Using Workflowy to Plan Your Annual Holidays

A simple technique

WorkFlowy is the perfect way to plan and manage your yearly celebrations.

Simply list all of your annual birthdays, anniversaries and holidays you want to celebrate in chronological order…

…with a templated set of nodes inside of them

Add in at the top of the list a node for “Gifts”.

You can have a “trigger list” of the kinds of gifts you might typically give.

As well as a list of the people who you typically might give gifts to.

Then, when planning a celebration, for “Ian’s Birthday” for example, simply look at ‘Gift ideas for Ian‘…

…last years celebration plans…

…and brainstorms for his birthday celebrations.

And now you have a helpful context to plan his upcoming birthday.

Once a celebration has passed, simply move the node to the bottom of the list,

and voilà…it is there, ready for next year, and the next celebration coming up is automatically at the top of the list. You now have a rolling flywheel of yearly celebrations.

If a celebration is a one time event, like a wedding, you can put it into the list in the right chronological place, and once it is past, simply complete or delete it.

Why this is so great

I have tried a lot of systems over the years, but once I started using WorkFlowy, it became effortless to look ahead and plan gift giving and events that are coming up around the yearly bend. “Review Our Family Year planner” is on my weekly list of things to do, so I regularly engage with it.

Since I have a specific place to record ideas for gifts and particular celebrations, all my best ideas are easy to find when it comes time to make specific plans. And now that you can add photos to WorkFlowy, it is even better. If I see something that I might want to make or buy as a gift for someone, I can snap a pic and there it will be, waiting for me when the time is right

And if someone you know has a wishlist on Amazon or other website, or a registry for an upcoming wedding, you can insert the link under their name to take you directly to their list:

If you have a task list that you use to manage your days and weeks, you can create tasks related to a celebration directly inside of the holiday plans node, then mirror them onto your tasks list to make sure everything gets done in preparation for the day.

You Can Do It! I believe in you!

So, time to get started. Jump into your WorkFlowy home, create a “Yearly Holidays” list and start listing all the holidays and celebrations you want to focus on each year, put them in chronological order, and start brainstorming.

If you want to be super-cool, you can even create a “New Holiday” template, and just click on that every time you think of a new holiday you want to celebrate

Now ride the wave toward your next holiday!

Then look at what is coming up next in the year, start making plans and getting prepared, and finally stop buying Christmas gifts on December 23rd for the first time in your life! You can do it!