Getting Organized: DIY Dry Erase Calendar

Unfortunately, one of the usual side effects of an artistic mind is complete disorganization. I must say, I am one of the most scatter-brained people I know, and have found that without a written plan for what I'm going to do, I end up spending about half my day either getting distracted by unimportant things or trying to remember what the important things were that I had planned to do. It's actually pretty remarkable the list of things I can know I need to accomplish with total clarity and conviction before I go to bed, and the next morning I don't remember one of them. So I was talking to my friend Nikki about this problem one day, and shortly after she sent me the link to a blog post for a DIY dry erase weekly calendar.

Kama for Today's Housewife: DIY Dry Erase Weekly Calendar

I already had a 24"x36" poster frame, all I had to do was replace the poster with a calendar (sorry Hanson, you've been demoted). I decided to use a sheet of scrapbook paper for each day of the week. Conveniently, it is 12" square paper, so it fit perfectly two across, and all I had to do was trim down to the height I wanted. I took the paper insert out of the frame and stuck on my scrapbook paper sheets with double-sided tape. Then I wrote each day of the week on a different colored paper (I have a couple scrap packs, which was great, but construction paper or printing paper would work fine), cut them out with pinking shears, and stuck them on. Into the frame it went, and voila!

As you can see, I have an actual dry erase monthly calendar mounted above it, which helps me keep track of events and other important dates. I also left an unassigned 12" square on the bottom right, which I use to write out a list of what I aim to create/do for the week, and from there I assign tasks to specific days.

Here is a closer view of Monday. Happy little trees!

The only thing I would change (and plan to one day when I can afford it) would be to use a frame with actual glass. I used this one because I had it on hand, and when I tried the dry erase marker on it, it erased fine. But after I had it up and was actually using it, I noticed that the words linger. The actual marker is gone, and using cleaner doesn't help, so I'm assuming that it must eat away at the plastic a bit. Also, I can only use black marker, the colored ones don't erase AT ALL. It's not a big deal for me right now, but if you want to try this I definitely recommend real glass. :)