WeekDate Planners

WeekDate planners look so unique and interesting, I just have to talk about them!

To clarify: I don't have one of these in my possession, so I can only show you images and links from their website.  But I can't resist discussing all the possibilities for a planner like this.

WeekDate's layout is one I've never seen before.  Their concept is, "Only Write It Once."  Click here to see the details of How it Works, but here is the basic concept:  you only write your recurring events ONCE, instead of re-writing them every week.

The top portion of the planner has space to write your monthly recurring events.  It's color coded to the weeks (more on that in a mo) so that you can see at a glance if today is your management meeting that happens the last Thursday of each month, your book club that meets the second Wednesday of each month, or your rent that's due the first of each month.  You can even use this section to track your FlyLady Zone Work.

The middle section has your daily details for the current week.  Along the top of the weekly page is a color code that matches where you are in the monthly calendar in the top section, to help you keep track of where you are in the month.

As if that all weren't exciting enough (which it is), here is the part I'm especially excited about: the bottom section has space to write your weekly recurring events:

This is where you write those events that happen every week: your Monday morning staff meeting.  Your children's sports and dance practices.  Your carpool schedule.  Your Saturday morning pottery class. You can even remind yourself every week to put out the trash the night before trash pickup day.

You write in all of those appointments and events that happen at a specific time every week. Then if the time or date changes, you erase it and change it to the new day or time, ONCE.  No more flipping through your planner changing dates and times every week!  And, let's face it: every time that you have to re-write something is an opportunity for it to slip through the cracks.  This eliminates that.

But you can even go beyond your weekly scheduled events and use this section for goals and reminders of what you WANT to accomplish.  If you are working on an exercise program or are training for a race, you can write your weekly training schedule (once!).  You can write two dinner menus at the bottom of each day and viola, there is a two-week rotating meal plan!  No more wondering what to make for dinner.  You can even remind yourself to call your Mom every Sunday.

Once you have your monthly, weekly and daily specifics written in, you look all the way up and down each daily column to see what you have to do that day.

I can see how this would be extremely helpful for people who have a lot of recurring events and appointments.  I know a huge benefit of electronic organizers is you don't have to re-write recurring events all the time.  For those of us who love pencil and paper, this is a wonderful paper alternative to an electronic organizer.

This organizer that I've featured is their weekly planner, which is now available for pre-sale for the 2011 version.  If you are interested, I suggest you order yours soon because last year they sold out very quickly!

Other WeekDate products that look really cool:

The monthly wall calendar with the same "Write It Once" plan.

A dry-erase whiteboard version of the weekly planner, and the WeekDate Whenever undated version of the weekly planner.  You can also download a July 2010-July 2011 dated WeekDate planner to print, cut and bind yourself.

You can find WeekDate on Twitter (where you've probably seen me re-tweet their useful calendar reminders for each day of the week) and also on Facebook.

Click here to see suggestions of how to use your WeekDate planner, and click here to learn more about WeekDate.