Students - How Are You Making Your Student Planners Work for You?

Students – How are you Using Your Student Planners?

We’re well into the second month of school now, and I’m wondering how many students are really using their school planners to their best advantage.

Are you writing down all your long and short-term assignments in the dates provided? Are you allocating time each evening to tackle a portion of that term paper that’s due before Halloween?

Now’s the time to re-think if you’re using your student planner to it’s fullest capacity.



In August, I posted a blog about Student Organization in which I recommended using a blank Teacher Planner for your calendaring needs. What’s great about these planners is that there are no pre-selected dates or information crowding the spaces you need to use. You create the planner you want.

Here are a few suggestions for making the most of your student planner:

Use your planner for everything in your lives – not just school activities. Plan your exercise times, community service projects, weekend and social activities too.

Don’t forget to bring your planner to every class. If you have a free period in school every day, plan what you will do to make the most of that free time. Study for that test tomorrow or get a jump-start on your homework.

Make a list of your goals in your planner. Try to list at least 4-5 goals (personal, health and educational) each month and see how many you can accomplish. Don’t feel bad if you don’t get through the list – just transfer those you didn’t get to and still want to accomplish onto the next month’s pages.

In other words, make the planner do the work.

How Not to Use Your Dish Stacker

My daughter found this picture on the website icanhascheezburger.com. I thought I'd share it with you.

Long Term Storage - Is It Worth It?

About three years ago, we moved from a 4-bedroom house into a 2-bedroom apartment for 14 months. We realized at the time that we couldn’t possibly fit everything from our house into the apartment and there were many things we wanted to keep for when we would be in a larger home again.

We shopped around and finally settled on putting our possessions into a large 10x30 storage unit at Public Storage. It was a convenient location and the unit was on the ground floor which meant we could drive the moving van right up to the unit and unload without having to use elevators, stairs, etc. Anytime I needed to retrieve anything from the unit, it was an easy experience.

The downside of these storage units is, of course, the price. We paid approximately $550 a month to rent this unit which translated to $7,150 over the 14-month period.

As this was a temporary situation, we were able to justify the cost of storing our items which included over half of our household furniture and possessions.

However, recently I’ve seen commercials for these storage unit companies touting slogans like “Packrats of the World Rejoice” or “Your Stuff Will be Happy Here”. Sure, your stuff might be happy, but will you?



If you are not planning on moving from your current residence and you have so much stuff that you’re thinking of putting some of it off-site into long-term storage, please think again.

Although that “first month free” might sound appealing, you won’t get this “bargain” unless you sign a one-year lease. If you’re storing a bunch of boxes of old papers, furniture you just can’t seem to part with or anything of no real value, you will have paid for these items at least five times over by the time you empty the storage unit.



Let’s say, for example you store the following items in a 5x5 storage unit for one year: your brother’s couch, an old chair from your great-aunt, some boxes of old books and school papers, and kitchen stuff your Mom no longer wants but you can't bear to part with. The value of those items better be well over $875 or you’ve just paid that much for one year of storage. Think what you could have spent that money on!

It’s important to remember that we can’t keep collecting more stuff to the point that we need outside storage to handle it all. If you can live without it (and you will be if you’re putting it off-site), you really don’t need it.

What Type of Learner Are You?

Franklin Covey put together a great article about learning types which I would like to summarize for you here:

Studies have shown that people generally possess one of three types of learning styles:

Visual, Auditory or Tactile/Kinesthetic.

If you are a Visual Learner you:

Learn best from reading;
Like to see things written out; and
Use words and diagrams as memory aids

If you are an Auditory Learner you:

Recall spoken stories better than ones you’ve read;
Follow oral instructions better than written ones; and
Say words in your head as you read silently

And, if you are a Tactile/Kinesthetic Learner you:

Enjoy doing experiments and role playing;
Are good at puzzles and mazes; and
Can often put things together without instructions

Finding out which learning style works best for you will help to better handle your files and paperwork at home or in the office.

I Love Fall!

I went to the store this morning and bought my first pumpkins of the season. Fall, especially the month of October, is my favorite time of the year. I will be getting the Halloween decorations out in the next few days and will post some pics and tips for you.

What will you be doing to decorate for the holidays?

100 Thing Challenge - Ebay Sales

For the past three weeks I've been paring down my collection of jadite Fire King dishes, cups and bowls. I've sold about 30 pieces and made a pretty good return on my investment.

I've been selling on Ebay for over 10 years and still believe it is a great way to make a little extra cash and also to find that elusive collectible you remember from your childhood.

Storing That Airline Blanket & Pillow You Just Paid For

Well it's official, Jet Blue is actually charging $7.00 if you want a pillow and blanket on your next flight. I guess the good news is that you get to keep the blanket and pillow you just paid for. It's probably just a matter of time until the remaining airlines follow suit.

So, the question is, what are you going to do with these items now that they're yours? After returning from your trip, wash the blanket and pillow cover and store them inside your luggage for your next airline trip. Or, alternatively, store them in your trunk with your emergency kit for use in case you get stuck in your car or the kids get tired on long car trips.