The Household Calendar

Page Updated on April 09, 2007

Try to get a program that will let you print out calendars in various formats from your computer, such as Microsoft Outlook 2002 or Microsoft Office XP Standard. Not only can you print out calendars with such programs, you can also enter appointments, to do lists, and reminders directly into the program. (This comes in handy if you have certain events or tasks that you do repeatedly, so you don't have to write them down on your calendar a hundred times. They will automatically print out on the calendar for you.) Many of these programs also allow you to share data with your Personal Digital Assistant (PDA).

Free Calendars and Schedules Print them out and start planning your life.

How to Set Up Your Calendar

1. Print Monthly Calendars: Print out your monthly calendars for the entire year, one month per page.

   Punch holes in the right hand side of your monthly calendar pages, so they will fit in your household organizer. (To save time, print your calendars on pre-drilled paper.)

2. Print Your Schedules: Decide if you will use a daily format or weekly format. Choose a daily format if you wish to schedule the exact times that you will be performing tasks or if you have an incredibly busy family and need to keep track of every family member's daily schedule. (e.g. wake up at 6:00 am, Kids: go to school at 8:00 am, Mom: go to work at 8:30 am, Dad: go to work at 9:00 am, grocery shopping at 7:00 pm, etc.) Choose a weekly format if you prefer to have a very flexible day and only wish to keep track of more general things, such as menus, chore days, appointments, and so forth.

   Punch holes in the left hand side of your daily/weekly calendar pages, so they will fit in your household organizer. (To save time, print your calendars on pre-drilled paper.)

3. Bind It: Place your calendar pages in your organizer so that when it is opened up, your monthly calendar will be on your left side and your daily/weekly calendar will be on your right side.
4. Divide It: Separate your months with dividers. You can make your own or buy some preprinted.
5. Clip It: Attach small paperclips to the top of each monthly calendar page. You can attach things (like business cards and such) that pertain to a specific month directly to the back of the page for that month. When that month comes up, you'll already have everything you need for events that month.
6. Make a Quick Flip Marker (Optional): This is just a time saver. Get a large clip or a bookmark that you can punch holes in and insert into your binder. Clip a large clip to the page for the current month, or punch holes in a large bookmark and insert it in your binder next to the current month. When you flip through your binder, you can quickly flip back to the current month.

Calendar Tips

• LOOK AT IT!: There's no point in doing all of this if you don't bother to look at your schedule daily. If you don't have a habit of looking in your binder every day, post your schedule in a place where you will see it every day, like on your refrigerator.
• Monthly Reminders: Use your monthly calendar to remind you of important events that you need to know about well beforehand. (e.g. birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, social events, major deadlines for projects, important appointments, ...) Fill these items in for the entire year or as soon as you learn about them.
• Daily Reminders: Use your daily/weekly calendar to remind you of day to day chores, routine schedules, menus, appointments, .... Make sure your daily/weekly calendar pages have space for a "notes" or "to do" section for items that need attention but do not necessarily need to be scheduled. Also, don't forget to fill in those monthly reminders on your daily / weekly schedule. Otherwise, you'll remember to get the laundry done, but you might forget that it's your sister's birthday.
• Reuse / Recycle: At the end of the day/week, remove the day/week calendar page, and flip it over so that the blank backside can be used as scratch paper (such as for shopping list and taking messages). Put it in the scratch paper section of your household organizer. Now you can reuse the paper one more time before you recycle it. (Save money and trees!) Do the same with the monthly calendar pages at the end of each month.
• Be Flexible: Write in pencil! If you write in pen (even erasable pen which never completely erases), and you need to change your schedule, you'll have to resort to crossing out the old appointments or messing around with correction fluid. It doesn't seem like a big deal until you need to write another item in it's place. Eventually you just end up without any room to write among the scratched out markings, and writing over correction fluid can get difficult to read.