Lifestyle + Homeschool Planner from Plum Paper

The past year has brought a lot of changes, and one of the most challenging for many families has been school. Whether your kids are learning in-person, distance, hybrid, or are homeschooled, there's a lot of organization and preparation that you need to handle. That's especially true this school year, with the constant pivoting that's happened just in the course of the past few months. I've partnered with Plum Paper to share how I keep track of our daughter's lessons with one of their beautiful planners!

Plum Paper Homeschool Planner

I've been using Plum Paper as my personal planners the past few years, and this year I decided I needed to add a homeschool planner on top of that. Our daughter Harper has been homeschooled since kindergarten and she's in second grade now. This is the first year we've followed a curriculum and I personally need a little structure to help her stay on top of that. I've always been big on lists and checking things off, so using a paper planner just feels right.

One of my favorite things about Plum Paper is how customized they are. You can choose from three planner sizes, and this time I chose 8.5 x 11". I like the 7 x 9" size for my personal planner but I wanted to go a little bigger for my homeschool planner. Plum Paper also offers over 100 covers and designs to choose from which is so fun! Whether you want seasonal, floral, classic, or a totally different style, they've got you covered. I went with the striped "Razzmatazz" cover with a monogram and the year - I absolutely love it!

You start the planner with goals for the year from both the student and the teacher. I think it's so important for kids to learn how to set goals and it's also really fun to see what your kids say and check in throughout the year to see how they are coming along.

Plum Paper Monthly Layout

I tend to use the monthly pages most in my planners. Since this is specifically a homeschool planner, I have noticed I'm using the weekly formats more but I still use the monthly pages to keep track of the kids' extra-curriculars and family events. The bright colors in Plum Paper planners make me so happy and I use felt tip pens - the paper is so soft and the ink never goes through!

At the beginning of each month you'll also see a monthly highlight page. I think this is a great feature to keep track of important family events. Parents or kids can set goals for the month, or you can set them together like we did. While most people's lives are a little less activity-filled than usual, I think we're all hoping for normalcy soon and are happy to fill these pages with what we can.

Plum Paper Weekly Layout

Once you get into the weekly sections of the planner you'll have even more control over what that looks like. The homeschool planner offers three different layouts and I chose one where I can customize the categories across the top. For our daughter I chose to fill the categories with the following:

• Chores
• Handwriting
• Reading
• Science
• Math
• Exercise
• Choice

I usually fill out the whole week on Sunday and we work through items, checking them off as we go. If there are things we don't get to, we simply forward them to the next day. My homeschool teaching style is fairly laid-back because that's what works for us, but if you are more rigorous this planner will work great for you too. That's the beauty of these planners - they're so easy to customize!

Since Harper is just in second grade and needs me to keep her on track, I thought it would be a great time to work on meal planning too. I've already got my planner out for her lessons, so I added Plum Paper's Meal Builder section to the end. It's the perfect tool for making well-rounded meals! Plum Paper offers quite a few add-on options so be sure to check them all out.

I love to add big bold details to my planners, so Plum Paper's Stickers were a must-have. Owning this planner has helped our school year run so smoothly. Plus, it's just pretty to look at and makes me happy! If you're not homeschooling, Plum Paper still has options for you, from life planners to goal planners to teacher planners and more. They even have a planner for distance learning parents!

• Buy it: Plum Paper
• Win it: One lucky reader will take home a planner from Plum Paper! This is a US giveaway ending 1/27. Enter using the form below, and good luck!

Open to the US only, ages 18 and up. Ends 1/27/21 at 11:59 PM EST.
Enter below, and good luck!

Disclosure: I received this planner in exchange for an honest review. As always, all opinions are my own. One winner will be randomly selected using the Giveaway Tools random selector and notified via email. Once notified, the winner will have 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way associated with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest or Google. Void where prohibited.