Q1: A deep dive into Lily’s question!
Her question relates to keeping her “planning mojo” going (and effective) in a hectic work environment as a manager with continuous unpredictable demands on her time. If you are visiting these show notes after listening to the episode, check out the comment section of this post for even more words of wisdom on Lily’s dilemma.
Q2: Pandemic planning and expecting the unexpected
Gillian wrote in with a very COVID-themed question – how to plan when there’s so much uncertainty around things like illness & school?
Q3: Cleaning house — what do you do with all of your old planners?
There’s no “right” answer to this. Personally, I keep some and toss some! I still wish I had my 2001 planner (I remember that I kept one back then, and would be very interesting to see what I was writing during my last college fall and then 9/11).
Life is (sadly) short enough that I could fill an entire Hobonichi each year from here on out and fit them into one large-is box. Sad but kind of important, too.
Q4: Where do you keep your planner?
This listener mentioned both prying eyes and toddler fingers as things she was concerned about! I could care less about the eyes (if anything – I’m thrilled if my bigger kids pick up on how I plan!) but definitely get the toddler finger issue!
I keep mine with me or near me basically at all times. (Is that weird? We do that with our phones, right?). At home, it’s on my desk — either my ‘downstairs mini office’ (next to the kitchen/main playroom) OR upstairs (bedroom mini office) if I’m working from home. At work, it’s on my desk — I just bring it in my work bag.
The only time I don’t have it with me is on an outdoor or kid-centric errand. I’ve never needed it at the playground!
Planner News:
I mentioned Cal Newport’s upcoming planner (releases 11/10; images now on Amazon) as well as Cultivate‘s 2021 line (so pretty).
I also moved into a new planner over the weekend!
Yes — it’s a Wonderland 222 (disclosure: this was very kindly sent to me by the creator after I emailed and expressed interest in her very intriguing product). Full review coming to the pod & blog. Unlike a lot of my past forays in 2020, I may be in this one for the long haul — it’s between this and Hobonichi!
The dated pages start today, so I figured the next 2 months can be a test so that I can decide where to stay.
6 Comments
Thank you for the link! I can’t wait to listen,
Curious to read your review of the Wonderland 222 planner! Are there enough daily pages for the year (like the Hobonichi A5) and what would you do to supplement the planner if there aren’t?
Hey SHU – thanks so much for the shout out on your last episode 🙂
I FINALLY made my decision for my 2021 planner. I had a Hobonichi for the first half of this year, but i found that I needed a more structured planner once the pandemic hit to keep my defining my goals and accountable to them – so I moved to the Panda Planner, which I love. BUT it doesn’t have a weekly calendar, so I have another planner for that.
For 2021, to keep everything together, I decided on a Filofax notebook (basically it’s a like a discbound system but with narrow, wirebound coils.) I loved the flexibility of discbound notebooks but they are just too bulky for me. Hoping this will be the perfect solution.
In it I plan to keep – Calendar pages (yearly, monthly, weekly, daily – as well as a plan-your-week page liek the Panda planner has which i find helpful for zeroing in on my core priorities.) But I will also keep my lists that I would usually keep in an accessory notebook, as well as the journal-like entries and sketches I do occasionally to help remember the year (currently in my Hobonichi.) Hopefully this all in one system will bring me planner peace 🙂
That sounds like a fabulous mix of everything important to you!! Planner peace here you come 🙂
You featured my response to the first question. Woo hoo!
I have started to keeep my planners now that I use the bullet journal because I have notes in there that I like to refer back to – mostly related to pregnancy. I use the leuchturm (misspelled – too lazy to look it up!) so it is quite small and since I don’t do as many daily/weekly spreads as I used to, I can fit about 2.5 years in each planner… So they are easy to hold onto. When I used the Erin Condren planners, I didn’t keep them because they were much bulkier! And before I exclusively WFH, I would always have my planner in my purse – but again since it’s so small, I think A5 size, it’s easy to bring everywhere and that is key for me. That was my biggest complaint w/ the EC planner – it was so heavy/bulky, especially since the ring binding.
I enjoyed this episode! I wanted to add I’m not that neat about my planners, but I actually don’t mind if my kids scribble in them–I usually add an arrow and a note like “kid name, age” and it kind of serves as a memory–since I track my time in my planners they are also memory books.