The Power of Binders

Binders aren’t just for students. I love binders for home management. There are all sorts of ideas for home management binders or “control journals” all over the Internet {see the links below}. I use one for my Motivated Mom’s* planner, one for recipes {page protectors keep spills from ruining my pages}, one for the holiday season, and I even have one I call the “I’M the Mama! Book.” That’s one I use for organizing articles I’ve photocopied/printed with evidence and support for my parenting decisions, such as breastfeeding, co-sleeping, etc. and articles and resources for decisions I’m still trying to make {such as homeschooling}.
My most recent binder is my cake binder. I threw it together to organize myself for my Wilton cake decorating classes.
  I like my binders to look snazzy. Plain old white just doesn’t do it for me. So I use scrapbook paper to dress them up. I always use the binders that have clear sleeves on the covers. Then all I have to do is find paper I like, cut it to fit, and slide it into the cover. In this case I also grabbed some cake-themed embellishments. Adorable, no?  Going the paper route {you could also use wrapping paper} is quick and easy. But you could use pages from a book or magazine, photos, or design a cover on your computer and print it out.
In the front pocket I have my shopping list for class supplies, as well as some Michael’s coupons I printed off their website. I keep scissors {for cutting coupons and cutting decorating bags} plus some writing utensils in the blue zipper pouch {and will probably throw in a small calculator as well, just in case I need to do some tricky conversions}.
Next are the practice sheets from our class book. We’ll use these by sliding them into the clear pouches on our practice boards and doing decorations right over the templates.
I’ve also included a color-mixing chart from the Wilton website. And I’ll be adding my color-wheel from when I was an art student. Hopefully, with all those resources at my finger tips I’ll always be able to get my frosting to color I want it.
    Then I have space for my notes from each class, as well as my cake plans. I’ve got all three class cakes planned out. I’ve typed up the flavors {including the instructions on altering the cake mixes}, and the colors I’ll be using as well as listing the amount of frosting I’ll need in which colors and at what consistency. Who knew there was so many details to organize just to make a cake? ;)
Finally, in the back pocket, is the class book we received on our first day, our cake decorating bible, if you will.
And that, my friends, is my cake binder. The organizing possibilities for binders are many. And the products made for use in binders are versatile. They make tab dividers, pouches, page protectors, photo pages, and more. You can even use baseball card sheets for organizing coupons. If you’re interested in using binders to organize your own interests, hobbies, schedule, or home then check out the links below.

Using Binders To Organize Your Life:

The Ultimate Resource Link List

• Flylady.net the site that first introduced me to the idea of “Control Journals”
• Organized Home Lots of information on home management binders as well as printable pages for your binder
• Simple Mom great post all about home management notebooks
• Mom’s Budget plenty of printable pages for your binder
• Executive Homemaker more printable pages
• D*I*Y Planner lots of printable pages in different sizes that can be used in a home management binder or in a more traditional planner
• Organized Christmas several different plans for organizing the holiday chaos along with comprehensive printable pages {really fantastic resource!}

So, there you have it. Binders rock!
Do you use any sort of home or hobby management binders? What are yours like? Tell me in the comments. :)


*To learn about Motivated Moms you can click the affiliate ad in my sponsor’s section. I do receive a {very} small kickback for planners purchased via that link, but that’s not why I recommend the planners. I use them myself and really, really like them. I’ve written about them in the past.