I have a long and storied history with lists and calendars.  I suppose it started in elementary school with my love of fresh clean paper and notebooks.  I remember meticulously recording my grades in my notebooks during high school, compiling a neat color coded list by the end of each semester.  In college, Notre Dame supplied us with something called The Daily Shillelagh (pronounced “shill -AY – lee”) which was a calendar and day planner with ads inside.  I used it religiously (pun intended) to plan my schedule.

In my professional years I kicked it up a notch.  I became a devotee of the Franklin Planner System – a gorgeous leather-bound zip-closure binder with color coordinated pages and dated archives so I could keep past years within arm’s reach in my office space.  But then.

The digital age.

Once the Palm Pilot entered my life, nothing was ever the same.  I have flip-flopped between paper and digital planning ever since.  At any given time I am a slave to my Google calendar or a to-do list on Google Docs or a paper date book and a pretty notepad. At present I keep my editorial calendar (I write for several blogs and I manage another) in a Busy Body Book.

When Blue Sky sent me a sample package of their Home Series products (which can be seen at Target), I sighed with pleasure as I opened the box and fondled the smooth, delightful paper.  Because paper is my precious.  The Blue Sky collection promises to organize you, clear your thoughts, and leave you with shiny children and a squeaky clean house.  The designs are  bold and simple, with colors that are pleasing to the eye.

I have been using the Multi-task Mouse Pad, the Grocery Checklist Pad, and the Multi-task Notebook.  All three of these products remind me to write down the ideas that are floating in my head. (The pads have a tendency to roll up at the edges, though, so they might benefit from using heavier paper or employ some kind of elastic tie-down around the corners).

I was also sent a Weekly/Monthly Planner, which I will use once January rolls around.  (I’m a little too attached to the current busy body book.  I can’t switch mid-year!)  It’s so big that it reminds me of a teacher’s planner, and I might as well give in to that notion, because I am signing up to volunteer in my first grader’s class once a week.  Since school has just started I am not yet completely immersed in all things school, but I know it won’t be long.

Blue Sky has a product that I haven’t ever seen before which I know will come in handy once our family’s days get super-hectic, what with a first-grader, a pre-schooler, a busy work-at-home-mom, and a college professor dad all running around trying to get out of the house.  It’s a notepad in the shape of a doorknob hang-tag – with a big hole for the doorknob and the words “DON’T FORGET TO” and a space for notes.  No more sticky notes that will fall off and hit the floor.  Just write “take out the trash” or “bring permission slip to school” in big black marker, hang on the doorknob, and nobody will forget anything again.  (Unless they are a man, which means they will not even see it.)

I was not compensated for this post.  Rather, I was given the products so I could sit at home and pet the smooth, pretty paper.