Friday, January 9, 2015

New Year, New Planner

Well, here we are -- already a whole week into the new year. How did that happen? And of course, a new year means a new planner and a new diary. For me, those are two separate entities: My planner is just for future planning, appointments, schedules; my diary is for noting what actually happens on a daily basis. And I'm talking paper here -- I've tried the digital route, but it just doesn't work for me. I need to write things down.

I have trouble sticking with any ONE planner for a whole year, and tend to switch every few months. Sometimes that's confusing, but it does keep things from getting boring. For the last several years I've been switching back and forth between my various Filofaxes and the Erin Condren Life Planners. I started off 2014 with the Erin Condren, but after a few months I decided to try my personal size Finsbury Filo, and ended up sticking with that for the whole second half of the year. It was super convenient -- I was able to have both my planner and my diary in one very portable book, just by using different divisions (monthly, weekly, daily).  But two things bothered me: There wasn't much space for writing my daily notes, and I missed the colorful content of the Life Planners -- Filo pages are pretty dull if, like me, you're not really into doing a lot of decorating.

So for 2015, I've gone back to Erin Condren, at least to start the year; we'll see how long I last. As usual, I had a hard time deciding on the cover design -- you can do quite a bit of customizing with these planners. I finally came up with a very simple black and white design that I was sure I'd love -- until I actually saw it. When I saw the planner "in person," it was just too stark (and actually sort of funereal).

Taffy cover design in black and white

But the EC covers are now interchangeable (!) so I was able to order a new cover set to replace the first one I ordered. The new one is much more colorful and much more fun to look at everyday.

Fleur Feliz cover design in teal and white

And for my daily notes, here's what I'm using in 2015:

Yes, that's Snoopy under the strap!
It's a Moleskine large daily planner in the Peanuts Limited Edition. It has one page for each day of the year, in a size that's big enough (5 x 8.5) for me to write down all the stuff I write everyday, but small enough to cart around easily. And I'm hoping that since I really love Snoopy and Charlie Brown and all their crew, I'll be inspired to stick with it all year.

And just for the record: I'm in no way affiliated with the Erin Condren folks, Filofax, or Moleskine. I just enjoy using their products. 

2 comments:

  1. I have tried keeping a daily diary but find I never have enough to write about. Either I need to not try or I need to get more of a life. I bought a new planner from Moochithings but haven't started it yet -- still working with my little bitty red "Keep Calm and Carry On" number I bought at the office supply. I keep a running calendar as my home page on the computer and I try to keep a calendar on my tablet but somehow that just doesn't work a well -- I guess I am still a paper kind of gal. I guess my blog is my diary. Sort of.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well my diary is really just a sort of log book where I keep very brief notes about stuff that goes on during each day -- where I go, what meds I'm taking, movies watched, etc. And I really could do that on the computer or on my phone, but I just seem to forget about doing it when I'm not actually writing it down. Keeping a calendar as your home page is a great idea, though -- I should try that.

      Delete

Welcome to Joysweb! And thanks for leaving me a comment. I love to hear from visitors. I do usually moderate comments on posts that are more than a few days old, and comments with suspicious links will not be approved.

Also, please note that while I appreciate blog awards, I never play award tag games. I think you all deserve awards!