I like to make lists and plan out my life. A lot. I love to be organized and have a calendar to look at.
The problem is, I’m picky.
Very very picky.
And have been looking for a planner that suits my needs for months and months (might even be years at this point.)
At some point I realized, “Hey, I rock. I know how to make books. I’ll make my own.”
So I planned out what I wanted, created documents in Photoshop. Figured out what kind of book I wanted.
And realized I was out of ink in my printer (About $80 to fill it.) and I needed to buy a Cinch (at least &70-90). And my plan went bye bye for a few months because we just couldn’t afford it.
Then over the weekend, we were working on our secret project and planning out some things for the next few things and I just got fed up with not having a planner. So I decided to change my plan a bit, do it all by hand and just use those little O ring things to bind it for now.
I’m not sure I’m completely pleased with the cover. I had a lot of fun making it though! I used canvas, un-primed and sat on the floor playing with watercolors and alcohol ink! It was very messy but very freeing. For the cover I also embroidered a flower and a little swirl (very messy and not perfect at all) then I drew in some leaves and a butterfly.
My little beginning page. I was sifting through my scraps box and found an old bubble mailer and thought it would be fun to use. I stamped the Polaroid hand carved stamp I made and then used white out to write “2011”. Also, if you can see that little purple and green thing peaking out in the bottom right corner? That’s a little pocket I made. I took a small envelop and glued some paper on it to make it pretty, it sticks out pretty far so while I love the paper and I need a pocket, I might re-do it.
I made little beginning pages for each month out of Kraft paper. I used colored pencils (been soo long since I used them!), tech pen and scrap paper to jazz it up. (I also made little tabs! Can you see, in the top right? I love tabs.)
Right after the beginning page for each month is the “month-at-a-glance” page. I hand drew this out. I measured a little (with a ruler) but then realized I couldn’t draw a straight line (with a ruler) so I just made it mess and fun! I really like it! I used a letter stencil to put the days of the week in.
After the “month-at-a-glance” obviously comes the week! Same kind of thing here as the month one.
Now here comes the problem. So far it seems like a pretty standard planner (just a little jazzed up and personalized) right? But I take lots of notes, I’m always carrying a notebook, or sketchbook with me to write down thoughts, places to go, artists/blogs to check out, blog ideas, doodles…everything. And if I had a planner and a separate journal/notebook/sketchbook…one would get neglected (probably the planner) because it’s just a hassle to carry both (especially when I don’t even carry a purse anymore!)
I’ve never seen a planner that had extra notebook, sketchbook pages in it so that’s why I made my own. There are 14 pages after each week (lined paper, kraft paper, printer paper and cardstock) plus 1 watercolor page (I hope to try to do a 52 week journal at some point and having it here might help.) I also cut up a bunch of old journals (scary!) and decided to put them at the end of each week. I figure it’s better this way. They don’t sit in an old journal, never seen. Now I see them every day, week, month for inspiration and encouragement!
Here is April and on the left is one of my old journal pages. So far, I only have the end of March and April in the book. It takes a lot of work to put together 1 month and I need bigger O rings!
There are also about 5 pages at the end for “Like a Bird Ideas”. I’m thinking about also including a meal planner in here somewhere and maybe a page for exercise or tracking writing. But for now, I’m going to see how it goes with what I have.
Here’s the back page. This canvas was mostly alcohol ink.
So there it is. I love it, and I’m so excited to start using it!
♥Do you have a planner? Bought or handmade? Let me see it! I love looking at planners.
(Also. If I made some printables for the month/week sheets…would you want them?)
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