Tour of My Home Management Binder

I have been meaning to give a tour of my Home Management Binder (HMB) for quite some time now. I was first inspired to create my own HMB when Candy from a blog called Keeping the Home gave a tour of her HMB. Candy no longer has a blog, but I used many of her ideas to create my own binder when I was pregnant with our daughter. It's a work-in-progress, but I LOVE it! I use it nearly every day, and it just helps keep me organized. My binder is separated into the following sections:

• Schedules
• Cleaning
• Food (with Recipe subsection)
  
• Budget
• People (with Health and Fitness subsection)
  
• Homeschool
• Birth/Babies/Children
• Other

Now...for the tour!

Here is the front cover, which I decorated. On the bottom is the excerpt from Titus 2:4-5
..."women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children,To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed."
Here is the spine of the binder.

This is the front pocket. I keep odds n' ends in the side pocket. Right now I have things like my food journal for the week, 52 Week Bible Reading Plan schedule, to-do lists, a blank cd, and scrap paper in there. On the other side is a zipper pouch that holds pens, pencils, white out, and also all the receipts for the month. At the end of each month I take the receipts out of the pouch and move them into an envelope and file it away.
Here are my tabbed sections.

My title page with Titus 2:4-5 again.
Next, a few inspirational pages. First, a print-out of "A Woman's Rules to Live By" by Keeping the Home.

Then, a print out of A Wise Woman Builds her House by Debi Pearl. Click on the link to read it.

Then, a copy of Proverbs 31:10-31


After that is the Schedules Section. This section contains a yearly calendar, Scripture Memorization list, and will eventually contain our family's schedule once our children are older.

Then is the Cleaning Section.

First I have a copy of Operation Castle Clean, which I adapted from a Keeping the Home article. I use this when my cleaning schedule is out-of-whack, the house is a disaster, and I am overwhelmed with where to begin! It's an emergency quick-clean to-do list.

Then I have my cleaning schedule, which I usually follow quite closely. Here you see Monday's cleaning tasks. I plan to do a break-down of each day's cleaning tasks sometime, but I'll leave that for another post, another day. :-)
Here you see Tuesday and Wednesday's tasks.

Next is Thursday and Friday's tasks. (No picture of those days since they have some names on them.)


Next is my laundry schedule, but no picture of that because there are names on it. On Mondays I wash my and my husband's personal laundry. Tuesdays I wash our daughter's laundry and our bedding with light towels. Wednesdays I wash dark towels if necessary. Thursdays I wash rags, dish cloths, and mop heads. Fridays I wash my husband's work and dress clothes.

Then is my projects page.

Then is my Deep Cleaning To-Do list and Fly Lady's Detailed Cleaning List. If you come to my home, you'd quickly discover I don't often get around to these detailed cleaning lists, LOL! :-)


Next is the Food Section. This is a fairly large section and includes my master grocery list, blank weekly menu plans, filled in menu plans (that I go off of to get meal ideas), 8 week menu plans, easy meal ideas, make-ahead meal ideas for stocking up the freezer before a baby arrives, a list of recipes to try, and a recipe section separated into sections.



Next is my Budget Section.


Then is my People Section (sorry, I don't have a title page for this so no picture.) It contains things like wish lists, birthday organizer, address book, witnessing info, and a subsection, Health and Fitness. The Health and Fitness subsection has things like the Couch-to-5K plan, my food and exercise journals, my weekly weigh-in report, and exercise goals.

After that is my Homeschool Section, which still needs a title page. This section doesn't contain a lot yet, but I'm sure it will someday soon. It contains homeschooling ideas and articles.



After the Homeschool Section come the Birth/Babies/Children section (I don't have a title page for it, yet, so no pictures). This section contains information related to childbirth, VBACs (we are hoping for a VBAC next pregnancy), midwifery, and a To-Pack List for the hospital.


After that comes the last section, the Other Section (no pictures again, sorry). This contains things like first-aid information and anything else that doesn't fit into a category. At the very back of the binder is an emergency information and contact list. (This might get moved to the front of the binder yet.)

And...that's it! Hope you enjoyed the tour!



*Linking up to Raising Homemakers*