WeekDate planner usage photos

As promised, here are photos of how I'm using my WeekDate weekly planner to track my household cleaning routines (based on FlyLady's Zone work), Happiness Project resolutions, recurring weekly and monthly events, to-dos, meal planning and exercise.  Click on the photos for larger views:

Above is my WeekDate planner open. The top section is the Monthly Recurring section, middle is Daily Specifics for the current week, left is lined space for lists and notes, and bottom is the Weekly Recurring section.  Click on any of the photos in this post to enlarge.

I'll take you through each section of the planner to show you how I'm using it. (For those of you who are unfamiliar with the unique "Only Write It Once" WeekDate system see www.weekdate.com and How It Works.)

Below is the top Monthly Recurring section, showing a couple of recurring events I have (which I circle to stand out as events and not tasks), and mostly how I'm using this section to track house cleaning (similar to the FlyLady Zones).

This is a work in progress and I plan to adapt these work tasks as the weeks go on and I figure out what system works best for me.

Below is the weekly section, showing next week. (Click photo for larger view.)  At the top of each day I write important things for that day. I circle scheduled events so they stand out. At the bottom of each day I write the dinner menu.  Any tasks written on the day space that I don't complete that day get arrowed over to the next day, no re-writing! The days are color-coded so I know which week of the month they correspond to: first, second, third, fourth, fifth and last. So each day I look up to the corresponding day in the Monthly section and down the column to see what I need to do each day, without re-writing anything!

At the left side of the weekly section there is a lined space where I write goals and resolutions for the week.  I also write reminders of things to do daily like laundry, sweep floor, and have the kids pick up their stuff (which I'm trying to train them to do!).  At the bottom of this section I write things to check off or write in daily: learning activities, exercise, and dinner. I like to have a designated space for these types of things, to encourage me to do them so I can fill in the space.  I'm trying to establish habits and routines, which I do not normally follow so I like having these daily reminders to guide me into what I'm supposed to be doing.

Another way I've thought of using this lined space is to have a set general daily schedule listed. I might try that on a different week. This might help me establish habits like exercise and house cleaning if I do them at the same time each day.

The bottom section is the Recurring Weekly section where I write all my weekly recurring events, and also keep my weekly housecleaning schedule. I generally have upstairs things scheduled early in the week and downstairs things later in the week, so when we have people over the spaces they will see have been cleaned most recently. I love having the reminders of what to do each day without having to rewrite them each week! 

Even things that happen every day get written only once. See above there's soccer every day Monday-Friday. I wrote it once and arrowed it over across the week. In my weekly section I made a note of when is the last day. On that day I'll erase the scheduled event. After two weeks of soccer my son decided he didn't want to do the remaining 4 weeks. So I wrote it once, and I erased it once, without having to flip through and write and erase on weeks of pages!

At the left of the Recurring Weekly section is a space to record Monthly Set Days. I have the day my visa card payment is due, paydays, and reminders to do my mid-month and monthly reviews.

The back sides of the weekly pages are lined, and I use this space for my weekly lists. The page is in three columns, and some of these I divide further to give space for my categorized lists, space to record financial expenditures and bank totals, and learning activities for the week.

Here is a view of the main sections, with the top and bottom sections pulled out of the plastic cover so you can see them better.  So now you can see how I look at today in the current week, look up to the corresponding color-coded day in the monthly section, and look down the column to the recurring weekly section to see everything I need to do each day. I only write each thing once, ever. And nothing slips through the cracks because there's no re-writing or copying over week to week. I write it once, and it stays in front of me even for future planning. So when I flip weeks ahead to schedule an appointment, my recurring schedule is already there in front of me for reference so there's no chance of double-booking or overlapping schedules.

And here it is in the plastic cover. You can see the clear plastic holds the cover in place without impeding your view of what's written (it's just a little shiny from the light reflection into the camera).

Click here to read my original review of the WeekDate planner to see more of the planner's features like the tear-off weekly tabs, Annual record, Phone list, pre-printed holidays, annual calendars and more.

If you want to try out this system, you're in luck! The 2011 WeekDate planners are still available, click here for the product page.

And, you can pre-order your 2012 WeekDate planner now for August delivery, click here for the 2012 WeekDate planners.

If you have any questions about the WeekDate planners or how I'm using mine, please post a comment!