Keeping Important Information Together

Today I discovered another great reason to have a Home Management Binder. But first let me share with you some of the information that I keep in this binder.

#1~ I like to keep copies of things that I have come across that have been encouraging to me in my role as a wife and a mother.
#2~ This section is on cleaning my home. This is also where I keep my home made laundry powder and dish washing powder.  There have been several great resources where I have printed off great sheets in helping me in this area. (I will make sure these sites are still available and I will do another post sharing where I got some of this awesome stuff)
#3~ This section is about menu planning - I also keep a printed off calendar - and when I am really doing a good job at keeping up with things around here - I like to write what we are eating - so that we don't get in a rut of eating just the same exact things over and over.
#4~Computer - in this section I keep a copy of my address book for my e-mail account, Favorite blogs ( need to update this section soon)
#5~ Vehicle Maintenance - sell explanatory
#6~ Contact Information - I like to keep a listing of our bills and such - the company names - account number and phone numbers.

That is the basic things I keep in this binder. Anyway let's get back to why I am so glad that I keep this information in one spot.

Next week end - Steve Arrington, ex-chief diver and expedition leader for Captain Jacques Cousteau will be sharing his most exciting and life changing experiences for Sabbath School, Church service and vespers. Well I have a good friend who I know would be very interested in coming to this but she does not come to my church. So I was writing up an e-mail to tell her about it. Well when I went to the e-mail address book - I remembered that when I got a new computer a couple of months ago that we were not able to get the addresses transferred over. So what I have in my address book are only those that the people have written to me in the last couple of months.

A little later - I remembered that I had this list of e-mail addresses and sure enough there it was. So I was able to let her know about this exciting opportunity for her and her family.

It is just a good idea to have all your important information in a localized spot so that you can reference it when needed.

(By the way, those of you who might be in the DFW area and would be interested in this program by Steve Arrington please leave me a comment or send me a private message and I can give you more details)

Home Management Binder

Now that I have found that I have a lot more free time, I have been trying to get myself more organized. One way I am doing that is setting up a notebook - with helpful information in it. In my menu planning section I have printed out a monthly calender so that I can keep track of what I am making and then I can refer back to it for help. You can find an awesome monthly calender for 2011 here. One thing that love about this calender is it has the holidays, day light savings time, and extra stuff like that already printed on the calender.

I do not plan specific foods for specific days usually. Normally I just plan out about 8 meals that sound good and then I make sure that I have the ingredients to make up said meals. Sometimes I do have a specific day that I want to make certain meals - especially those things like a roast that I need to defrost the meat ahead of time. Anyway it sure makes things easier to have the food on hand for meals and so when meal time rolls around - you just look at the list and decide what to fix.

So on the calender - I write what we actually ate. That way I can keep from over doing certain meals. Sometimes if I make the same thing over and over my family gets tired meal. My Onion Pie recipe is one that they got tired of because I liked it so much that I kept making it. It has been a while since I have made it so I might try it sometime in the next week or so.

There are a lot of ladies out there that have set up a Home Management Binder and I am so glad that they shared some of the information with me because it inspired me to work towards getting one together for myself. I have not decided what all information that I want in mine yet - it is a work in process. I know that I am working on a master list of things from the grocery store - I think it would make it easier make out a grocery list if I had a master list to make sure I had everything that I need. I am also working on a schedule of keeping my home in order. Basic jobs to do certain days. There are times I have let certain areas of my home go cause I did not make time to take care of it.

What I really like about having a Home Management Binder is that it is very nice to know that I have the information that I need - right there, handy and easy to reference. :o)