And yet, when it comes to making a calendar or a to-do list, I just can’t be bothered with electronic versions. I have tried. SO many times I have tried. Tim has worked diligently to keep our family calendar updated in Google docs. I really wish that I was interested in helping him with it. But to me, if it isn’t on paper, it just isn’t real. This is where I draw the line for how technology can interface with me. I MUST have a paper to-do list, and a physical calendar.

I actually haven’t had a calendar in a little over a year, mostly because I keep trying to make the Google calendar work for me. And guess what? IT ISN’T WORKING! I do have to-do lists, but they are frequently lost, and I never have a bigger picture idea of how my week or my month is looking. My old system worked fine day-to-day, but didn’t work well at all when trying to plan for the ebbs and flows of the week.

Did you catch that? I said my OLD system. That’s because I have a new one. And I big puffy heart love it. It is called the Woman’s Planner, and it is the creation of a mompreneur named Corri. She spent several years seeking out the perfect planner to help her keep life with her family organized. And after a futile search, she decided to make her own! I get the sense that Corri is very keen to hear what users of her planner think, as she has made some tweaks to her original design so that the planner can best meet the needs of the women who use it.

So here are all the features you’ll find in this planner:

8×10 coil book 3″ fold over page marker – so you won’t lose your place A newly designed monthly ‘budget page’ complete with fixed and variable expenses the keep it all together ‘social planning’ page the same amazing half page format to keep you sane birthdays at a glance page yearly finance/budget page

household appliance tracking wish lists for everything your wishin’ on xmas planning a page to keep track of what your saving for contacts notes the most incredible extra – pocket dividers in between each month to hold all those bills, cards, school notes etc.

What I’m absolutely gaga over is the fact that it has these half-pages at the top and the monthly view at the bottom. This is one of the key things that I was missing with my old system. I was sort of missing the forest for all the trees, because I had a very clear picture of each day, but no real sense for what was coming up in the following days or weeks.

I’m the type of person who writes down everything I need to do…I’ll even write it down just to cross it off if I did something not on my original list! So I was a bit intimidated by the lack of space for writing humongous lists each and every day. But I have quickly learned some shorthand, and I’ve also stepped away from writing down every little thing, and not suffered one bit from it! Still, you can see by the picture that I use pretty much every square inch of this planner!

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader is going to get your choice of a Woman’s Planner or a Girls Planner (Girls Planner available in June) from Chaos Simplified! The contest will run until May 2nd at 11:59pm EST when a winner will be selected via Random.org. The winner will have 48 hours to respond to notification before the prize is forfeited and a new winner is selected. Open to residents of the United States and Canada. Limit one entrant per household, please. You can get the 2011 planner on sale now for $28.95!

Mandatory entry: Tell me which planner you want, and why you think it is a good fit for you or someone you love.

Additional entries:

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Be sure to enter my other current giveaways, found on the sidebar of my homepage.