How To Plan Your Month To Get More Done

Happy July, friends! The year is half over, can you believe it? I have no idea where 2018 is gone. For that matter, I don’t know where the past two years have gone. I look down at our little guy and can’t believe how big he is (and independent, and stubborn, and sweet). It’s hard to imagine that this time two years ago I was a new mom who had no clue what she was doing.

Now fast forward two years and I’m a mom to a toddler who still has no clue what she’s doing! But I think that’s just part of momhood. Fake it until you make it. As long as your kid is happy and healthy, then you’re doing a great job. No time to be picture perfect and sweat all the small stuff. You just have to roll with the punches and pick yourself back up after every mistake.

As we start a new month, it’s fun for me to spend a little bit of time planning out some fun activities to do. Especially now that it’s finally summer around here. We have lots of plans to visit the nearest petting zoo, swim most nights, and just be outside as much as possible. I sat down to plan out our next month and thought, I should show you how I do it.

I’ve gotten a few questions about how to do it all as a mom – work, fun, cleaning, and all the small stuff in between. So I figured now is a great time to show you how everything gets planned way in advance. I’m not a fly-by-the-seat of your pants kind of Mommas. I’m more of a plan it out, stick to a plan but make room for changes and extras.

That’s why we like to plan three months at a time when possible. July is actually a new quarter for us, so we’ll be planning July, August, and September very soon (I might throw in a post on setting new goals, too)! But once a new month starts, it’s time to focus on that specific month. Because let’s face it not every Mom plans their son’s second birthday party almost three months in advance (but thanks to having a son born on April 15th and I work in a tax office, I have to).

Planning for each month at a time is the perfect way to add in all of those school parties, birthday parties, and all the fun that comes up. It all gives you a chance to build in productivity days and times to focus on what needs to get done. For me that’s focusing on my business since I work full-time, but it also means times to deep clean our house, do outside yard work and so much more.

Here’s how to plan your month to get more done:

Pull Out Your Calendar

Whether you use a paper planner or Google calendar, get out and get it open. If you’re like us and add things in as they come up or plan for several months at a time, now is a good time to make sure those events are still happening. A lot of times, I’ll add in trips to visit friends or family, but something will come up and we are no longer going. So spend a few minutes making sure what’s in your calendar is still happening.

Add New Events

Did your kiddos get invited to a birthday party or sleepover? Make sure to add in any new events that you’ve recently been invited to or learned about. Right now school is out for the summer; however, you should be making a note to look through the school calendar for any upcoming events. One of the biggest complaints I hear from friends with school-aged children is they never know when something is coming up. They usually lose the school calendar from the beginning of the year and most of the notes that get sent home with their kiddos never make it to them.

Also, take this time to look through your community’s calendar and add any fun family activities or chamber events that you want to attend. Our public library hosts so many events during the summer, so I always add those in as soon as their monthly calendar gets published.

Mark Any Due Dates

Make sure to write down any due dates that are coming up. Even if a bill is on auto-pay, you should make a note of when it will be coming out of your account. That way you can keep track of everything getting paid.

Write Down Pay Days

Make sure your have made a note on any pay days or checks that you should be receiving. Perhaps you’re paid on the 15th and 30th of each month, well that makes it easy to remember. However, if you get paid every two weeks then those dates shift and it’s important to know when they are coming up.

Schedule Money Dates, Date Nights, and Family Time

Most families’ schedules are crazy hectic. So having time together can be hard to find. Make sure you’re planning family nights, game nights and weekend trips with just the family. They don’t have to be any crazy expensive outings, you can probably find some cheap or even free ones to do.

Also, you should be scheduling time with your spouse. We like to have money dates every few weeks, but date nights are just as important. It’s a time for J and I to just be together – no kid, no worrying about money, no housework that needs to get done. It’s just time for us to be husband and wife. It’s nice and much needed after a few weeks of running around like mad people.

Block Your Time

On days where you don’t have a lot of running around or kid activities, then block your time to get more done. I use time blocking on days off work so I can focus on different projects for my business and for around the house. Right now I work Monday through Thursday in the office. Fridays become my business day. It’s a day that I can work on my shop to add new templates, create new blog posts, batch record videos for the channel, and just spend time growing my business. It’s amazing how productive you can be if you have uninterrupted time to get things done. I block off time to clean the house and do one or two small projects around the house, too.