5 Helpful tips on how to stay organized during the holidays
Write everything down. Make shopping list, to do list, mailing list, decorations list, meal list. Getting it out of your head really does help.
Delegate tasks to others and allow them to do it their way. Examples are household chores, grocery shopping, trips to the post office.
Simplify and reduce to save time. Bag gifts instead of wrapping them. Put up minimal decorations. Reduce your gift exchange list and your charitable donation list.
What’s new in 2022? I hope this year is off to a great start for you! Are you making plans and initiating changes?
Planning and prioritizing is a great way to organize yourself. A bit of planning goes a long way to improve your workday and time at home.
Lists help me remember things. We all need a memory jogger now and then, and the older I get the more helpful lists are to me. It’s much easier to refer to a list than it is to stress about remembering all the things that need to be addressed. I create shopping lists for the super market, checklists for household chores, and honey do lists for home improvement projects. Creating a list helps me recall the information exactly when I need it.
Lists help me de-stress and clear my mind. I write things down in a list format to get the information out of my head and onto paper so I spend less time churning those thoughts and ideas around in my mind. Some people call this a mind dump. I create lists of books to read, websites to check out, future projects to accomplish, and goals to pursue. My stress reduces when I write my thoughts down and have something concrete to refer back to when I want it.
Lists help me organize, prioritize, and plan action steps. After all, a list is just words on paper, or a device, unless we use them to prompt us to take action. What really helps me take action is attaching the item on the list to a specific date and time on my calendar. I’m a bit old school and like a paper planner. The one I use has a space to document daily to-be-done items. The system I’ve created for myself looks like this. At the end of each week I organize the action steps to take place during the following week. I assign a day for each action, and then prioritize every action at the beginning of each day. It’s important to be realistic and limit myself to 1-3 top priority items per day. I admit it took me a few months to perfect my system. Now it’s habitual.
There are a wide array of lists, from grocery store lists, to vacation wish lists, to lists of business goals. I encourage you to make lists and use them to help you remember, de-stress, organize, prioritize, and plan action steps.
https://helpfulorganizer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/To-do-list.jpg8001200Janine Cavanaugh, CPO®https://helpfulorganizer.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/15-Years-LOGO.jpgJanine Cavanaugh, CPO®2021-01-15 16:14:022021-01-24 16:30:31What lists can do for you
Are you a list maker? I am. I make lists for a large variety of things, because they help me stay organized. Besides being a great way to document the information that collects in my head, lists are helpful in prioritizing information and providing visual queues for what needs to be done. Below are 6 of my most used lists.
1. To Do List
Creating a master To Do List that contains all the things I want to get done, need to accomplish, and have to address, provides me with peace of mind. By writing all these things down, I release myself from worrying that I will forget something. By having the list to check and work from, it’s easier to organize and prioritize what I do, and when I do it.
2. Daily Tasks List
Working from my master To Do List, I write 3-5 Daily Task items on each day of my calendar. It’s important to prioritize my Daily Tasks and to make sure I have enough time during that particular day to get the item done. If I don’t complete a Daily Task item, I indicate it with a colored tab, but only if I think I can get to it within the week. If not, I cross it out and write it on another day in the future. It’s very rewarding to check off the items, and see what was accomplished in the day and the week.
3. Shopping List
A magnetic note pad and pencil on my fridge are what I use to create my shopping list. My husband and I write down what we need to pick up at the grocery store whenever we think of an item, or whenever we run out of something while preparing meals. The placement of this list needs to be easy and convenient in order to encourage everyone in the household to write items on the list. A basket on top the fridge holds all of our coupons, discount cards, and any gift cards marking the fridge as our shopping ‘center’.
4. To Bring on Vacation List
Creating a list of what I want and need to bring on vacation provides me with time to organize my thoughts an plan ahead. This prevents me from forgetting important and necessary items. Creating one location where I can collect the items on my list, until it’s time to pack them in suitcases, is also a helpful component to this vacation list. I use my dinning room table as my collect location.
5. List of Important Dates
Having a master list of important dates, that I transfer into a new calendar at the beginning of each year helps me stay on top of important dates and time lines. I keep a birthday and anniversary list by month, a taxes and bill payment schedule by month, and a membership and license renewal list by month. For large bills and membership renewals, I note on my calendar two weeks in advance to payment and one week in advance to payment. Referencing these lists when setting up my yearly calendar is very helpful.
6. Honey Do List
My Honey Do List is a list of items that my husband needs to address or that we need to discuss. This list is kept by the kitchen phone (or is waved in front of his face while he’s watching TV). Any action items that need to be planned for a specific date are put on the calendar.
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