • $60+/year (although that is a completely reasonable price for a good planner)
  • No clear contrast between time blocks and to-dos (i.e., I don’t need to set aside two solid hours for laundry, but I do need to remember to fit it in during the day)
  • No pockets or folders to collect odd pieces of paper/receipts/invites/etc.
  • Large size
  • Writing the same thing multiple times each week