5 tips for maximizing the success of your calendar

You’ve got your family planner, now what? While it may be fun for some, organizing everyone’s lives can be somewhat daunting. Hearth has your back with five tips to help you and your family’s calendar out.

Before we dig into those, we have to ask. Is your schedule online? I know some are addicted to their paper planner, but it is time to ditch it or at least supplement it with a digital calendar. Here’s why. TLDR? Using a calendar app or online calendar makes it accessible to all. The best planner is the one that will actually be used, so go ahead and make the switch. If you like having a “hard copy”, our Hearth Display serves that purpose and goes far beyond your average bulletin or white boards. It syncs with everyone’s phone and ensures that your family has all of its information at their fingertips. 

Now that that is out of the way, let’s get down to the details and help you make the most of your calendar app. Because, yes; there’s an app for Hearth too!

1. Use it. Put EVERYTHING on it. Remember that a family planner only works if you use it. It’s better to put too much information on there and scale back than vice versa.
2. Code it. Better yet, color code it. Hearth actually does this and assigns colors to your family members so that you can glance at your digital calendar with ease.
3. Section it. Organizing by time makes the most sense and Hearth does this for you, but you can also schedule in a way that works best for you. Think school, extracurricular, medical appointments, meal plans, etc.
4. Remind it. No one is above a good old-fashioned alarm. Lean on alerts if you need to. We love the 10 minutes prior alert, but you can make this specific to each calendered item based on when you need to leave. Don’t sleep on verbal reminders either. Whether it is day of or the night prior, prompting your littles will help teach them and begin to instill time management skills.
5. Map it. This isn’t always logistically possible, but try to schedule events in the same area around the same day and time if you can. We are all about working smarter, not harder.