Showing posts with label planning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label planning. Show all posts

Monday, November 9, 2015

So Many Planners, So Many Days...The Planner Girl Dilemma...What to Do with My Franklin Covey

Planner Progress in my Midori
I have always loved paper, pens, doodling, listing, planning, and knowing what tomorrow holds. Why?

1-I like to be organized...I think I have the organization gene

2-Paper, paper, paper love...when I was in high school, and this was the late 1970's people, I bought the pink and sometimes multicolored notebook paper. Everybody else had white.

I am on the computer a lot for both my day job and personal business. Ink on paper is a respite from that. Therapy. Like my stitching and knitting is therapy. Scrapbooking is therapy. 

But pretty much since the 1920's, it has been predicted that our society would be paperless by now, and we are anything but that!

Maybe we don't really want to live our entire lives digitally? 

I don't know. But what I do know is there is nothing like a gorgeous, brand new crisp planner in your hands. 

In the past, when planners came in black or brown with very officey pages, I was making my own planners out of things like those fabric covered journals, notebooks covered in fun paper and stickers, and making my own custom pages for the ring bound planners I had.

Over the last few years as the planners have gotten pretty and more creative, I've tried different ones. The planner community calls it "planner peace" when you arrive at just the right combination for organizing your days, months and years. There are many who have upwards of four, five, or six planners at a time.
My homemade home planner

I don't find that peaceful or practical. For my daily planner, I like having all my stuff together in one place. My planner operates as if it's my personal assistant, and I really like that. I call it "Planner Progress." It's something that works well if you have a ring binder with different sections and plenty of room, or a Midori Travelers Notebook, as I prefer, with my five booklets inside dedicated to different purposes, and a nice six-pocket folder.

I actually made an 8 1/2X11 home planner. It is big and bulkly on purpose. It could be a life planner as I first called it, but it became my home planner. It has folders for mail, bills, recipe clippings, a recipe section in the back and everything to do with the business of running my home. I made planner pages for it, but they are all about life at home, and it still works really well. You can read more about how I made it here for part one, and here for part two.
I turned two older planners into an art journal.

But back to why so many planner girls like so many planners! I think on YouTube it is their job. They review them, so they have to buy them, sometimes getting them to review for free, try them, and set them up for the camera. And that's understandable. And I doubt they actually use most of them. Many end up having giveaways which is especially nice when they receive free product from the company. I love planner videos!

In real life, I think there are people who are sort of addicted to all the pretty planners and they divide up how they use them. And this is really what you would have to do. Here are my ten ideas for some of the things you could use different planners for:
  • Memory Keeping/Scrapbook Style of the days
  • Travel Planner
  • Journal Planner--writing down a sentence or two about each day
  • Homekeeping Planner (like my big homemade planner above)
  • Craft Planner--perfect to keep in your crafting area, keeping track of your makes, supplies, crafty wish list, craft shopping, and crafting business
  • Diet/Exercise planner
  • Bible Planner--sermon notes, favorite verses, daily inspiration
  • Recipe Planner--menus, recipe notes, shopping lists
  • School Mom Planner--everything having to do with children's activities and schedules
  • Happy planner--writing down something you're thankful for every day, something that brought you joy, and your future plans for happiness!

I'm sure we all need more reasons to buy more planners! (of course I'm kidding...remember I'm the frugal one who made her own planners) Planning isn't what it used to be, remember that. You don't have to have daily appointments to have a reason to have a planner. If you love pretty paper, stickers, diecuts, washi tape, and being happy...you could have fun with a pretty planner.

Check out where I turned my past planners into an art journal/junk journal--I still love it.

So the other day I was going through a box and found some of my old planners, including this Franklin Covey compact style planner. I remember loving this fat little thing! And I had everything in it. I still like it, and would love to use it. I'm just too happy with my Stitchydori to convert it over to a daily planner.
 
New setup for an old Franklin Covey planner

That won't stop me though. This red compact planner was last used in 2006, and it is in excellent shape! I'm not even sure if it's real leather or faux! I don't think I paid that much for it though. Franklin Covey planners are America's answer to the Filofax, and you can still get them. And they sell this particular one on Ebay because they don't make it anymore. The rings are high quality and the cover is durable. I love the zipper pocket too.


So I'm setting it up. Using scrap paper (I'm still stash busting this year), and I have to say my little corner rounder punch does very well for this kind of project. Check back later in the week and we'll see how this old-to-new-planner setup is going and what I plan to use this guy for!


Eat, Write, Dream, Stitch  


Monday, March 5, 2012

Afternoon Plans

What are you doing this afternoon? Don't you love afternoon plans? I don't know why, but when the sun is out and my greenhouse is warm and lit up, I suddenly have the urge to do so many things. First, I want to gather up my stitching and bring it out to that lovely long sunporch called my "greenhouse" and put my feet up and cross-stitch for the next two hours with a big glass of iced tea and lemon, and the cats playing and enjoying life.

It's just for days like this that I keep a little butterfly cross-stitch kit, I made up myself, hanging on a handle by my sewing table in case I get the urge to see a butterfly come to life on a piece of aida cloth. But, unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of stitching for two hours--so I can only wish. I am caught up on the laundry (that usually lasts for five minutes) and the house is not in bad shape. I need to practice my violin, plant more tomato seeds, work on revisions in my play, find my pedometer for a walking competition that starts tomorrow, get a few things at the store including some free Silk almond milk--one of those coupons that  doubles to the actual price of the product!--clean up my desk, sew the straps onto my latest girlie apron, and embroider two new designs I'm working on. Well, I guess that's enough for an afternoon! And, sadly, I'm not even sure what I'm fixing for dinner. But I'm thinking that a big salad and some chicken cordon bleu sounds lovely.
First I have to wrestle the ribbon away from Joseph.

Now, I know if I get started on cleaning my desk, I will without a doubt do a little piddling. I was piddling  through some stuff the other day and found this 1948 falling-apart fat encyclopedia hiding in a drawer. I remember encyclopedia salesmen in the 1970's selling whole sets of big, slick heavy black-cover books of knowledge (pre-internet), so this old fat thing is kind of a wonder. I snipped off some ribbon to tie it up and put it out in the open somewhere. It is funny to look things up.





This old encyclopedia is fun to look through--but I'm too busy!

Oh to be Minnie, without a care in the world!
So, I will be fortunate to check one or two things off my list today, and thank goodness that the chicken cordon bleu is frozen! But I'm definitely going to need some tea! It's only Monday.
Eat well. Write often. Dream big and little. Stitch something...it's good for the soul.