Home Management Binder: Planning and Contacts

Updated on March 29, 2022

Home Management Binder: Planning and Contacts. Create a place to keep track of all your most important planning information and contacts.

Last week, I shared a supply list of what you need to set up your Home Management Binder. I also listed some categories you may want to include in your binder. Remember, this binder is meant to work for YOU and your family. Since each family is unique, so will be each of your binders!

However, I thought I would share some details about my binder that may help you to get organized and get yours set up faster. The first two categories I am going to cover are 1) Planning and 2) Contacts. These will both be easy and quick to set up once you have gathered all the necessary information.

Before we get started, I want to share with you a few photos of my binder so you can see exactly how mine is set up. I used my free printable cover page I included in last week’s post for the cover and spine of my binder.

On the inside you will see that I have all of my folder binder tabs labeled with the appropriate categories. I used my label maker to create the labels for the binder tabs.

At the very front of my binder I have an Emergency Contact sheet. This lists all important numbers I might need to access quickly – poison control, local police department, doctor’s offices, dentist’s offices, and school phone numbers. This way, I don’t have to go searching for those numbers. The last thing you want to do is wade through a sea of paperwork or your phone book to find the pediatrician’s phone number in the middle of the night when your child gets sick.

The first section I have in my binder is a planning section. Right behind the main folder/binder tab I have a perpetual calendar of dates. I include birthdays, anniversaries and any other important date I need to remember on a yearly basis. When I am updating my wall calendar or planner, I can go to these sheets and quickly transfer all the important dates I need to remember and potentially shop for.

After that, I included a school district calendar I received from my son’s school at the beginning of the year. I simply hole punched it and placed it in my binder. There is too much writing on the individual days of the week for me to use it as my monthly calendar, but there are a lot of dates I need to remember regarding his school in there. I can quickly access the calendar at any time and I refer to it every month when updating my planner.

The last part of the planning section includes monthly tabs. Anytime I receive a calendar I may need to refer back to or anything else that needs to happen during a particular month – it goes in here. I include library schedules, school breakfast/lunch schedules, and sports schedules here. Any piece of paper that has a date on it that I will need to remember but don’t want to transfer to my planner right away goes here, also.

I also include things like coupon codes or other time sensitive materials that will need to be used in that month. For example, each month we get a coupon code to order books from my son’s school. I just place it in the correct month and I can always find it when I need it.

In the very back of my binder I have a section called, ‘Contacts’. Here I include any contact information I collect.

First, I keep a contact sheet that is not necessarily emergency information, but it is nice information to have all in one place. I have listed all our important household numbers. I have included the name of the company and our account number, what the service is, and a primary and secondary phone number (if available). This has come in handy when our power has gone off or we have had a leaky pipe blow! I don’t want to have to dig through a bunch of old bills to find the right phone number to call.

I use the address book on my computer to store all the addresses and phone numbers of my family and friends. About once per year, I print out a copy of this list to have a hard copy to include in my binder. This way, if anything happens to my computer, I will still have all that important information in a safe place. Also, if I am writing thank you cards or a quick note, it is sometimes easier to access my binder than to use my computer to look up an address.

I keep several business card page protectors in this section as well. If I receive a business card I may need to refer to later, I just place it in my binder. I only place cards into the binder that I think I may need to refer to on a regular basis. If I get a card I want to keep but don’t think I will need frequently, I place it into my business card sorter in my desk in my craft room. At some point I may scan all these cards into my computer, but I am paper person. I like having hard copies of things even if I also have them on my computer.

Again, this is one more example of what works for me, may or may not work for you. Pick and choose what information is helpful to you.

Today I am including several free printables for you to use in your binder – an emergency contact sheet, a perpetual calendar, and a utility phone list.

First, you can print off this emergency contact sheet and fill in the information. I keep mine in a page protector. Since it is the first page of my binder it gets handled a lot and seems to hold up better being in a page protector.

This download is for personal use only. Do not share the direct link to the .pdf/.jpg file. When sharing, please link back to the original post.

Second, I have a perpetual calendar for you. Write down all the birthdays, anniversaries and any other important date that happens on the same day each year.

Last, I have a frequently accessed phone list. You can fill out important numbers for your household. I have pre-filled out services most of us use. I have included some blank spaces at the bottom if you have additional information to add. I have added to mine names and numbers of our repair companies (example – heating and cooling service).

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