My Favorite Time-Management Hack for Managing the Mundane as a Creative

The Pomodoro Method

Tonight, I (Shelby) am using what’s called The Pomodoro Method—but with my own twist (which I’ll get to in a minute).

The method was developed by a university student who had a kitchen timer shaped like a tomato (pomodoro means tomato in Italian). With his original time-management technique, you use a kitchen timer to discipline yourself to short, focused bursts of work, with short breaks in between.

Typically, the breakdown is four rounds of 25 minutes working with 5 minute breaks in between (which equals about 2 hours of focused work). Then after the four rounds you get a longer break (around 25 minutes) before repeating the process. My shorthand for this particular application of the technique is 25-5 x4.

I used this technique a lot when I was freelancing. The work I was doing would often get very granular and repetitive. Sometimes the monotony would make me throw in the towel—especially when I thought about needing to do eight hours of the same tasks. The Pomodoro Method kept me on track, while also legitimizing the need for breaks.

How This Hack Came in Clutch Today

I mentioned at the beginning that I’m using this hack right now—with a twist. Here’s what’s happening: I ended up unexpectedly having a free night. The kids are at the grands, the husband is working late, and the house is blissfully quiet.

It’s also a royal mess. Shortly before being ushered out the door, mine were just two of the nine kiddos running around the place. The “event” wasn’t planned—we just live in a tight-knit community with a lot of cousins. I typically do not let my children leave behind a mess for others to clean up (and neither do the other parents involved), but I happily prioritized more time for a leisurely visit over our normal habits this time.

I figured I could whip the place back into shape as soon as they were out the door.

But as I was tying on my apron and rolling up my sleeves, inspiration struck. I wanted to write more than I wanted to clean my house. (I know there are other creatives out there who resonate with this dilemma.)

November 2, 2022

A video review of the Evergreen Planner

Posted by By Clari Mercier

Posted in Lifestyle Planning, Planner Review

“Do you struggle with consistently using your planner? Do you ever get lost in your planner, and feel like you spend all your energy figuring out how to use it instead of making progress on your actual goals? You need the Evergreen Planner, my friend! This planner was designed by three entrepreneurial stay and home mamas who know what it’s like to wear a lot of hats and juggle lots of plates. This system was designed for women like you, who also need to keep track of lots of responsibilities and see how they all interact with each other.” – Rachel Tenney

October 19, 2022

Turning your planner into a hub for your brain

Posted by By Clari Mercier

Posted in Lifestyle Planning, Planner Tips

Many of you know that the Evergreen Planner system was born from worksheets that Shelby created in one of the most hectic seasons of her life. What is perhaps less well known, is that the beautiful leather cover we sell was born from McCauley’s vision for creating a planner that was both beautiful to look at, extremely practical to use, and would last for years to come.

The first leather covers that we used (pictured above) were handmade by McCauley on her living room floor. But we knew that wouldn’t be a practical way of getting them into the hands of an entire planner community, so McCauley spent a few years searching for a leathersmith who could take her handmade vision and turn it into a beautifully refined handcrafted leather product we could have available to our dear customers.

How the Cover Creates a Hub for Your Brain

Our Annual and Classic planner booklets can be used powerfully on their own, but when bound together in our Cover along with anything* else you need, the booklets are transformed into a personalized system that can stand up to the demands of constant use.

*When we say anything… we mean it. We stuff our covers with stamps, sticky note pads, washi tape, pens, small scissors, etc. Our Covers contain everything we need to braindump, sort and plan on the go! In a purse or loose in your car, this would feel like absolute chaos, but when it’s bound nicely in your leather Cover you can take all these implements on the go without a second thought!

October 5, 2022

Taming Your To-Do List

Posted by By Clari Mercier

Posted in Lifestyle Planning

A Season of Chaos

Earlier this summer I (Clari) was about ready to call it quits with this whole intentional living thing. We had moved to a new town, went through weeks of delayed home renovations, dealt with the whole family getting sick, travelled a bunch, and then came back to a place that felt anything like home. All our normal rhythms that we had built in our old home to sustain our daily habits and responsibilities had fallen apart, and I just didn’t even know where to begin to pick up the pieces.

Every time I had a spurt of energy to do something about my situation, I found myself contemplating the chaos without a clue as to where I should begin.

About that same time, a dear friend text me requesting tips on how to best maximize her Evergreen planner and I couldn’t decide if I should just laugh or cry. There I was as a co-owner of a company who sells a planner that is supposed to make intentional living intuitive and I couldn’t get my life in order. She had asked me how I was using my planner, and the truth was I was hardly using it at all. Like all my habits, the habit of daily planning had fallen to the wayside after so many months of not having a lot of control over my days (anyone who has gone through a slew of home rennovations knows precisely what I’m talking about here).

Taming My To-Do List

So I let the text sit there for about 24 hours until I could come up with a response that was both honest, but would also help and encourage my friend in her own time-management journey. And suddenly I remembered that Shelby (co-owner & creator of the Evergreen Planner), had written an amazing resource titled Taming Your To-Do List. I knew that’s exactly what my friend needed. And as I typed out that text, I realized that it was also exactly what I needed. Not even bothering to search for it among the many files on my computer, I went straight to our website and downloaded the guide.