Plan With Me : April

I’ve always said that I am a paper and pen person. I may overcomplicate the process, but to be honest, my brain works better when I am able to look at things on paper. To be able to not only look at an overview of what the next bit of time looks like for me, but then to break it down into manageable actions really helps me to not feel overwhelmed when I am trying to juggle everything.

Since we are starting “fresh” with a new quarter, a new season and a new month, I figured I would break it down and share I organize my brain with you! If that interests you, continue on!

So, for my blog and business, I like to look at things on a quarterly basis. I like to list out my goals and priorities, as well as the action steps to complete those. I do this in Moleskine Notebooks (one for business, one for blog) and have a separate sheet of paper that lives in my planner with an overall look at the four quarters in the year. I have one page dedicated to each quarter and I’ll write out (typically in pencil until about a week before the month starts) what blog posts I am thinking of for the month and where they should fall. This helps give me an overview of the entire quarter and if I have an idea of a tips blog post or have found another topic I want to touch on, I can quickly look and see where it will fall into place. I typically have 4 scheduled blog posts a month and the rest are just as they happen.

Once I have my overview handled, I look at the first month of the quarter. I have switched planners, sort of. I am still in a Day Designer, but I am using their full on planner, rather than the weekly only. As things started to get busier, I found that I needed a little bit more space in my day to day to keep track of everything.

In the month view, I will write out everything that is planned for that month, whether it is blog posts, videos, appointments, birthdays, days off, whatever it is. This gives me a little bit more of an in depth look at what that specific month holds in our schedules. A lot of times this will change as we go through the month, but it’s good at least have a good starting point.

The final thing I do is plan out the first week of the month. I will mark down the times that I am working as time blocks and then mark in the times that blog posts or videos are going live. I also mark down any appointments that I may have. Once the time is blocked out, I will fill in a couple of the to-do boxes. I have a couple of days that are set aside for specific things for my job, or for cleaning purposes, so I will “auto-fill” those tasks in on the relevant days. The final thing I’ll do is look at my previous week, the new month, and the upcoming week to see if there are any tasks that I have not done, or things that I need to get done. This could be anything from making sure the scheduled blog posts are all uploaded and scheduled, to checking on different supplies in our home.

So, that is my April Plan With Me! I hope that you enjoyed getting a little insight into how I organize my brain to start a new month off. Let me know what you do! Are you an electronic planner type of person? A paper and pen person? Or maybe just a fly by the seat of your pants? Let me know!