Planner Peace - I don`t care about it anymore!
This sounds harsh, right? But, I have learned in the past years that planner peace can change daily or weekly. It is what fits best at one certain moment!
I set up a planner, I think that this is the perfect set up but while using it the flaws come up and I`m rethinking my system.
This can happen within a few days, or within a week, sometimes after a month. And then I change it again, but I don`t feel bad about it, it gives me joy to find my set up and to try out new things, new sizes or new systems.
my planner journey in 2021
2021 was especially interesting, I went from A6 size to HBxWA5 (which is a japanese size of personal high and A5 wide), to B6 and B6 wide to A5. Inbetween back to A6 because I have bought so many nice covers in this size.
From rings to discs, back to rings, to an occasional bound book, back to rings. Always having the idea to have everything in one cover. I did not want to open this one, then open another one, having three open covers on my desk, taking up too much space, but one-for-all. Open one cover and have everything in easy reach.
There were always reasons to change: A6 suddenly being to small, but I love it because it is so portable. But writing in it ... I always had the feeling to "squish" everything onto one page and in the end didn`t like it.
B6 and B6 wide was working well with discs but to have all-in-one I needed bigger discs and it was not portable anymore.
HBxWA5 is such a lovely size, wide as A5 with lots of space but not as high as A5, which means a bit more square. And I rather like wide pages and not slim ones. But it is very hard to get any covers for this size, I only know of two japanese companies (Ashford Style and Mark`s) which offer this size, otherwise you need nice shops on Etsy who will create such a special-sized cover for you. But in the end not portable either.
Then going to A5 size, sooo much better to write in, having so much space on one page, no more squishing, with 30mm rings, months, days, weeks, tracker, lists... all in one cover... actually quite great! And discovering Filofax covers again! After years in my youth where I used Filofax in a smaller size, then years having other covers, now I remembered them and they have so many nice covers.
But taking it with me in my handbag? No way, way to heavy and too big!
And then going away from my all-in-one-idea, thinking about what do I need when I take my planner with me and what can I leave at home on my desk.
Here we are, my current set up, as of 09Dec 2021:
(from bottom to top)
- A5 Kecheli Notebooks ring bound cover for lists and trackers
- A5 Filofax notebook for daily journaling
- B6 Muji Planner for appointments and tasks
- A6 Pedori Vienna ring bound cover for weather tracking
I will go into detail about how I use every planner in future blogposts and I will show you the inside of each planner.
Just some short information about each one:
° Kecheli Notebooks: this is a shop on Etsy from Turkey, she makes lovely ringbound covers with felt, leather and laces. With closures with buttons you can select at time of ordering, with flaps, without, with very lovely colors for every taste. I`m in no way connected to her shop, I just ordered 4 of her covers and really like them. She mostly has personal and A5 covers.
All my lists and trackers are now in this binder. They have 30mm rings, space enough to have the current year and past years in one binder to always have a good overview.
And, I can leave it at home on my desk because I do not need my lists and trackers when I`m out.
° Filofax notebook: this notebook from Filofax in A5 has small wire rings, not normal rings as Filofax normally has. The pages can easily be taken out of it to be rearranged. And the very best thing: this paper is very fountain pen friendly! Not too smooth, but no bleeding, no feathering and nearly no ghosting!
My choice of notebook for my daily journaling. I use lined paper, and just write as much or as little per day as I like, one day after the other
° B6 Muji planner: I wanted to have a small portable planner where I can write down my appointments in a monthly overview. In addition have a weekly vertical overview on the left and grid paper on the right. And grid paper at the end for notes.
Not perfect perfect for my fountain pens, but I think I can make it work as I only need some inks for color coding and I think I can find some which do not bleed. Because bleeding of inks... I DO NOT LIKE IT!
° A6 Pedori Vienna leather cover: another very lovely shop on Etsy. Beautifully made leather covers in various sizes. I bought my A6 second hand, because I was looking for a dark blue cover in A6 and strangely dark blue covers are not very often made.
This cover houses my weather tracker. It is like a Hobonichi 5 year planner, on each page five boxes, one for each year, to have one page for 01Sep for example to enter information of 5 years.
I love to look back to past years to see what the weather was on a certain day. I decided to print my own pages because I did not need the free space which Hobonichi has on the right hand side. I rather wanted to have one page per day. And luckily 365 days fit into this A6 planner with 30mm rings.
Stay tuned, I will go into details of each planner, cover, setup and paper in future blogpost.
Thank you to all, stay healthy and (planner) peace to everyone!
Andrea