Our Planners, Ourselves

I probably place too much emotional importance on my planner. But I think there are many people who feel as strongly (or maybe even more so) about their planner as I do about mine.

Filofax users tend to have a strong attachment to their Filofaxes (and if you don't know how strong, take a peek over at Philofaxy.com!) I think one big reason why we love our Filofaxes so much is because everything about them is our own choice: we choose the binder size, style and color, and every single thing that goes into it, or not. We aren't stuck with a bunch of pages that are useless to us. If we don't like the diary format, we change it. And if we don't find a diary format that suits our needs, we can even make them ourselves and put them in. Because we have chosen everything about our Filofax, it becomes a reflection of the user's personality. You can tell a lot about a person by looking through his or her Filofax!

Another reason people become so attached to their Filofaxes (or any other binder system) is that the binder stays with us year after year. Bound-book planners are finished at the end of the year and put on the shelf. But a Filofax can be your daily companion for many years. It's hard not to become attached to something that helps you with every aspect of your life for years on end!

Another brand of planners that people tend to become very attached to is Moleskine. I admit it took me awhile to understand the appeal. It's just a black cover. The planner formats are very minimalist. There's nothing fancy, no designs. It's just a basic framework.

But therein lies the appeal. The Moleskine planner is a blank canvas, and the planner itself fades into the background. The user is free of constraints and can use each page for writing, sketching, planning, or anything at all. The pages contain (almost) only what the user has put there. The result is that the pages of the book become an expression of the user's ideas, thoughts, and life. When we look into the book, we see only ourselves. The book becomes a part of the user. No wonder so many creative types love Moleskines--it's easier to express yourself on a blank canvas than to work around pre-existing designs.

What about you? Do you have an emotional attachment to your planner? Or is it just a time-management tool?

Filofax Amethyst Deco!!!

Here is a pic (from the Filofax Facebook page) of the new Filofax Deco in Amethyst coming out later this year!! Somebody please catch me as I swoon!!

As we all know, I adore my Ivory Deco Filofax. And as we also all know, I love purple. So the combination of the two leaves me just about speechless!

Check out some of the other new Filofax products coming out in the background of Filofax_UK on Twitter. (Slimline Deco! Songbirds organizers! Awesome new bags!)

It's a year full of excitement for those of us who love Filofax! Wheee!!!

Daycraft Make My Day diary

I have a bunch of Daycraft diaries and notebooks that I will be reviewing this month. Here is the awesome Daycraft Make My Day diary. It definitely makes my day!
This book is very eye-catching because it just looks so cool. The hard cover has black fabric that is nice to touch, and on the front there is a reflective design that says Make My Day.

This looks really cool too: the edges of the pages are black, with After Day After Day After Day inkjet-printed all around.

First of all, the book is the perfect size to go everywhere. It's 6 1/4 inches tall and 5 1/4 inches wide, so it fits into a very small bag. And yet, the almost-square shape means the book opens wide to show a roomy weekly layout, with the days as untimed columns (click on the photos for a larger view).

I love the clean, simple design. I really appreciate the current month at the top right of the page, to let me see where this week is in relation to the rest of the month.

The cream-colored paper is 70 g, and is sourced from sustainable forests. It's great to write on and very smooth.

At the beginning of each month there is a page spread like the one shown below.


Each month there is a picture of different things spelling out Make My Day. One month it's spelled out with legos. Another month it's with french fries. Another month it's with flowers. This really adds to the personality of the book and is fun.

The right page has the month calendar at the bottom with most of the page having lined space to write in. Having a page at the beginning of each month is great for that month's goals, lists, bills to pay, whatever I need to remember for that month. Great feature!

There is also a 2010 overview planner with four months to a view. I always like having monthly calendars in my planner to be able to see what's coming up.There is also a forward planner for all of 2011 with the same four months to view setup:

There are reference calendars for all of 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012:
There is a list of international holidays, including the US and UK:
Something that is an absolute requirement for me in a planner: International dialing codes!

Below is a feature that I really like and appreciate: an International Airport Guide. This is great information for any traveler: it lists numerous airports around the world and gives you the website for reference, how far it is from the city center, about how much it should cost to get a cab to the city (essential for avoiding being ripped off!!), whether there is a train from the airport to the city center, duty free limitations, etc. Wow!!! I love this feature. (Click for larger view):
There are international conversion tables, and a C-F temperature conversion chart (which I refer to often and always need to have with me).

In the back of the planner there is a page for your personal information. And, here is another feature I love: the last several pages of the book are perforated tear-out mini-notes for those moments when you need a scrap of paper to write your number or email address on and give to someone. And each little piece of paper says Make My Day! Very clever.

This is a cool-looking little book with tons of personality that's packed with useful international information. It has an excellent weekly layout with monthly planning calendars. It's a very portable size with a nice-feeling cover. Overall it's an excellent planner and an awesome book!

Daycraft is the #1 brand of planners and notebooks in Hong Kong, but they don't have a US distributor yet. So go to your local bookstore and tell them that they MUST start carrying this brand, because their products are fantastic!

I recently received another box of more Daycraft planners and notebooks to review! Woo hoo! So stay tuned to Plannerisms, loads more Daycraft reviews to come!

Amazing Appointment Books!

Enormous thanks to Plannerisms reader Cyril for sending me this!! Wow!

These are appointment books by Marc Weinstein, who runs his own appliance repair business in Washington, DC. He uses spiral notebooks marked with colored paperclips to keep track of his clients. Read all about it here:

http://popularkinetics.wordpress.com/2010/02/14/marc-weinsteins-appointment-books/

I bet he could teach us all a thing or two about managing multiple projects. Marc, if you are reading this--we'd love to learn more about how you use your appointment books!

How big is your day?

I tend to fill up the day spaces in my planner, whatever the size. When I use a weekly planner with small day spaces, I can write maybe 3 things in today’s space and the day seems full. "Whew!" I think, "I've done a lot today!" Maybe, maybe not. It depends on what those three things are.

For some people, a planner with small day spaces works fine. Especially if you have meetings or other events that take a lot of time in your day, maybe 3 or 4 things on today's space is plenty.

My days tend to be full of tasks, with only an occasional scheduled event thrown in. I also have a bad memory so I like to write a record of what I did, and when, since I won't remember. These details quickly fill up a small day space.

When I wrote my March 1 post on Philofaxy I thought I had the answer to the small day space. It made perfect sense to have non-time dependent things OFF the day space, and on a list somewhere else. It made me VERY hopeful that I could use my fabulous Deco Filofax (with its small day spaces on the weekly planner layout) as my planner-and-everything book.

But, let's face it. I'm so out of sight, out of mind I should probably change my name to OSOM. So whenever I saw blank space on my calendar, instead of switching to list mode I thought, "Sweet! I don't have jack to do today!" And, as a result, I didn't do jack.

I hate to call it a Filo Fail, because if I were more diligent about checking my lists all the time, I could "make it work" although that phrase makes me shudder just thinking it. (And anyway, I'll still use my gorgeous Filo as my "everything except my planner" book so that's no loss.)

So now I need to learn to accept, and even embrace, who I am. Whatever the size of my daily space, I tend to fill it. If it's a small space that's full after just a few entries, I do those and I'm done. If it's a big space, I fill it, and crank out some productivity. Anything that doesn't get accomplished today gets arrowed over to tomorrow. My Lesson Learned: use a planner with big day spaces!

So, how about you? Do you do well with having only a few things scheduled and the rest on a list? Or are you a member of the OSOM club and have to have everything in front of you on today's space? How big is YOUR day?

Moleskine Month Tabs Hack

Anyone who has read What I'm Currently Using (in the sidebar) will see that I recently added a Moleskine pocket size daily planner to my planner lineup.

This is the second year in a row I've used a pocket size daily planner to carry around in my pocket and jot down those little things that pop into my head that otherwise would be lost. The dated daily format makes it easier for me to find those things again later. Last year I used an Exacompta Daily Pocket for this role, but this year I went with the Mole for the hard cover and especially the elastic strap. For 2011 there will be a showdown between these two planners since the Exacompta Daily Pocket will come with a Smooth cover that has an elastic closure.

But I digress. I wanted to show you my monthly tab hack. First let me show you what I was trying to do. I love having monthly tabs (really just colored areas on the side of the page indicating the month) like the Journal 21:

And the Plan-It planners:

Especially on a day-per-page book, it really helps to have the months indicated to easily find the day I'm looking for. This works great for planning ahead and also for past reference.

So first I went through each page and gathered up each month's worth of day pages. I used a black Sharpie to color the edges of the month's pages in the designated area. I did that for each month, going down the side of the page. That looked really good. I should have taken a picture of it. But I didn't. Instead I blazed forward with Phase 2.

I decided the tabs were very useful, but it would be so much more functional to have the months indicated too. So I wrote the months with their corresponding tabs. The result doesn't look so great. But, this is so useful to me that I don't care that it looks like a kindergartener did it.

I also wrote the year on the spine in silver Sharpie, just because I like to:
I love my ugly monthly tabs. They really do make it a snap to find the month, and subsequently the day, I'm looking for.

Have you done any hacks on your planner? How have they helped you?

Monthly Goals

Welcome to March!

This month I'm doing something new (to me): I'm writing out my goals for the month. I'm hoping that having a specific list of what I want to accomplish in March will help keep me on track.

While preparing my list of monthly goals I've been reviewing my goals that I set out for myself at the beginning of the year and deciding what I can focus on this month. It's also a great time to jettison any annual goals that are no longer relevant due to changes in circumstances.

I was inspired to do this by Charlie Gilkey's Monthly Action Planner. It has a great format for helping you think through your month, any events that will happen, and your actions for making it a great and productive month. (I also highly recommend signing up for Charlie's Newsletter on his website Productive Flourishing. He sends periodic emails that are motivational and positive. They are like a helping hand to get back on track. Thank you Charlie!)

Of course any kind of list of your monthly goals is more useful than nothing at all. Most importantly, your monthly goals list needs to be someplace where you can refer to it often enough to be useful, at a minimum of once per week when you are making your weekly plans. It's one thing to write your goals, but it's a whole other thing to put them into action.

Last week I busted out my personal Deco Filofax (and am Calling the Dog with it and my Minister weekly planner), because I have so much going on right now and even more coming up in the next several months. I updated my tabs (which you can read about in What I'm Currently Using, scroll down) and freshened-up my Goals section.

Now I put my current month's goals page right behind my Goals tab so I see it first every time I open that section. The next page is my Annual Goals/ New Year's Resolutions, to refer to easily when I'm making each month's goals list.

When the month is over, I'll write the month review on the back side of that month's Goals page. This will let me evaluate which goals I achieved, and which ones I still need to work on. From there I can write the following month's Goals page. I'll archive the old month's page behind my Annual Goals page and put the new month's Goals page in front. That way I'll keep a record of monthly goals throughout the year to see how I'm progressing toward those annual goals. And with my current month's goals in front, I have easy access to it all the time.

Do you make Monthly Goals? Where do you write them? (On a page in your planner? On a sticky note on your bathroom mirror? In reverse-writing on your forehead with a Sharpie so you can read it every time you look in the mirror?)