A Look at My New Daybook
January 11, 2012
Well, my "2012 Daybook" is finally done and ready to use ... so I thought you might like to take a peek. :)
Very simply, this is a homemade, spiral-bound planner - with a page devoted to each week of the year, as well as a page for each day. It does not contain a month @ a glance calendar, because that's something I like to have out in view at all times, so it needs to be separate. (More on that later.)
Here's how it looks from the side ...
(I had the plastic "coil" binding done at Staples - it cost me $4.77.)
The daybook itself is made up of scrapbooking paper (cover page, dividers) and regular copy paper (planning pages). I used "ivory" copy paper (rather than standard white) because, to me, it looked softer, and more "vintage." I also used a firm cardboard "back" piece to give the daybook some solidity. (For this, I re-used a bit of cardboard that came inside a package of binder pages.)
The cover page is a collage of scrapbooking papers, in shades I love - soft reds and yellows. And I chose these lovely crocheted roses for the front cover ...
... but!
Unfortunately, they are too bumpy! When I go to work in my planner, the flowers make the writing surface unlevel - which will drive me crazy! The whole reason I prefer a spiral-bound planner over a three-hole binder is so I can lay my pages flat.
So - as much as I adore these pretty flowers - I decided to peel them off and do something different for the cover.
And here's what I came up with:
Not as pretty, but it will do the trick. :)
Ok, so now let's look inside the daybook ...
On the left I have a spot where I'll write my personal contact information (name, address, phone, etc.). On the right-hand side is the cover page for the January-February (Deep Winter) section ...
A pretty blue gingham check with little calendars ...
Then we have the meat of the planner ... the planning pages!
Each week of the year has four pages (so there are 208 pages in all).
The order is this:
1. My Week @ a Glance.
I used a ruler and black pen for most of my page designs. I also used some pretty vintage clipart for embellishment.
So this page has space for planning "Special Days," "Dinners," "Nature Notes," "Shopping & Errands," "Home & Garden Tasks," "Correspondence," and the week's "Budget."
After the weekly planning page, I have:
2. A Daily Worksheet.
A page for each day of the week:
The daily planning page includes space for an agenda (divided into a.m./noon/p.m.), chores, spending, learning/living notes for each of my children, things "to-do and remember," the night's supper and random notes.
After Sunday's daily page, there is the next week's planning page - and so on!
Each season has its own divider - a piece of colored scrapbook paper with tiny calendars designating the time of year.
March-April (Early Spring) is a soft aqua:
May-June (Late Spring) is a pretty grass green:
July-August (High Summer) is a sunny yellow:
September-October (Autumn) is a warm, chestnut brown:
November-December (Holiday) is a cheerful red:
And at the back I have a page for the New Year:
And here's that back cardboard piece I mentioned above:
The planner sits out on my counter next to my homekeeping binder. I like to keep the binder open to the month at hand, and the planner open to the current day.
Eventually, once my new desk arrives, I will have this all set up in my "home office" corner.
*
So, there you have it - my Daybook at-a-(long, detailed)-glance. :)
And yes, for those keeping track (because goodness knows, I go back and forth on these matters!), this planner does take place of the "MomAgenda" I had been using. It also incorporates the planning sheet I had stapled to the front of my weekly file folders. So far I'm really enjoying it - I love the look and feel of it, and the design seems to make sense. Because I thought long and hard about what I need to plan for (think of, attend to) in a given week and on a daily basis, I have a spot for writing out the tasks and reminders I truly need. I'll keep you posted on how it's working for me as we move through the year!
*
Now, as I've mentioned, I've recently had trouble leaving comments here at my blog. Well, I finally heard back from Typepad and the solution was very simple - and the issue was kind of embarrassing! I had somehow marked my own comments as "spam," lol!
So I got a couple of my comments out of "spam jail" and posted them - I will work through the rest of them as time allows this week.
Well, I hope you all enjoyed this peek at my new daybook, and I hope you are all having a nice week. Very bright and chilly here today ... but a storm's moving in late tonight. I have my fingers crossed for snow - it always snows on January 12th! ;) - but it sounds like it will mostly be rain.
Oh well ... the Winter's still very young!
So have a great Wednesday, my friends ... I will see you again very soon!
:)