Let's Get Organized!

 The Month of January is always a "Get Organized" Month to me.  So I sat down,  designed and built a Message Center for our home.  I wanted to build a Message Center with a Calendar that I could keep track of our schedules.  This is what I came up with and wanted to share with you...

 The Message Center measures roughly 30x 22 inches.  It can be hung on the wall or on a door.

*Note, I took pictures of it leaning up against a black background.  The Message Center system itself is all of the white board that is shown here with white edges and has all of the featured items displayed here...

It has a Magnetic Chalkboard to the left that is made with sheet metal and painted with Chalkboard paint. It has built in cubbies on the right and lower portion to hold office supplies and whatever else you might need to store. Keys, Scissors, tape etc.

I framed my calendar with a wood 8 x10 frame. I used some decorative tape to mark off certain items like vacations etc.  With the whole background of the Chalkboard portion being metal, in order to hold the frame onto the metal Chalkboard background, I glued some magnets to the back of the wood frame.
 I found my calendar at http://yourway.net/printables/2013-calendar.pdf . 

 Here is a shot of the frame with some magnets glued on the back of it, I actually have put a few more magnets on the back of this frame due to the weight of it. 

The Frame can be removed to change out the calendar or you may not want the wood frame at all.  Here is a shot with the frame removed.  I found a notepad with a magnet on back, like the yellow one in the photo that can be used for listing items or misc. notes...

I wanted a place to have the date for each day displayed.  I put vinyl on that says: Today's Date:  The numbers are wooden numbers.  I have seen numbers like these at Michaels or you may be able to search and find them online.  I had mine cut from a man that cuts wood for me periodically.  

The fun part about the numbers is they have magnets on them so they can be changed out each day. I have the extra numbers stored in one of the cubbies.

Here is another shot of the numbers changed to a different date:

Here is a magnet on the back of one of the numbers:

If you do not have or like the idea of the wood numbers, the date can be changed daily with Chalk!

The lower half I put vinyl on that says Goals.  This can be used to mark or write out with chalk your daily "To do's" or plan out your menu for the week.  Write out your goals you want to reach that week or with a magnet like this yellow one here, you can place it on what day of the week it is that day...

Items listed of what you might need to do that week. This lower cubby can be for Misc. items, mail, etc.  I found some cute blue clothespins and pinned a picture of my kids to the front of the cubby...

With Menus:

Here is the cubby where I store the numbers to be changed.  It can be used for whatever you may need:

The next cubby can hold chalk, scissors, whatever...

This final one can be for keys.  I have washi tape here for now...

Now another fun thing you can do with this system is, each month you can change out the calendar and also accent it for the Holiday or season that month.  With Valentines coming, I thought I would show you how I  accented it ...

On my calendar, I used some red accented washi tape to denote Valentines:

changed my numbers to wooden numbers painted red and glittered...

Found a cute red glittery heart and to mark the day of the week a red magnet...

If you would like to see how I made these wooden knob magnets, you can here or by clicking on the photo below:

I wanted to show you a shot of this hung on our Pantry door...

I found some cute blue scissors to match my cute blue clothespin...

The bottom cubby has turned into my decorative tape cubby...

I have loved accenting our Calendar with different types of tape...  I love this banner tape I used to mark off Parker's Birthday...

In a follow up post, I will show you how I built our Message Center!

 

With Much Love & Gratitude,