I’ll Never Write a Paper To-Do List Again — I’ll Use This Prettier, Smarter Alternative

I’m a to-do list person. I have a notebook for my work tasks, a personal planner for my life admin, and a notebook at home for weekend to-dos like cleaning, laundry, and other tasks. I need to write everything down; otherwise, frankly, I will forget. But I often keep my to-do lists on random sheets of paper that inevitably get lost under my pile of mail or even tossed out by accident — and then I’m back to square one. 

So when I saw a clever video of how one person made their own to-do list with a picture frame, a piece of paper, and dry erase markers, I was immediately intrigued. Finally, a cute, permanent, and practical solution to my to-do list problem. Now I’m going to try it. 

Instead of using a piece of paper and a pen to write down your most urgent to-dos, consider one hack posted by the TikTok account Daily Original Vids run by Jeff and Liz Richards. In a compilation hack, the fourth trick shows how you can take an ordinary picture frame and transform it into a reusable to-do list board.  

To make the hack work, you simply grab a picture frame that comes with a kickstand, put a piece of lined paper inside of it, and write on the glass of the frame with an erasable marker. You can hang the frame on an entryway, kitchen, or office wall, or you could prop it up on a table that gets a lot of traffic. Ideally you’d want a frame that’s at least 8×11-inch big. However, if you do want a smaller one or bigger one, that could work too — just know there will be less (or more) room to write on. 

I’ve already mentioned that this hack makes sense as a way to make sure that you don’t lose your paper to-do list, and in that vein, I think that this is a truly practical alternative to paper. Additionally, this feels like an actually gorgeous version of a traditional dry-erase board that, when not in use, could just feel like a framed piece of art. 

I also appreciate the sustainability of the hack. If you have any picture frames lying around, this hack is an easy way to make sure one piece of paper and one old frame get a lot more use than both items were getting before. You could use the frame for anything — a grocery list, a to-do list, or just sweet messages to your loved ones that they can read as they’re on their way out of the front door for the day. The possibilities are truly endless, and when the words are wiped away, it’s impossible to lose your permanent to-do list.