Planner Hacks of the Unhinged Kind

There comes a time in all of our lives when nothing seems to make sense and at the same time... somehow it still does.

Do allow me to elaborate.

While the aesthetics of Traveler´s Notebook do tickle my visual senses, the very narrowness makes me feel subconsciously limited. There always is the option to tilt the notebook to its side and enjoy the width of a4, while taking positives from the very portability of a regular size notebook (11 cm´s). But that just feels... wrong. Or is it just not being accustomed? Food for thought, right there. 

Another narrowness lurks upon the paper of personal sized planners. They are only 9,5 cm´s wide. There are those who write comfortably to personal sized paper and given the right tip or nib, suitably dry enough of an ink etc... so can I but it is not enjoyable. I now journal and take notes also on a4 size and see how big thoughts just flow to a bigger paper. Preferably with at least medium nib and wetter inks. I love the feeling of pen flying atop a paper freely, spewing out ideas and answers from your subconscious mind.Why would anybody volunteer to smaller ideas?

Yet the physical aspects of this life come into account as well. When one needs to carry many,many many kinds of different information with oneself, I have found that the ringed option still becomes more of a practical solution. There is the option to remove used pages off and load only so much that you absolutely need to the rings.  

While I do have and adore a Franklin Covey Classic binder, as well as a Filofax a5 Balmoral, the issue of weight paired with genetically useless joints come into play. A planner to me is something that holds my Life. Not an easy nor a light task to take upon, I reckon. There needs to be space to monthly, weekly, daily planning, to lists, projects, slots for different people that need be taken into account etc. A pocket size would be ideal in terms of carrying but entirely impossible in terms of paper size. A personal? The narrowness of the paper drives me mental! 

So what is a gal to do? Well, I´ll tell you what is a gal to do. Wider papers to a personal size. 2 cm´s wider, to be exact. And it works. 

I used rings from a personal binder (a general sumthnsumthn brand from a grocery store. Even that cheap plastic binder had better rings than the rings that my Malden from Filofax had... Those were useless and needed to be binned.) to the task and an old suede jacket. Actually the binder was made eons ago already, to a writing project but when life got so much more hectic, I needed to let the writing project be for a while and so the soft suede binder with its 11,5 cm´s papers were forgotten...for awhile. Only to be realized once more as it ascended from the shelves like a bold, immortal phoenix, laughing at the face of personal paper and its limited petty little nature.

And this is how it became my everyday planner. Because I no longer can function nor think without Chronodexes, I naturally needed to print a week on two pages worth of chronodexes and see if it works. It all comes down to these circles of sanity to me. If chronodexes won´t work with a system- we can´t talk. Bye. If they will, everything is possible! This now is third week in a row and I can say that this works. This indeed works! What I have is Mo-Wed on the other page and Thu-Sun on the other. To the in-between I put an original personal sized paper. In this it actually is quite useful because it won´t "block" completely to other side of the week. 

I had to be a bit of a bore and slap generously post-its to the pages, I did smudge some words but I didn´t want to risk some crafty geek digging out people´s names and their contact information so I spread the joy of stationary about. I could have printed out a random week and I could have filled a "pretense layout" but who has time or patience for that!   

As you see, I took these pictures early this morning so only the Monday is entirely filled, despite the fact that the whole week is already planned in terms of appointments. 

I use colour coding. I think visually. Colour coding allows me to take a glance of a week or a day and immediatelyI know what is about to take place.What we have here in our Staples is a collection of Mark-It dots. They don´t always get used evenly. Shuuuuuure, I could order on line but I also could do so many other things. I also have these nifty coloured pens that, when wiggled about, make these uncanny dots. So see if I care. BUT this morning it hit me! No, not caring- don´t be silly. But this idea that what if.... What if I coloured the Mark-Its with Sharpies to create the needed coloured dots. Radical, I know but oh well, stranger things have taken place in this world than people colouring sticky little pieces of paper. 

Isn´t it incredible how terrifyingly crafty ideas one comes up with when procrastinating paperwork...

I know there is angels in the sticky tape on the picture above. I found it last Holiday season and it is so strong that no force known to human kind can rip that thing off once it is laid down. So when ever there needs to be a pocket in any papery thing- it is doomed to have a jolly group of angels keeping it put. I could have covered this with a more respectable washi but this too falls under the category of "see if I care".

 

So I then tried the white dots with pink sharpie. Perfection. Our cats now have dots dedicated only to themselves. 

I also tried black atop of red dots. Turns out that the strongest black tint was found in felt-tipped calligraphy marker. Great! Paperwork now has dots mirroring the colour of my cheery soul. 

And thus, a package of Mark-It dots morphed into a much more versatile version if itself.  

I also tried pink atop of yellow dots. Nope. This resembled too much of the brownish sienna dots already existing. Besides, yellow dots actually are one of the most used ones. But it was fun to try. 

I have received a few messages asking how I track on monthly basis and I still am writing about it this month, as promised. But right now there is somewhat more acute situations in our home-front so I shall have to tackle those hurdles first. 

My very best to all!

a5 Malden, now ringless and working.

It has been a long time since I sat down to type a few words to this neglected corner of the blogdom. However, as it is in life everything comes in cycles and I made a decision to dust the ol´ thing from oblivion. 

Over the past few years I have been fibbing about different systems when it comes to time-tracking, planning and staying atop of the several responsibilities that life brings. I had been using an a5 Balmoral from Filofax for... closer to 15 years already and then I ordered two a5 Maldens from Filofax. turns out that the glorious quality that I associated with the brand had gone to the very opposite direction. On the other binder the rings were beyond repair and they ripped all papers. The other binder was, after several ring prepairs a bit longer living experience- we are talking months here. Eventually they too gave up and it was time for the rings to come out. 

I will disclose the altrecations done to the binders with greater detail- not only rings were poor in quality, but stiches were ripping off as well. Not acceptable in any product that customers are paying money for.

Since time and age has had its effect on the Balmoral, it has done the very same to me. I have a genetic disorder that causes my limbs be overly soft and there is all kinds of deteriation happening in both joints and in bone matter. While I take incredible joy in the paper size of an a5, my joints no longer can take the very heft of such a binder.

And this contrast is the source of all the fibbing mentioned. How to maximise the paper size while still maintaining a manageable weight of one´s binder. 

I have tried a lot of systems now, over the course of few years. And right now I have something in use that is not killing my wrists, has not bended any of my fingers backwards and still holds almost a5- sized papers. I took my altered Maldens to good use and use traveler´s notebook style inserts in there. While "regular" TN size is 11 cm´s in width, I have used 13 cm´s wide booklets. This size is also known as Moleskine Large size. 

I will go to my set up in greater detail in a later post, but for now it´s sufficed to say that this system, this size feels... able in its physical aspect. My planning system worked like a well-oiled machine all along, I am very organized. However I needed to get it all to a paper size that was manageable and as large as-physically speaking-possible. 

I had all of the three booklets running smoothly as a well-oiled machine in the covers, no problem there. I use a calendar-which is Chronodex by Patrick Ng. In it I have attached mothly (month on two pages) pages from Philofaxy printables. Middle insert is a Bullet Journal, Last of the three is Collections. In it I have only a few subject matters, the "running collections" (those that are prone to change, such as things to get to the office, books to order, things to get to home, different sorts of information that is prone to change) are written on the Bullet Journal. Everything was all fine and dandy. Only... the chronodexes were running out of their course. This was the last week in it! And it was in the regular size which left two cm´s from 13 cm. width. Manageable yet visually annoying.

Well, that was about to change since... 

This morning I was greeted by the new download by Patrick Ng. This download was a booklet full of glorious chronodexes, for the second half of the year. 

Printing the new pages under careful observation of the Feline Overlordess

I printed the pages on ivory 80 gsm. paper. The Wild One watched over the printer- or the Thing Of Doom, if you asked of her.

Printing the booklet is very straight forward thing to do. Dowload the file, print it double sided. My printer is the simplest techy thing ever, so I first printed the first half, flipped the stack on the short side and printed the other half on the other side. 

After printing I folded the pages carefully and crisply.

Then you just fold the pages in half, bind them and cut the edges. Again, the regular TN width is 11 cm´s, I use the 13 cm. width. I did entertain myself with the thought of a full a5 size, but I then discarded the thought after I needed to go and apply some more of the numbning creme to my wrists...

However, there is generous space for more inserts if needed. I am telling myself not to get crazy about it, though. But I could, if I wanted to... stuff the thing.

I have three bookletts in the setup, all 13 cm´s wide. I could fit a5´s if I wanted to.

Tied by using strong cotton thread.

I round my edges. I always round my edges. I can not see how not everybody rounds their edges. Everybody should round their edges. Rounded edges are a wonderful thing! 

I have noticed that by cutting little grooves, the rubberbands that hold the booklets at place don´t wobble about annoyingly.

I rounded the corners, as I always do.

Small nicks at the very spine help to keep rubber bands hold their appointed places.

On the left is year´s first six months worth of chronodexes. On the right the next six months.

I just want to praise the whole visual scenery that Patrick Ng seems to have a natural inclination to create around him and the things he does. Do go and dwell in the goodness that is his flickr! It is a feat to one´s eyes. 

Everything about the booklet pleases me immensely. 

Backside of the booklet is a "Boarding Pass to the future" in which one can commit with one´s goals.

So this is it. My Book, my Brains, my Diane.

This is how my pens travel with me.

Happy Yuletide

`Tis the Season! 

I bought a fabulous leather trench from a second hand shop, the leather was just so soft and buttery. I cut it to pieces and made a bag (for myself) and a cover for notebooks (for my son´s minder).

The TN is made by assembling two layers of leather, gluing and hammering them together. The optional size visually for me is 12 cm´s width to a5´s height. So I measured and made the leather covers to fit 12 cm notebooks. I glued and hammered and stitched additional, third layer of leather to the spine, to give it strength and to avoid the dreaded puckering that always is so very gringe-worthy...

Picture above is closest to truth, talking about colour, since it´s been taken with flash. We had absolutely no natural sunshine today and the sun was up for only 5 hours today altogether. But... as it is in Nature, days will get longer every day, starting tomorrow.

However taking pictures with flash gives a unnatural glare and my source of picturification is a phone camera so adjusting flash doesn´t exactly isn´t an option. So... pictures below are all taken without flash and show a much darker shade of leather than the lovely really is.

                                                 

After having finished making the covers, I oiled and conditioned the leather. It was very dry to begin with. 

Inside the covers it has two flaps. This is to ensure that possible a4´s don´t escape, and also, the topmost flap assists in keeping the notebook pages open. The crocodile textured leather actually is genuine alligator. I bought a vintage bag from Amsterdam back in the days and used the bag so fastidiously that the very intricate lock system finally gave up. I snipped the seams open and gave the leather new life. Alligator is perfect material for such flaps because it is very hard, almost scale- like. My son explained that it feels like the skin of a dragon would feel like. Harness- like.

The first notebook is 60 gsm. paper from Staples. I suppose it is the closest experience to Tomoe River paper we get to come in our neck of woods. This is my absolute favourite paper in the world thus far. So thin, so good quality, takes any media and doesn´t even wrinkle when using watercolours. Shades through, naturally since it is very thin paper indeed, but so far even the wettest ink has not bled through. It feels silky smooth to touch and after writing on it, it only gets better.

I covered the notebook with a piece of wallpaper.

I am giving this shebang to my son´s minder (I could say nanny but the lady does not live with us, claiming her to be a "babysitter" gives me all kinds of wrongful vibes since my boy certainly is not a baby anymore), she always seems very keen on my notebooks and organisational systems. She deserves to experience this goodness herself.

On the inside of the cover I slapped a few sticky notes just for fun.

                                      

Second notebook is printed from MorganLeFaesTrinkets - blog. I have used her printable notebooks with quotes on them for... I can´t even remember how long. They all have 5mm grid on them and I love grid. I can colour code my page markers to the same places every time I take on another notebook to use. 

Third notebook is a monthly calendar that I printed from Ray Blake´s blog My Life All In One Place. It is a "full" or "regular" size notebook and I just trimmed and extra cm. to the sides. It contains monthly spreads to year 2016 and 2017.

Fourth and fifth notebook are weekly spreads to take one through the entire year.

At the back there are additional two pockets and a pen loop- pen loop made from the alligator leather.

You can´t quite see well but the sneaky sneakster in me had this wonderful notion to hide the knot from the elastic closer to the outer edge.Perhaps one can see it better from very close but this gives somewhat cleaner outlook to the back cover. 

The overall feel of the notebook is very soft, very pliable yet very sturdy. All the layers of leather give it sturdiness a notebook such as this greatly needs. 

All notebooks were printed to 80 gsm. paper in "ivory", from Staples, save the first one that is white and 60 gsm. 

I hope she will like her gift, my son said she will certainly be thrilled, and those two have known quite many years already, as have I... so I do believe that she will be quite pleased.

Happy Yuletide from us to you and yours!

Quick, easy and inexpensive TN covers.

A brief hullo.

I have now lived in TN that is regular sized otherwise but I´ve shortened it by 3 cm´s. 

Warmer months have come upon us and portability becomes even a greater issue than before. 

I will go back to the shortened version of regular TN in due time, but in this short post I´d like to address quick, no fuss, inexpensive TN covers. Probably even a baboon could make these so no need for even basic leather working skills are required. 

All you need is cardboard and rubber band. I have some craft paper and cardstock, all varying between 120-200 gsm.  If it´s on the lighter side, I just glue two sheets together before cutting. If I´m glad with cardstock thickness, I´ll just cut merrily away. I round the edges, also will round the middle point of cardstock. I will slide a rubber band to the covers and call it a day. That´s it. The rounded groove in the middle will hold the rubber band in place. 

I usually boink a hole for closing elastic to the mid-back covers but this time I thought to myself... why not try the mid-back for a chance. I remembered why I hatehatehate the knot at the spine, it pokes the whole bunch of notebooks away from spine and you want them to be close to the spine instead. See the absolutely dreadful gap at the spine. Uuuurgh!   

Another point. Paper loves paper. Flattability won´t be an issue and when covers need changing, it won´t be hard to look for another quick fix. Print the covers for added wo-hoo element, if you so are inclined. 

There is no reason to why not to cover the cardstock in plastic, one way or another... but I do love the feeling of paper for myself and as tatted pages are a mark of a book well loved, TN makes no difference in my eyes.

The difference in leathers used in Malden binders

I´ve often told about difference in Malden leathers. It is understandable that once one sees a certain type of leather in a binder they wish to purchase, and then when it comes and proves to have quite the opposite look... questions arise. It is natural for hides to come in varying nature, in my opinion it would be responsible for a company- any company to first note that leathers can and will vary, or then perhaps they should outline the type of leather to use altogether. 

Had I have promised a customer a silk shirt in satin weft for generous drape, and delivered shirt made of Pongee silk with completely opposite effect it being of rough, nubby texture, this would not have been acceptable. Also, had I measured and agreed to make a size 38 garment, yet the outcome had peen of size 42, this would not have been acceptable and would have deemed me quite the unprofessional, which would be bad reputation and detrimental for professional pride. 

When I ordered two ochre Malden binders in a5, I got one in satin weft and size 38, while the other was size 42 and Pongee silk. In proverbial sense.

The other was incredible dry, it had small tears in leather and while I opened it, I heard the leather tearing apart. It was visibly made of thinner leather and held within itself great promises of future silkiness after- what proved to be several months- of conditioning. 

I have great respect towards leather. I eat meat, I use leather. However, it does not mean we don´t need to respect the animal and the products it provided us with. Native Americans brush blood under their eyes (I do not know if this is true in all tribes but it was true with those with whom I talked with) after killing the animal and gives it thanks for giving its life to humans. In terms of consumption, I think all possible bits of beast should be used. You make hides, pelts, eat the meat, can do preservatives, boil glue etc etc. But you respect the process, you respect the outcome, dammit! When an animal has given its life for you fancy binder, bag, belt, coat, gloves, whatnot, do be decent and take care of it. When animal still has a heartbeat, it also has fat underneath its skin. This fat makes skin elastic, skin can stretch back and forth, it protects the beast from pesticides, diseases, sun, keeps the animal warm or cool. Just as with our species, humans, it is their largest organ and vital to surviving. When an animal is killed and it is separated from its harness, the hide goes through grueling process to make it pliable enough to serve us, the species of humans. The very thought that magically, we as "crown" of food chain, make it so that leather no longer needs the natural fats and oils and can sustain because of the awesome fact that a human is using it and all of a sudden it becomes something very else than the natural organ it once was, having its own requirements now denied and suppressed, is utter garbage and makes us assholes. And that is slightest of the cases. So condition yo´ leathers, dammit! If you are a company, pretend to have some respect, even if you really do not know the meaning of the expression. Trust me, the consumer will not know the lack of your morals, the consumer just won´t see cracking of the leather. Because it´s so hard not to notice it. 

If you are a person who never conditions your leathers... why!?!? Do you know that a leather product can outlive several generations, properly conditioned and will show beautiful patina, but will decay sooner if you just are not in a mood of taking care of something that died for you. Also, it makes you an asshole. Yes, I will judge. Forever. Should you care? Absolutely not but you should condition your damn leather products!

Above is picture of the two binders. The smaller and thinner one lays flat more so than its thicker, grainier and larger friend. Also, notice how the other pocket is of different colour. It is the same colour found on the outside. Best leather for this binder is found on the inside, on the zipper pocket.

The leather on the thinner one was and is thinnest on the upper corner here. It also is creased and pouching. After two years of active use, it still is.

I then applied natural oils (a mix I made back at the time. No chance ever to remember ingredients) to them- because of the dryness. This should be done every time for either dry leather, or leather that has not been conditioned for a long time. After the naturals, I applied medium brown leather creme. The difference in colour got significantly different. After this, another coat of natural oils was applied. All of this got sucked straight in the leather.

I was trying to demonstrate their difference by holding them up, but the coarser and thicker binder wanted to spread up (the hussie) and the flimsier one was having none of that and kept falling down. Perhaps the beast it came from used to be Victorian in previous life? So I opted to show the pair how to compose oneself  and stand up straight.

For several days I applied oils and cremes and leather conditioners to them and especially, the thinner one was beyond thirsty. The binders sucked all oils straight away and I just kept adding. How does one know when the leather is saturated=conditioned enough? The natural fats linger on before whooshing into the leather. Like any organic creature, leather needs moisture and it will feed itself until all is fine and dandy. Picture from above is a week after conditioning with natural oils with no pigment. I could see their true colours coming through as more moisture was given to leather

This picture above  is of the pair as they are. They still are getting conditioned, however they no longer are creaking or breaking and are saturated. The finer one is silky, buttery and soft. Even if I have decades working with different materials, including leather, I could not predict this level of softness after the dry, sandpaper-like feel. My friend kept hugging it and said it was an equivalent to a plushy toy for adult. This interaction made me very uncomfortable and we ended up in a friendly, yet determined enough tug-of-war when it came to possession of the thing. Ever since I´ve  kept it at quasi-safe distance from her.

I needed to cut out some material because the rings were useless and gaping, also I made it into a binder that holds 12 cm x 21 cm. notebooks. It is a home for my book projects and indeed, the colour is very espresso. All very naturally so.

The other below is to be seen on pictures on prior posts. I used it as my "one planner" but logistic challenges emerged when I need to use it on the go. Such generous and gorgeous floppiness needs two hands, I dropped it a few times too close to comfort and made it a home to Commonplace Book and Dear Diary. We now have received a new harmony as my planning needs have found a new home in a TN, which agrees more on opening, making appointements and taking notes on the go. 

From ring-bound planner to planner Elysian Fields

From the beginning of this year I have tried my very best, nearly every system and every size available and I have even both made and printed sizes that are not readily available. This year has brought new responsibilities and tasks along, albeit my ideal size would be a4 (or a5 if we feel the need to cinch)... however, these sizes are not the most portable. I had this a5- sized Malden with gorgeous leather but it was unusable due to low quality rings. One would suppose that when you end up paying 175€ for a binder, it would not have cheap Chinese rings that give up on their duty before two weeks are in, and in such assumption...one would be wrong. Considering I bought two of these a5 binders at the same time, having the same occurrence happen to both of them... I´m inclined to suspect this is not a coincidence. 

However the leather was wonderful. For several times I considered removing the rings. I had done this before on the other binder already. 

Then Kent from Oz happened. My life now had purpose. I knew what I was expected to do.

Sky was clear, my planner plans whispered of conclusion, the fruit of my hips recovered from his fever to be able to go to school leaving me opportunity to perform pilgrimage to stationary stores, it was as if all the Faeries of the Universe had maneuvered cosmic conspiracies and I was willing to play. 

Above is where it all started from. The bane of my peace of mind was gaping even when the rings were closed. Not for much longer, mind you.

I don´t have awesome manly powers on my hands. My joints are categorized as legally disabled but I was a woman on a mission and you do not get in a way of a woman with a mission.

As you can see, I needed the help of pliers and bending and wiggling etc. But I got the job done eventually.

Last time,on the case of another binder, I opened and then sewed the seams but this time along, my mission was to get the rings out ASAP and throwing a sharp knife on the case seemed like an appropriate thing to do. I glued and hammered the leather back to where it belonged to. Looking at the edges, you would not know that there ever was a slit. See the picture below.

  

This is what emerged from the insides.

The beauty without low- quality rings. At this point I felt unnaturally victorious. I applied my richest hand creme to my hands to mend the scratches from wiggling the pliers and applied it to the newly liberated friend as well. We were joint in the prospect of a better and brighter future. The amount of lists we would join our forces in! The hills were alive with the sound of music.

Size sans rings is considerable larger than a5 would ever be. 

Even while closed. Could it be a hybrid between an a5 and a4? Would my life, finally be complete? Is it angelic voices and brass flutes I hear? Tomorrow, shall we all join hands and sing "cumbaya" and will the wars finally end (how uncanny would it be if all the pageants would have to come up with a new go-to answer!)  

YYYYEEEESSSHH! Ok, so the world peace didn´t quite work out, unfortunately, but can you see how beautifully the leather cover sits atop an a4- sized wax cover notebook.

And this pain in the ... places found its rightful place in the bin.

My parting words for this monstrosity would be...

NSFW and for the love of all that is good-do not start the video while children are nearby!

And the last two pictures of it on use. Majority of these pictures were taken in direct daylight, to give as accurate idea of leather, as possible. The following two pictures I took in my bedroom, where the light is harshest, this noon. This really shows the rich grain of leather.

I bought a4 notebooks for this and cut them to size 22 x 18,5 cm´s. Given the size of the binder, I´m surprised of how easy it is to carry. The absence of rings gives binder much needed rigidity. I admit to having shoved another notebook that could be stored next to desk but I chose to add it as well... because I could. I also chose to carry Commonplace Book in the covers as well. 

It makes planner peace quite blissful when you can include two weeks on a spread in which one has ample space to write both appointments and reminders. After planner- notebook I have a bullet journal to delve into detail like I meant it. 

This is how I managed to thread the rubber band. I used a long- corded circular needles to pull rubber band through the back of the covers. I have five rubber bands in the spine.

I cut small slits on both ends of the notebook spine to hold the rubber bands in place, since the openings are considerably far away from notebook edges.

All in all... the only regret I have is that I did not do this earlier. I recommend this very warmly to everybody considering this.