Updated Sep. 22, 2019. Originally posted Jan. 9, 2013.

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The previous post got quite long, so I decided to put the periodical tasks and monthly routines aside until today.

That post had a lot of steps, but hopefully most of them were fairly quick for you!  You should have accounted for all of your daily, weekly, and monthly tasks from your list of household cleaning tasks; today we’re going to address the others.

STEP 1 (or 12, if you’re continuing from the last post): Grab 12 pieces of paper, index cards, etc. and label each one with a month of the year.

STEP 2 (or 13…): Working from your household cleaning task list from last week, consider all of your less-than-monthly tasks, one by one.  Ask yourself how often it needs to get done, and if there are particular times of the year that are especially well- or poorly-suited.  Write it down under the month or months you will plan to do it.

For example, if I’m going to defrost my freezer twice a year, I will write “defrost freezer” under two different months, about six months apart.  Because my freezer is outside, I probably don’t want to do this when it’s coldest outside, or I will be miserable.  Nor do I want to do it when the weather is hottest, as it will be harder to keep food from spoiling while I work.  It’s probably best for me to schedule this for the spring and autumn.

By contrast, it doesn’t really matter when I wash my shower curtains, so I can plug them in whenever I want.  (I will probably choose to put this in a month that’s otherwise fairly sparse.)  I also like to avoid loading up certain times of the year when I know we’ll otherwise be very busy – like right before Christmas.

If some of these are specifically fitting for particular days of the week, you can add them to your list for that day of the week (noting the frequency with which it’s to be done).  I typically assign most of these to Saturdays (Yard, Garden, and “big project” day around here).  Some of them are bigger tasks, and many require my husband’s assistance and/or whole-family cooperation, so weekends are a good time for us to do them.

When all of your tasks are fully accounted for, move on to the next step.

STEP 3 (or 14…): Get all of the lists you’ve made over the past two days into a “final draft” format that you can use.

They don’t all have to be the same!  Just be sure they’re in a layout that will work for you.  I generally keep my overall weekly plan (that is, Monday = Laundry, Tuesday = Errands, etc.) and my daily routines in my day planner.  But then I have a ring of laminated cards for each day of the week (I’ve done checklists in the past), and a list of the periodic maintenance tasks and their assigned months that I refer to on the appropriate days.

Whew!  That was a lot of planning!  But if you’ve made it this far, you should have your calendar/appointment book, to-do or other task lists, and all of your ongoing household routines set up.  These form the foundation of your day-to-day, week-to-week functioning, so you should be off to a very solid start.

Index Card Laminating Pouches – 5 MilMr. Pen- Loose Leaf Binder Ring, 40 Pack, 1 InchLoose Leaf Binder Ring, 40 Pack, Assorted

If you’re just stumbling across this, please click here for the other posts in the series.