It's Music With Miss Christie's blogiversary! Woohoo!!
And wow, what a year it has been! The twists and turns of 2020 were not on my radar when I started, but I think they've helped shape my mindset for the future. So today, let’s recap the last 365 days by the numbers: Total Posts: 57 Total Pieces/Songs: 12 Most Popular Piece/Song: The Smelly Elf Total Resources: 39 Most Popular Resource: Llama Hear Ya Play: Accidentals Are you surprised by any of this information? I was! I didn't realize how many posts I wrote this past year. Pretty good for someone who's not really a writer and fought starting this blog for years. Don't worry that story is coming soon! :) Thank you, friends, for making the adventure of this past year so much fun! I’m so grateful for each and every one of you and am excited for what this year holds for us all!
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If you've been around for a little while, you will know that we have a different challenge or incentive for our students. Remember the Candy Corn Challenge?
Beginning on Monday students will be collecting stickers on their hearts for The Heart Challenge! Here's how it works: Students will earn a sticker to put on their heart for every theory page and piece that they complete. Simple, right? There will of course be a prize for the student with the most stickers on their card at the end of the challenge. :) Big thanks to Sara Campbell and the Piano Teachers of Canada Facebook group for the inspiration! In late November, I began my yearly reflection on what did and didn't worked for me in the last year and started considering adjustments for the new year.
In 2020, I used a single planner for the following categories: Finances, Business (work)/Blog/Store, and Fitness/Health, This year I'm keeping some things the same and completely overhauling others in my quest for organization and planner peace. I plan to follow up quarterly, so I'm writing this post as much for my own accountability as I am sharing my reflections and ideas with you. :) Let's start with usual the elephant in the room. Finances. Financial Planner In December 2019 I decided that 2020 was going to be a "no spend" year. I wrote out a sheet in my planner of the rules and guidelines for my spending. I budgeted and tracked my business expenses digitally using My Music Staff for general bookkeeping and a P&L for my studio. For my personal budget I used a Numbers spreadsheet. So I set my goals and then just tried to not spend money. You can probably guess how well that worked out. Some of it had to do with it being 2020 (hello Amazon!), but most of it had to do with my system. I wasn't able able to clearly see what I was and wasn't spending my (and my studio's) money on, so I get to the end of a quarter and be WAY over budget in some areas and WAY under in others. Then I made two discoveries. The first was Dave Ramsey's EveryDollar app. This app does everything my spreadsheet did and more. It's clearer, does the math better, it's easier to use...overall it's really a much better system. I've been using it for the past couple of months and I LOVE IT! My favorite feature is the "fund". A fund is a way for you to budget for big expenses over the course of the year. Here's how they explain it: "Imagine you have a $300 insurance bill due in three months. Set $100 as the "Planned" amount. In three months, you'll have $300 when you need it." Nifty, right? Side note: did I really just say "nifty"? Ooph, I'm getting old. The second thing I discovered was Mike Michalowicz's book Profit First. I won't be going through all the details of the book in this post, but I highly recommend reading the book. I will be implementing the Profit First system - in addition to using the EveryDollar app - in my business beginning this month and will update you after the first quarter. #accountability Work/Blog Planner I love the flexibility and creativity that The Happy Planner products offer, but trying to plan 2 businesses and a personal life in a single planner just wasn't working for me. I've been using a Happy Planner for almost 2 years and I've seen a lot of people purchase 3-5 planners for a single year. I seriously thought the were crazy. Honestly, who needs more than 1 planner? Turns out, I do! It's not that I have a lot to plan every week, it's more that keeping everything separate makes more sense to me. When things make more sense, I don't overthink as much and am more productive. I've decided to take the year one quarter at a time. For the first quarter of this year I will be using a combination of my own 2-page monthly calendar and Elizabeth Caldwell's Teacher Entrepreneur Planner for my blog/store planning. For my music school planning, I'm sticking with a vertical Happy Planner and a new daily page that I created a few days ago. (I'll update you on that as well) Near the end of the quarter I will evaluate my systems and decide what needs tweaking and what works as is, then adjust accordingly. Let me know if you're interested in seeing more about my planner set up. I've been considering a flip-through video. Fitness/Health Planner This is where I failed the most. I had it in my head that if I wrote down my weight every day and if I planned what my workouts would be for the week that I'd have success. I used the long range planning pages of my Happy Planner for my workouts and created my own version of it for my weight. In theory it all sounds great, but practically speaking it just didn't work for me. I got discouraged when the scale when up - even though I know there are so many factors that are out of my control - and on days when I physically didn't feel up to to the workout I planned, I either did it anyway and ended up feeling like garbage for the rest of the week or I beat myself up for not "sticking to the plan". Neither of which was healthy. This year, my fitness goals are different than they've ever been. This year, I simply want to be active. I'm not a naturally athletic person, but I used to be active. Teaching elementary and middle school kept moving, but now that I spend so much time sitting for work, driving and my other hobbies, I'm not so active anymore and it's time to change that. I'll be using my own 2021 At a Glance Calendar planning pages, but instead of tracking weight and workouts I'll be journaling what I did and any new skills learned that week. I'm also looking for new active hobbies, so if you have something that you love please share it in the comments! :) ----------------------------- What are your favorite organizational systems? How are you going to plan your awesome year? |
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