While I was organizing my and Robin’s important personal documentation and health summary sheets, two things occurred to me: having Robin’s health info in a locked box won’t help babysitters and I have gained a lot of weight again and am not healthy. So I am adding two things to my to-do list: 1) create a household notebook and 2) start planning and preparing for a month of healthy meals. There are so many free, attractive, and useful templates for household notebooks out there! I’ve been having fun searching and downloading.
An ugly notebook (and photo)
I either don’t do some of the things many others do (I don’t send cards to people) or I do a lot on my computer (we use mint.com for our finances) so my notebook has:
1) Menu Planning
* In season produce, foraging, and when-to-buy lists
* Recipe list
* Pantry, cupboards, freezer, fridge inventory lists
* calendar and shopping lists
2) Emergency Information
* Medical history and contacts for each family member, including pets
* Emergency kits inventory lists and procedures
3) Chores and Checklists
* Seasonal chores
* Children’s chores (eventually)
* Traveling checklists
4) Restaurants (menus)
5) Manuals
I printed some divider sheets and used clear sheet protectors with stick on labels for my section dividers. I used a free border and text editor to make my dividers at least moderately interesting. They turned out better than I thought they would!!
Here are the sources for the templates I downloaded:
Simple Mom blog
Organized Home
Life as MOM blog
Money Saving Mom
Mom’s Toolbelt
I found some pretty fabric in my stash, so I’m hoping to sew a binder cover sometime this week. Then the whole thing will be functional AND attractive!
