The Chore Chart

I used to believe: “If you want something done well, you need to do it yourself.”

Slowly but surely, I have migrated to the camp of: “Why would I do something if I could pay someone else to do it for me?”

It’s been an evolution, but the busier I got after college, the less inclined I was to spend my “precious time” doing tasks I didn’t want to do. And truthfully, my fiancé has had a huge influence on my thinking. It’s not necessarily that he can’t do things, it’s just that he doesn’t want to. And when you are working 80+ hour work weeks, I completely understand not wanting to spend your valuable free time putting together a bookshelf or cleaning the floor. It’s all about delegating! There’s an app for that: TaskRabbit.

You might say I had my “come to Jesus” moment when we first moved apartments together. My fiancé said hands down we were getting people to pack for us. Meanwhile, I BAWKED at the $1000 price tag. But then I realized it was $500 each, and the amount of time I would spend sourcing boxes, packing etc., (and badly – I’m not a professional!) definitely made it worth hiring out. And let me tell you… I’ll NEVER go back. We lived a completely normal life until the morning of the move. There was no “we can’t have eggs, our pans are already packed,” or “what the heck box did I put my underwear in!” It was THE BEST.

But back to cleaning. We both hate cleaning. Does anyone like it? I am not a messy person, in fact, I’m pretty tidy. But tidy is not the same thing as clean. And my sweet fiancé?? I don’t think he’s ever cleaned a toilet in his life. Pretty much the first month we moved in together he sent me a piece from the New York Times about it. The Times publishes almost the exact same article every year. The gist? You’ll be in a happier relationship if someone else does the cleaning.

In the 2017 piece, an assistant professor at the Harvard Business School created a study that found, “People who spent money to buy themselves time, such as by outsourcing disliked tasks, reported greater overall life satisfaction.”

But now it’s a global pandemic and my same fiancé who couldn’t live without his cleaner is now scared to have someone come into our safe haven home. The main problem? Our house still gets dirty. In fact, it’s way worse because we are in it 24/7! The only food we eat, we make in our own kitchen. The only bathroom we use is our own. We aren’t taking vacations and sleeping elsewhere. It’s a mess. Literally.

I knew I needed to nip this in the bud as soon as we came back to NYC, so I started priming Chris for this idea of splitting chores. While in Texas I mentioned how I didn’t want to be in charge of all cleaning. Then I talked about how he wanted to split tasks. I have learned from working with children that the more buy-in and choice they think they have, the better the result. So I asked him:

  • Are there certain things you prefer to do?
  • Do you want to do the same chores every week?
  • Should we switch off?
  • What are the things we should make sure we are cleaning daily/weekly/monthly?

Then I took out my scrapbooking box from under the bed (this is NYC, a lot of stuff goes under there) and got to work. I even crowdsourced on Facebook to see if people had ideas or templates. Most templates I saw online only were for children’s chores. I only two examples of couples splitting chores, which I found semi-troubling (Thrifty Mom and Our Little Apartment).

I spent a long time figuring out the color scheme I wanted. Too long, if I’m being honest. Then I used a paper cutter to measure out the exact dimensions so it was even. I used a tiny puncher to round all of the corners. I layered paper within my chosen color scheme. I found sparkly stickers to spell out our names. Then I had to divide the tasks evenly.

Chris said he had no preference of tasks and that he’d like to switch off. I made my chart and I made our names on separate pieces of paper so I could switch them week to week. I looked on Amazon for cute, pretty, and strong magnets. I needed something that would stick through lamination, and I wanted them pretty since they were going to live on our fridge (which is visible from pretty much our entire apartment because New York).

I made a check list with mini circles that would hopefully match up with my magnets, and two columns for tasks to do, and tasks that were done. In theory, this was so that we could do the chores slowly throughout the week/month and know that at least they were getting done at some point. In reality, we have been leaving them until Sunday and then doing them all. I told you we hate chores! Procrastination is the name of the game.

Here’s how it’s going: the chores are getting done but we hate it. I feel less anxious because I’m not living in filth but I do dread Sundays. And 2.5 weeks in, Chris asked me to text our old cleaning lady and ask her to come back. She hasn’t written me back yet, but I’ll keep you posted. At least it looks cute!

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Bullet Journaling in 2019

Oops, I did it again. I wasted my time, got lost in the hype. Oh baby, baby.

That’s right guys, my failed 2018 resolution and I had another go-around. I am happy to say that with some major adjustments, I had slightly more success, which was largely because I changed my mindset and stopped caring about succeeding. Of course, I’m talking about bullet journaling.

You may remember my blog from a year ago about my 2018 failure.

For those of you who are new around here, a bullet journal is “a way to track the past, organize the present, and plan for the future.” Sounds awesome. Unfortunately, it is VERY time consuming, especially if you want it to be cute! Which, of course I do.

If you are too lazy to read my blog from last year, the TLDR is that in 2018, I went down the BuJo Youtube rabbit hole, got obsessed with many different “habit trackers,” I got behind, I was tired of writing down everything I did, and I basically gave up on both the journaling aspect, the “tracking the past” aspect, and decided I would just use my google calendar to “plan for the future.” I decided to ditch the BuJo since it became a time-wasting method instead of a time-saving method.

But then I got a 40% off coupon for Michaels (seriously, I get one every 2 weeks, how does that store make money??) so I decided to buy a new notebook and start again with some adjustments.

The main parts of the bullet journal concept remained: the index to keep track of where everything was, the future log to put things for later in the year, the monthly log, weekly logs and collections. My main addition was a lot more scrapbooking. I kept little mementos from things I attended and attached them to the pages with Washi tape. For example, many many playbill covers, “Beat” stickers from football games, my ticket from the Belmont Stakes, tickets to Knicks/Heat games, and bus tickets and mementos from my travels.

The main changes in 2019 were to my collections and to the way I tracked my weeks. Between those changes to my actual bullet journal, and the change in my attitude about keeping up with it, aka my “IDGAF mentality,” I was able to successfully keep up with my journal all year long.

Collections:

Last year, I got reallllllyyy behind in tracking my moods. Also, it felt repetitive (yay for being happy most of the time), useless (why does it matter in December that I was sad for 2 days in January?), and also it was difficult to track if I fell behind. There’s actually a psychological phenomenon about this called rosy retrospection, and when I was a week behind, I just assumed I had been happy the whole week. Which is dumb and pointless. The first thing to go in my 2019 BuJo was the mood tracker. I decided to keep my 10,000 steps a day tracker, because it was easy to fill in if I got behind thanks to my FitBit app, and I kept my daily workout tracker, because I wanted to see the distribution of my workouts as I tried to add in more strength training to my routine.

I chose to get rid of pages I either didn’t use, or pages that were repetitive because I was tracking the data in some other way or in some other app. For example, I got rid of my “To-Read” page because it was easier to add them in the Good Reads app, and I always had my phone with me to add books as people recommended them to me. I also got rid of the ratings on my Movies Watched page, because I could remember how I felt about a movie without writing it down. I got rid of my “braids to learn” page, because they were bookmarked in my Instragram. I also got rid of my “Key” because after a year of bullet journaling, I didn’t have to remind myself what the symbols meant anymore.

The last thing I wanted to do was make my life MORE difficult, but I did add on a few new collections of pages for my 2018 layout. First, marathon training! I added my training schedule based on the Hal Higdon method, and I added pages to track my training and miles. I liked seeing it all together, instead of scrolling through my Nike+ app. Also, I liked writing down how certain runs felt to me, so I could remember that I sometimes had bad days, but they were often followed by much better ones. I also added a Braiding calendar at the beginning of each month. The “braiding community” often puts together “twins” for people’s birthdays, where you do a similar style or type of style for someone’s special day, or you just have a certain hashtag to add. This was hard for me to keep up with because they are often planned in advance so I reserved a page each month for this. I may not do this next year, because I often forgot to check my BuJo before posting for the day, anyway, and they are often planned early for the next month, so I couldn’t write them down anyway. TBD if this collection makes an appearance in 2020. I also added a collection of “hair hashtags” but I never ended up looking at it, so I think it will also get the boot in 2020.

I LOVED my Savings Goals page. Not only did I get a chance to draw my adorable piggy bank again, but it gave me a lot of pride and a sense of accomplishment to see that I was making my goals for the year. Speaking of goals, I also loved my goals page and will continue that for 2020. Also staying in 2020? My social stats tracking page, my blogs posted page (really trying for 24 this year), my spin themes page, and my reading stats page. I read 35 books last year, and definitely met my goal of non-fiction v. fiction, with 9/35 non-fiction! Only 6/35 were written by men, though. I need to work on that.

It was super fun to see my travel summarized on one page, so I will keep that for 2020, as well I was away 90 days, traveled 23,965 miles x 2 (there and back! 47,930!!), and I took 18 trains and 18 planes.

Weekly Log:

I think I was better able to keep up with my BuJo in 2019 because I changed the way I journaled my weeks. I often got behind by a day or two in 2018, so in 2019, I decided not to split up my weekly logs by day. I just gave a single page for a week, and jotted down a few memorable things about the week. The main reason I use my bullet journal is to remember goals and tasks I want to complete for the week that may not be incredibly important enough to set phone reminders, but make me feel good to check off and save me money. For example, for my tasks, I wrote down when I needed to cancel my Clear membership before the free trial was over. Or I wrote down that I needed to make a dentist appointment. Book a hotel for a wedding I was going to, buy more paper towels, frame my diplomas, RSVP to a wedding, Venmo request my bf for the electricity bill, buy a wedding gift (lots of wedding-related tasks). I also grouped my goals in this category, for example, publish a blog about my BuJo, apply for 3 jobs, finish my continuing education class final project. Writing down these small goals and tasks reminded me to do them, and also incentivized me to complete them. There’s really nothing like ticking a box or crossing something off of a list.

IDGAF:

The main reason I was more successful in 2019 than in 2018 was because I did not give a f*ck. Here’s an example. In September, I went on a vacation to Paris with my bf. I brought my bullet journal. I did not write in it one single time despite already having laid out the pages. In 2018 I would have been upset with myself. In 2019, I just kept on going. In October, I went on a vacation to Greece. I was determined to keep up with my Bujo. Again, I brought it with me and I collected little mementos throughout the trip, and I didn’t write in it once. I just taped my bus tickets and winery pamphlets onto the pages and continued on. My lack of self-loathing for being behind in my bullet journal helped me continue.

The clarity for WHY I was journaling was helpful. For me, it’s to keep track of things I need to do, and to have a little reminder of my year at the end. And if I forget to write something? It’s not the end of the world. Has anyone out there tried their hand yet at bullet journaling? I bought some new Mildliner “creative markers” and I can’t wait to see how things change in 2020!

P.S. I still cannot doodle to save my life, but my piggy bank drawing is still adorable!

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Bullet Journaling – My Failed 2018 Resolution

Sometimes you have to throw in the towel. Or admit defeat. That’s what happened to one of my 2018 resolutions to keep a bullet journal. I realized that there was just not enough time in the day to both do things, and then write about them. Let me explain.

Bullet Journaling, or #BuJo for short, has a cult following, especially in the crafting/online community. Basically, it was invented by a guy, Ryder Carroll, to make up for the things he couldn’t do using an app. It is an analog way to “track the past, organize the present, and plan the future.” He has a handy 4-minute YouTube video about it here. BEWARE of the YouTube black hole, guys. My story began by watching that 4-minute video, and next thing you know it was 5 days later and I was at Michaels purchasing 5 types of felt-tip pens and 8 tubes of washi-tape. But again, I’m getting ahead of myself.

In theory, Bullet Journaling is great. You can use any notebook, although Bullet Journal sells their own, because #capitalism. But the point of a BuJo is that anyone can do it, in any notebook they want. Of course, the internet has favorites (the Leuchtturm, Moleskine etc.), but you can use any book. That’s because you do all of the work yourself! You write it as you go. You do most of the work when you first set it up, at the beginning of the year. If you had never heard of bullet journaling, but all of a sudden, you’ve seen it on your social media, that’s because the first week of the year just finished and people were rushing to set up their new “layouts.” In fact, the YouTube black hole contains HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of bloggers showing their 2019 setups. DON’T CLICK IT. IT’S A TRAP.

My gorgeous Bullet Journal (#RIP). I used it enough that I broke the elastic!

Here’s the main gist, and what is included in all bullet journals:

  • Index: This is a running list of your pages. Remember that you can do this BuJo thing in any plain notebook. That means you need to write your own page numbers and refer back to this Index as you add pages and update it.
  • Future Log: This is usually a quick monthly separation of your year, where you add the events that are coming up in the months ahead. This is necessary because you only write the current week’s tasks. You can control how many pages you use this way, or if you need to add anything.
  • Monthly Log: Includes the days of the month, and the letter of the day (M for Monday etc.). This is a “Birds Eye View” of your monthly appointments and tasks.
  • Daily Logs (usually done by the week) – Tasks, Events, and Notes for each day, in bullet form, and sometimes starred for importance
  • Collections: Lists of tasks or other things all grouped together by topic. This is where the Pinterest/internet community gets carried away, but more on that later.

At the end of each month, you set up the next month by looking at any leftover tasks you didn’t complete. You go to the previous month’s tasks, check off the ones you completed. With the leftover ones, if you don’t want to do it anymore, you cross it out. But if it’s still worth your time, “migrate” it by drawing an arrow, then writing it in the next month’s monthly log. If the task is not due for a few months, then you can instead write it in the future log, for the month when it’s due.

This is all meant to reduce distraction and be more productive, basically a “Konmari method for your thoughts,” according to Vogue. (Marie Kondo is so IN right now.)

Well guys, I was so determined last year. Not only did I set up my Index, Future Log, and Monthly Log, (all of the photos in this blog are REAL excerpts from my bullet journal!), I also did all of the extra things that the crazy people on the internet do. I even wrote a yearly calendar at the beginning where I wrote out the numbers 1-31 for every single month in tiny little invisible squares. (I got the “dotted” notebook, which is loved by all internet BuJo’ers, because you can write straight, but you don’t have those UNSIGHTLY lines. Lines in a notebook? EW!) I tried to learn how to doodle, to make cute borders, I bought pens of different colors and thicknesses, I googled “how to draw a piggy bank” for my savings page, I really was all in.

The most fun part was the collections, although it also became the most time-consuming part. As I quickly learned from my new internet-blogger peeps, you can make a collection for ANYTHING. The first type of collection is a “habit-tracker,” where you do exactly that. You can track your daily sleep, steps, exercise, food, etc. You can have a graph where you mark every day you successfully make breakfast at home, or go without caffeine, or make it to the gym! I had two habit trackers, for my gym sessions (color-coded by type of workout), and for my moods. The mood one quickly made me realize that I’m happy a large majority of days. Good discovery, I guess, but boring to track after a while. I would sometimes get a week behind on these, which was much easier to remember my gym sessions, but more difficult to try and remember how I was feeling on a particular day. Sometimes I think I faked it.

Habit Tracking! This did not last long.

The other types of collections were more like lists to keep a running tally of things throughout the year. These lists included books I read, stats for my books (gender of author, length, genre), movies I’d seen (there were a lot… this was in the heyday of Moviepass RIP) and also my social media statistics (followers, number of posts etc.). I also wrote about my many many trips and travel stats.

Additionally, I made lists/collections of things to remember for the future: braids I wanted to learn, books I wanted to read, movies I wanted to see, themes I wanted to use for a spin class etc.

I was doing so well for a few months, especially with the collections. I am a very crafty person, so I was having fun! I used to scrapbook all the time when I lived in Florida, and although I still have most of my scrapbooking stuff, it sits in a box underneath my bed because as all New Yorker’s say, “ain’t nobody got space for that!” Anyway, bullet journaling was a great way to keep crafting, but keep it to one single book with a small(er) amount of supplies.

It was fun… until it wasn’t. It became burdensome. I hit my first hurdle in my very first month with my bullet journal when I went to Seattle and Vancouver. Should I bring my Bullet Journal? How many pens? Is it worth carrying in my backpack? Will I forget it anywhere? When will I have time to write in it if I’m busy hanging with my best friend, hiking and boozing it up? Ultimately, I did bring it with me, but it was difficult to keep up with. I brought it with me on MANY trips, even to Spain! I wrote in it on each train ride between cities to recap what we had done.

But eventually, it became a hassle. I didn’t feel like recapping my day. I had never been great at keeping a diary and making a note of each time I fought with my bf seemed stupid and useless. Also, did that make me sad? Angry? Tired? Or was I still overall happy for the day? What would I put in my mood habit tracker?

I also started to fall very behind on my collections. Although I thought it was a good idea and I did enjoy crafting, it felt redundant. When I heard of a book I wanted to read, I put it on my Goodreads “want to read” shelf. Why would I also write it in my BuJo? Also, as I progressed with my braiding, I was bookmarking all of the braids I wanted to try within the Instagram app. Why would I also try to describe it in words in my BuJo? Same thing with my travel: I was already writing about it on my blog (sometimes), so why would I also waste my time and write about it by hand? Everything seemed superfluous and time-consuming.

I spent a few weeks scaling back, and only writing the highlights of my weeks, but I realized I wasn’t even using the bullet journal anymore as it is intended, as a planner and organizer, but more as a diary. Again, why would I use it as a planner when I have Google calendar on my phone, in my pocket? There are some things I miss, like tracking my social media stats, but I may just keep a running list of that in the memos in my phone, instead of a full craft-stravaganza.

I understand that some people enjoy bullet journaling as a creative outlet, but overall, I don’t understand it as a time-saving method. To me, it was a huge time suck. Although it was fun, I would probably never do it again. I did, however, learn how to draw a SICK piggy bank! Have any of you experimented with bullet journaling? What did you think?

Savings Goals! (I did much better than this but I stopped keeping track)
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