Back to School: Calendar Keeping

I was up way too late last night.  It was day three of back to school, and I thought I better get a handle on things before they got out of hand.  Things being Calendars. Between the snack calendar, lunch menu, two different soccer schedules, a weekly calendar, the school holiday calendar, Cal’s daily preschool schedule, a special classes schedule, and ongoing, incoming special events, there are suddenly a lot of schedules to keep track of at our house.

I should say, here, that I am a calendar fiend. I love planning ahead, looking back, and feeling like I’ve got it all under control. In high school I had a day runner planner that I used to keep track of all of my various school activities, including what I was going to wear every day. In college, I had one of the first generation PDAs (personal data assistant, not hand holding). I used the lovely pixelated green/grey screen to keep track of classes, work schedules, and the very small amount of money I had for grocery shopping. Now, as a mom, I’ve tried a bit of everything. I’ve used web-based calendars, paper planners, and two years ago, right along with the rest of the world, I got a smart phone.

As a tree hugger, I tried my darnedest to use only digital calendars. We first used Cozi Calendar, and then switched to Google Calendar when I got my Droid phone. The google calendar syncs with my phone and is shared to my husband and mother so that we can all keep track of one another. Great in theory, but the problem is that you have to actually enter events into the calendar, and I, for some reason, have a hard time doing that.

So, at the beginning of 2012, I did something really crazy. I bought a paper planner. For me, as a mom, there is just something about being able to see the week/month laid out in front of me in hard copy. It’s easier to look at on paper, and just like reading a “real” book, it  feels nice to hold our schedules, our lives, in my hand.

Now that you have my type-a calendar back story, here are the scheduling tools we are currently using at our house:

• Weekly Wall Calendar – I recently posted about our new backpack station, which includes easy and incredibly flexible DIY Weekly calendars – one for “This Week” and one for “Next Week”  This serves as an easy at-a-glance way for Craig and I to see what is going on (and for the kids, once they learn how to read).

• Google Calendar – great for sharing digitally with others and quickly adding dates on the go. (Just don’t forget to add the dates!)  I tend to add dates to my paper calendar and then update the google calendar a couple times a month.

• Paper Planner – I love my paper planner. After shopping around A LOT and even considering making my own planner, I found the OrganizHer On-the-Go Family Planner.  This line from Mead is really nicely styled, but more importantly, the weekly layout pages of the planner are perfect. There are separate rows on the weekly spread for each family member’s schedule, plus a space for meal planning. There’s room for up to five family members, so I use the extra row for my blogging-related to-do’s and post schedule. Another plus, Mead has additional pages for their planners and other products that you can download and print from their website, so you really could make your own planner if you wanted.

• Weekly Schedule – Sometimes I need to plan my days down to the hour. I have created a weekly schedule spreadsheet that lets me schedule our days in half hour time blocks. I type in set-schedule things like getting ready for school and soccer practice.  I print a couple of these weekly schedules at a time and then pencil in other tasks and activities in the blank spots through the week.  I’m pretty much the only person that sees these, but it helps me in charting out a particularly busy day or week.

So, this is what is working for me right now, but it still seems like a lot of calendar synchronizing and updating is going on.  How do you keep track of your family’s schedules?  I would love to hear your tips and ideas.

Related posts:

Back to School: Our New Backpack Station Getting Ready for Back to School! School Drop-off Limbo Back to School Closet Organization (on the cheap)