My planner and journal set up changes a lot during a year, here you can read about my ever-changing set up of 2019.
But there are two notebooks which I have now used for several years:
- for weather tracking
- for my lists and trackers
weather tracking
I`m using an A6 notebook from Nanami paper for my weather tracking, as a cover I use the woodbook A6 from Jungholz Design.
I use the A6 notebook from Nanami Paper because it is a small book with a lot of Tomoe River Paper, the book has 480 pages but due to the thin 52gsm Tomoe River Paper it is still slim. I can fit a whole year of daily weather tracking into this little book and still have space enough to add informationen about the yearly happenings in my garden. It has a small 3.7mm grid layout.
As far as I know Nanami Paper will not restock the A6 version but they do have other lovely notebooks with Tomoe River Paper in A5 or now the new one in pocket size. But I guess any other notebook will do fine as well, depending on how much you want to write for each day. The 5-year-version of the Hobonichi Techo would be a good choice as well.
The Nanami Paper Notebook has a sturdy cardstock cover but I wanted to add a cover which will protect this notebook for at least 5 years. My choice was the A6 Woodbook from Jungholz Design, it is a cover made out of wood, mine is made out of Padouk wood with a lovely red tint. It has an elastic closure and normally a pen holder and a page finder, but I removed these two as I do not use them anyway. The cover is very slim, no extra pockets, very sturdy and so nice to touch. You can use any notebook in this cover which has a cardstock cover, the cover must be slim enough to fit into the holding mechanism at the backside. A Leuchtturm cover would be too thick but for exampe a Stalogy notebook fits perfectly well.
and here is the inside of my weather tracker:
I have divided each page to fit 5 years on one page. I can easily compare the weather to previous years and see the changes of the climate.
I`m using small stamps to indicate the main weather per day and add the temperature (mostly the low and high of each day).
At the back of the notebook, starting from the back as well, I add information about my gardening year. When flowers started blooming or when I worked in the garden, when I cut the roses, things like that. I even have enough space to add pictures of any nice flowers.
This year I have rarely used my stamp for "snowing" (actually just twice and I have not even touched a snow shovel this winter), it was just too warm this winter. Therefore the flowers like snowdrops or primroses started two to three weeks earlier than normally. To have 5 years in one book makes it so easy to flip back to previous years and compare each year.
lists and trackers
my planner system changes each year (and various times during a year) but here is another notebook which follows along for quite some years now:
A Stalogy A5 notebook inside an A5 woodbook cover from Jungholz Design!
I use this notebook for all my lists and trackers.
Stalogy from Japan (which can be ordered on Amazon Japan or here in Europe via their webshop) comes in different sizes (A5, B6 and A6) and different page counts. The thick ones have 368 pages, the slim ones 192 pages.
The A5 size has a 4mm grid layout, the others a 5mm grid layout; the paper is white (not bright white, a tiny bit off-white, similar as the white Tomoe River Paper).
The paper is very lovely, it is not as smooth as Tomoe River Paper, it has a bit of a "tooth" and works very well with fountain pen. The paper gives a bit of feedback, the pen is not sliding around on this paper but gives a lovely writing experience. I like it a lot!
I`m using the same cover for my Stalogy in A5 as for my Nanami in A6, the woodbook from Jungholz Design.
The intention is the same: a good protection of my notebook which I will (and have) used for several years, a slim outline but nevertheless a sturdy protection.
The cardstock cover of the Stalogy fits perfectly well into the holding mechanism at the back of the woodbook.
my lists and trackers
you might ask why do you need a whole notebook for all your lists, do you have so many?
... no, not really, but the same as with my weather tracker, I like to flip back to previous years to compare. In this notebook (which is the thick version with 368 pages) I now have started my fourth year and it is not even half full.
I can add lists which never expire and flip back to them whenever I need them. When I add these lists to my yearly planning notebook I would need to rewrite them every year (or even sooner, depending on how long such a notebook would last). Or would need to search notebooks from previous years to look something up and then, find the correct one...!! Now I have an index per year at the front of my notebook and can easily find any of my lists or trackers.
The Stalogy notebooks do not have any page numbers so I was able to add the page numbers per year, each year starts fresh with the number 1.
here are some lists and trackers which I have in my Stalogy:
- my online orders (when did I order where, how much was it, when was it delivered)
- the games of my favorite icehockey team, which is by the way HC Davos here in Switzerland
- a tracker for any TV series, to have an overview which season I have already seen
- movies that I watched and when
- a tracker for my fountain pen ink, when did I use which ink in which pen
- my inks
- the temperatures and precipitation of a year
- the planner sizes
- sleeping hours
- step tracker
- how much water or tea did I drink during a day
- a tracker "when did I last do what"... like watering the plants, cleaning the bathroom etc.
Stalogy with 4mm grid
I have searched for this notebook a long time as I wanted to have one with a 4mm grid and a lot of pages.
The advantage of 4mm grid: you can fit so much more on one page than with a 5mm layout! And it is a bit bigger than 3 or 3.7mm which can get a bit cramped with thicker nibs.
The monthly layout for my sleep/step/water tracker would never fit on an A5 page with 5mm layout, but no problem on 4mm.
The Stalogy notebook opens up nicely and stays open.
I did not want to use Tomoe River Paper in this case as I knew this notebook should last a couple of years, the Stalogy Paper is still thin but not as thin as TRP (TRP 52gsm, Stalogy about 70gsm)
I only use a few stickers in this notebook, just some watercolor flower stickers for decoration, I want to keep it slim and flat.
pens I use:
I use the following pens in my Stalogy notebook:
- any writing in fountain pen ink
- coloring with Caran d`Ache felt tip pens
- coloring with Stabilo 68 felt tip pens
- dots with Tombow dot pens
- black lines with Pigma Micron 0.3 pen (does not smudge with the use of the above mentioned felt tip pens)
Some pens do bleed a tiny bit through this paper, the Stabilo pens more than the Caran d`Ache pens but it depends on the color, blue does not bleed but green does... or pink does but not red....
The Tombow dot pens are fine overall, just sometimes the blue one bleeds a bit.
Fountain pen ink does not bleed at all in this A5 notebook.
The paper is not the thickest one so you will have ghosting with any pen.
I therefore do not use every page but always the right hand page for any tracker, I can therefore ignore any bleeding or ghosting on the back side because I do not write on the left hand side.
We now have March 2020, I have not even used half of this notebook, so I guess it will be around for a couple of years more :-)
This notebook always stays at home, I do not need it during the day, only when I`m away on holidays, then I will take it with me.
I mostly update my daily trackers in the evening, then it is easiest to remember everything and I do not miss a day.
Stay tuned for my next blogpost: my planner set up in a William Hannah discbound planner!
Thank you very much for reading and (planner) peace to everyone!
take care
Andrea
P.S.
I used one big lovely sticker in my list+tracker notebook:
a mandala sticker from Fourtyonehundred on the very first page!
She designs and makes these mandalas herself and they are so lovely. Check out her webpage and see all the original paintings or accessories.
P.S.S.
And as always: I state my own opinion on all the mentioned planners, covers or whatsoever, I do not get paid for mentioning these items, I have paid for all of them out of my own pocket.