Digital Planning

Hello, Butterflies

Today I want to talk about Digital Planning. I feel that DP has come as popular or becoming as Bullet Journaling. 

I want to give you a little background on how I started looking into Digital Planning. My children had both complained how they did not have much time to write in their planners at the end of class. So they were forgetting about homework or test coming up. 

So I started looking around for a solution for their problem. I ran across a youtube video on DP. but it was showing on a tablet. So I thought to myself this could work on their phones. Again it was shown in an app for an Apple product and the kids had Android phones. 

A couple weeks later I found an app that could be used close to the one I had seen in the video, MetaMoJi Note. I had also learned how to create a Digital Planner with the programs I had on my computer. So now my children use their phones to write in their planners will walking to the next class. 

I have watched them at home planning with the planner I had made for them, but they were adding stickers, color coding, and many other things. So I decided that it looked fun, why not make one for me. 

So I did but I made it for my Ipad mini and used the app that I had seen in the YouTube video, GoodNotes.

So I would like to share with you some pictures of my DP and how I use it.

This is the Goodnotes app open with my sticker book and 2018 Digital Planner.

This is what the first page in the planner.

This is my future log, in the photo you see Jan- Apr. I swipe the page to the left to see May- Aug. and swipe the page to the left to see Sep-Dec. I can click the month name and it will open up that month.

This is my monthly view, I have self-tracker, goals and task list on the right page. On the left, I have the calendar with important date list. Also, I can click the number of a  Monday and it will take me to the week.

This is what a blank monthly page looks like.

This is my current week, I set it up daily. I set down the night before and fill it out and add stickers.

Here is a blank weekly page.

I have also added in my kid's tracker to the DP.

I have also added in my a blog tracker to the DP.

There is a button you can use to get close or you can zoom in with your fingers. I use both when adding or marking off tasks.

As you can see I do not have the apple pencil, I have an older Ipad that does not support it. I have an Ipad mini 1. So they have built into the app a palm rejection tab that I can pull up when I am writing. 


Thank you for joining me as I flip through my Digital Planner.

If you have any questions please free to leave them in the commit and I will be happy to answer them.


Please Join us in the Facebook Group PlanneryButterfly We would love to hear from you there as well.

As always Have a Good Day Butterflies

Monthly Challenges Help with a Daily Routine

Hello, Butterflies

Have you ever struggled with wanting to have a daily routine? or Having a daily routine and just could not stick to it?

Just to let you in on a secret, your not the only one with this problem. There are many people that have this problem. I am one of them, but no longer.

I would set down and write a list of how I want my morning routine, I know this would not happen every day the same way, but most of my days would go this way.

I was so wrong! I would not fallow the list. Until I started doing monthly planner challenges!

Yes, that is what did it for me. 

Each morning I would get up and jump into my planner to my Monthly Challenge, just to see what the day's doodle was. Will I was waking up I would think of how I want to draw the daily doodle. Get dress and then set back at my desk to draw the doodle, then go through my planner to see what I need to do for that day.

After doing this for a month I started getting up at the same time each day, Was ready for work early so that I could set down and draw. I found that I had started a routine of this each day. I was also finding I was having more time in the morning then I had before. 

I had added to my goals that I want to get better at hand lettering but was having trouble fitting in time to practices.

So the next month was coming and I need to set up my Travelers Notebook for the new month. So I added in my normal Monthly, Weekly, Daily and now my Monthly Challenge for doodling. Then it hit me there is hand lettering Challenge too. So I added a lettering Challenge to my morning routine, in the first couple of weeks I felt like I was in a rush to get my doodle and lettering Challenge done before work. 

I just need to realize that I had the time, I had rushed around for so many years before because I was always late getting up. With getting up a little earlier to do the daily doodle I had extra time to do the lettering challenge too. 

I found that I was able to add other small things in that I could to do also in the morning. Until I had that Morning Routine that I had wrote down months ago.

So, just add little things to your routine that make you happy or feel good. You will find that it's much easier to get a hold on that routine list and check it off like it was nothing.

I hope my routine story help you get a hold of your list and squash it with no problems

If you have any questions please leave them down in the commits.  

Please Join us in the Facebook Group PlanneryButterfly We would love to hear from you.

As always Have a Good Day Butterflies

Looking For Planner Inspiration?

Hello, Butterflies

Have you had them days when you need some planner inspiration?  

How do I want the spreads to look like, How do I want to use this planner?  

I am not just talking about Bullet Journaling, I am also talking about Traveler's Notebook and Binder planners.

I also have them days and I find myself turning to YouTube. I have found many videos on planning, but you have YouTubers that just inspire you, to make a spread that your not sure will work, or that its ok to make mistakes because it happens. To add color, washi tape or just use color pens to your planner. 

Will I have a list of YouTubers that I look to when I find myself needing Inspiration! I want to share with you today 5 of my YouTubers that I look too. 

Each of these YouTubers has they own styles of planning. I am not looking at their systems of planning but how they do things to make them want to open up their planners to keep them going through the day and get things done. 

So Here Is A List of My Top 5 :

Each of the names listed below will have they Youtube channel links next to them, so please stop by and check them out. 

Boho Berry YouTube Channel

Cindy Guentert-Baldo YouTube Channel

Bullet Journal Junkie YouTube Channel

Sunshine & Stationery YouTube Channel

Plan With ShanYouTube Channel

So if your needing Inspiration, check out these YouTubers. 
Each of them has great content about planning and how they use it in their life. 

I would also like to mention there are a lot of smaller content creators on planners that also need the help of subscribers and video watch time, so please don't forget to like and subscribe and share their channels. 

If you have any Content Creator that talks about planning Please leave the name or link in the comments below, as I would love to see who inspirational to you.

If you have any questions leave them below in the commits. 

I would love to hear from you!

Thank you for stopping by

As Always Have A Good Day Butterflies, See You Soon.

My Planner Routines

Hello, Butterflies

Today I want to share with you my planning routine. I find having a routine helps me be more productive with each day. 

In the beginning of me using a planner, I didn't have a routine and found that I was not keeping up with my planner. Things were slipping by because of lack of a routine to check my planner. 

So let me share my planning routine and then I will share some tips on how to start a planning routine.


Mornings:

• I update trackers
• Look at my monthly calendar (to check for Events)
• Look at my weekly spread ( to see projects or to do's for the day and week)
• Then I will set up a Daily ( I will break down to do's or project into smaller task)

Middays:

• I will update any project or task that I have completed on my weekly spread.
• I will update my day of the completed task and look over task I am moving on to next.
• I add any notes or thoughts on task or projects.

Evenings:

• I will mark off completed task and move any task to another day that I did not finish. 
• I will add any project or to do's that have popped up and need to be completed that week.
• I will again look at the task or project I have planned for the next day. 

One of the tips I have for you when your setting up a routine for your self is to make a list and stick it to the front page of your planner. This list could be just your morning routine you want to have. Then when you feel like you have that down and no longer have to look at the lists add your midday routine to the same list. This way you are now training your self to look what you want in the midday and still seeing your morning routine so you are not forgetting what is on that list. You will do the same when you have your midday routine down you will then add your evening routine down to the same list. 

You will be looking over the list each time you are adding a new section so your keeping in mind of the other routines you have in place.

I have also done this and add a checklist to check off when each item is done, this way when I see that the list is full of check marks each day for a month I know I can remove the list from my planner.

I hope this helps you be able to setup your own planning routines. 

If you have any questions or suggestions please feel free to leave them below in the commits. 

I would love to hear from you!

Thank you for stopping by

As Always Have A Good Day Butterflies, See You Soon.

Pretty or Productive Planning

Hello, Butterflies

When you plan do you Pretty Plan or do you Productive plan?

I have planned both ways and find they both work for me to get things done. 

When I pretty plan I find adding stickers or doodling on a page to make the spread eye pleasing. I find that sitting down and planning out the layout of my stickers or doodles help me relax. Also during me playing with my stickers or doodling in my house I find that we have a more relaxed conversation with each other. I plan out my spreads each Saturday morning well everyone is eating breakfast and we don't have any electronics on during this time. In a way it makes me feel like its a holiday each Saturday morning, having nothing rushing us and having that time to talk and joke around with each other.

Most of my productive planning is done in the same way as my pretty planning on Saturday mornings with the family. The reason I use the productive planning is as we are going to be busy later that day, or it's going to be a busy week. I find when I have a busy week ahead it easier for me to just write the tasks, appointments, and projects then placing them on a sticker. I also find with just writing them out I have more room in the daily sections. 

I have found that I want the Pretty and Productive planning. So for me, I have just gone to using color pens when writing out my plans for the week. This way I have the space to write in and I can have a color code for the different events and task of each person in my house.  This way I can still have the pretty colors that I am looking for and the space to fill in everything I need to do each day.

I still have them weeks that I will get out the stickers and use them on a spread. I have those weeks I just want all the writing in one color. I also have those weeks of doing both with stickers and writing in different color pens. 

The point I am trying to make is if your Pretty planning and find that you're getting everything done that you planned Stick to it! If your Pretty planning and not getting much done then change it up, go back to the basic with paper and one pen. 

If your Productive planning and find that your getting things done and like the look of the spread Stick to it! If your Productive planning getting things done but tired of looking at the same thing change it up add color pens to your spread. 

Your spreads are there to keep you on track! So do what you find helps at that time. 

Tips How to Reach Your Goals

Hello, Butterflies

Today I want to share with you some tips that I use to help me reach my goals for the day, week and month. 

Let me be honest I was not that person that set goals for myself, I did not see the point in doing it I was not going to reach them.  When I did set them I just picked something that was important for my mom and not me. With doing that I just did not put in any work into reaching it. 

Now that I am older I look back and think why did I not set goals? Goals are there to help me make changes I want and not someone else. So then I starting goals and still finding at the end of the year not reaching them.  I knew I was doing something wrong! When I was younger I was shown here is your goal now get it done. I did not know that there were steps to get to them. 

So over the years I have read, watched Youtube videos and sat in on speakers talking about goal setting.

So now I had the basic way to set goals and to break it into small steps, but still was not reaching them. So I decided that it was time to set down and work on my goals! In the meanwhile, I found that I was also needing a list of things to do so that I could work on the goal each day.

Planning Routine

I sat down at night planned out the next day, and add one of the small steps in for my goal. I would get up the next morning and look over the plans I had set the night before and put them order on how I want to get them down.

That was good and all but found that I was not focusing on getting the task wrote down done. I found myself cleaning the kitchen and putting away clean clothes instead of working my tasks list. 

Preparing

So each night I would clean the kitchen and any other small task before bed so that I knew I would be working on my plans for the next day. I would also lay out my kid's clothes and my the night before. After a couple of weeks, I then started to get out bowls or plates for breakfast instead of rushing in the morning.

 When I did all these things the family had more time to talk about things they had to do for the day which would set the day to be a good one for all of us.  The days I would oversleep and be rushed to make breakfast the day was off for the whole family.


Weekly Planning 

I was not there yet of making the goals I had set in my daily plans.  So I would then set down and plan my week out with just my goal plans so that I knew ahead of time what I need to do get done each day. This worked out great, but then I would hit bumps in the road. In the middle of the week, I would have to add a task that needed to get done right away and would take most of the day. This where I learn to double up to small goal task or just move everything a day head. 


Talking about Goals

I would get stressed out over having to move my goals to another day. So it was time to talk to my husband about the problems I was having with my goals. Telling him what my goals I had set for myself help me as he could give advice and reassure me that I could meet my goals. He would ask me before we went to bed about the day's goals if I got them done. 

If there was any way he could help me get them done if I did finish them that day. Like he would take the kid's to the park to play for an hour so that I could catch up and not feel like stressed about not finishing the goal.


Project Planning

I need a way to split my task and my goals, so why not turn them into a project and set a deadline to get each project to get done. This way I could take the small goals and turn them in to project for the week and I would not stress about moving them around each day if something else came up. 


Tracking Goal Progress

Now I need a way to track my goals. So being a woman that like to make lists that what I did and each time the project was started I would put one line thought the bullet for the project. When the project was done I would put the second line across the bullet to show that I had completed it. By the end of the year, I was reaching some goals and others very close to finishing them. 


Don't Be Hard on Yourself

My husband reminded me that I should not be hard on myself for not finishing some goals as there is next year and I would figure out a better way to get it done.


Reward 

The year after when I set up my goals and broke them into a small project I also put a reward that I would give my self for reaching my goal. My loving husband would also help with the rewards for some of my goals which help me reach the goals I had that year. 

So If you are having problems reaching your goals to give these tips a try.

• Planning Routine
• Preparing
• Weekly Planning
• Talking about Goals
• Project Planning
• Tracking Goal Progress
• Don't Be Hard on Yourself
• Reward 

If you have any questions or suggestions please free to leave them below in the commits. 

Thank You for stopping by!

As Always Have A Good Day Butterflies, See You Soon.