I am 62% ready for Christmas

If you have known me for more than a minute you know I am a planner. Which might be putting it mildly. Before I went back to work I dragged out the scrap booking supplies I never use since I went digital and made my annual Christmas planner. And then promptly, because history is destined to repeat itself, I lost it. Or, more specifically, I believe my tiny toddler lost it for me. For those of you who are keeping score we brought our tiny toddler home from Russia the last week of May. Since then we have lost:

complete set of car keys
my favorite flip flops
every baby spoon we own
countless matchbox cars
the cap to nearly every pen in my office
my stapler
a framed photo of our family, pre tiny toddler
my kindle (I don't think I can blame this on him but I am not 100% sure.)
my Christmas planner

I am sure the list is much longer than my memory allows for. So, no Christmas planner.

But have no fear. My return to the work world three weeks ago coincided with the death of our laptop. My need for the ability to work more quickly than if I was hammering out my thoughts on a stone tablet prompted me to be at Best Buy as their doors opened, armed with research information and ready to buy. My husband often says that the sales associates who get to handle our bigger purchases are quite lucky- we walk in knowing exactly what we want and the only work they really have to do is ring it up and collect their commission. Which, before anyone tells me, yes, I know, Best Buy does not pay commission. I know because, somehow, the sales associates work this into nearly every conversation.

So I bought a new computer. And I love it. And now that I am back online with more power I can have my Franklin Covey Plan Plus software back. Oh how I have missed you. Sorry, I need a minute...

I moved from my tried and true paper planner to the software version a few years back. Then my career took me into a position where I was never home and frequently traveling to assisted living communities with no wifi forced me back into my paper planner again. Then I quit my job and stayed home with my boys and put the planner away in a drawer. And totally fell apart. See above list of lost and/or stolen items for proof of my total disorganization.

But now I am back at work, in my home office, with no overnight travel and no need to drag my laptop everywhere I go. I start my day in my office, and I have my planning & solitude time back. So I visited my favorite Franklin Covey website looking for the planning software and found something even better; an online planning system. Just like my paper planner, but better. It looks like my planner. It feels like my planner. I can print out specific days if I need to take it with me. But I can keep way more notes. I can keep better information on my contacts. (That's you, people.) I can easily create time lines for projects. Oh. My. God. I am in love all over again.

I don't even miss my Christmas planner anymore. Which means it will turn up any day now. I have entered my entire holiday season into the project section and can track my progress to assure I don't miss a thing. I can even upload photos and websites to the notes section. And you will be happy to know that Project Christmas 2011 is right on track. According to my software, I am 62% ready for the big day and by the end of the week I am projected to be 80% there. I know. I am such a geek.