Daycraft Gold Slab and Astrology notebooks

Many thanks to Daycraft for sending me these notebooks as samples to review!

First up is the Gold Slab notebook.   The cover is so highly reflective I had a hard time getting a decent photo of it!

This notebook measures 10.8 by 15.7 cm. It's chunky with 360 pages. The pages are gold-edged giving a solid-gold look to the book:

The paper is 80 gsm, lined and cream colored:

The end papers are a dark gold color:

Next up is the Astrology Notebook with real Swarovski crystals. Daycraft very thoughtfully sent my Zodiac sign, Libra:

The cover is soft PU. Inside the front cover is a removable clear plastic page with the zodiac constellations that you can use as a page marker:

The first page has a summary of the sign's traits:

The white paper has a + pattern giving the pages a starry look:

Thanks again to Daycraft for these beautiful notebooks!

If you are lucky enough to go to the London Stationery Show April 24 and 25, look for Daycraft products there!

New poll: What size planner do you use?

Next up in my series of polls: what size planner do you use as your main, day to day planner? Please vote over there in the sidebar.

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Bound-book folks, please choose the size that is closest to the size of book you use.

Filofax folks, please choose your page size as close as you can:

Pocket and Mini would both fall under Pocket

Personal = Medium (kind of an average between the size of the page and the size of the book)

A5 is A5 

A4 is Full Size.

I'm very curious to see the results of this poll!  In this day and age of technology on the go and working from anywhere, do people want their planner to be as small and portable as possible? Or do larger planners still have a following?

Thanks for voting!

Personal Planner UK: my personalized planner!

Many thanks to Personal Planner UK who very generously gave me a gift code to create my own personalized planner!

When I first encountered these planners online I was absolutely enthralled by the options. I've seen personalization of planners where you can choose your cover, but this goes way beyond that. You can choose every element of your planner. Would you like your days lined or unlined? Timed or untimed? You can choose icons to record work hours and exercise. You can choose lists and notes spaces. You can even choose what pages you want in the back of your planner!

Here's what I chose:

I chose the Large size planner, which measures approximately 8 1/2 inches wide by 5 1/2 inches tall. I chose everything from the colors, my name, year, and even the color of the elastic band. Rock on.

It has a clear plastic heavy-duty cover to protect the planner all year.

Inside I chose the color and design of the top border, how I wanted my day spaces (top half lined, bottom half blank, no times), lists etc. etc. etc. I chose a clear plastic ruler/ pagemarker, but I could have chosen from a variety of colors. (Click on photos to enlarge.)

I created my planner to start July 2012 but you can choose any start month you want and it goes for 12 full months. The paper is super-thick so you can use any pen you like.

Here's a closeup of the daily spaces. I also customized birthdays and anniversaries on the appropriate dates but you don't see any of those here.  The website saves your dates to automatically print in future planners. I also chose icons for weather, work hours, and exercise.

 For the back pages I chose year overviews of this year and next year, and lined pages.

There's even a clear pouch in the back for papers, tickets, receipts, stamps etc.  Cool!

When you finish making your custom planner, it gives you the option of automatically creating the next year's planner (starting whichever month comes after when your planner ends) with all the same settings. If you entered birthdays and anniversaries they will automatically update.  You can save this new planner to your account for later, and make any changes you want too.

Many thanks again to Personal Planner UK! Customized planners are awesome!!!

GUESS WHAT!!! (Hint: Moving Again!!)

Those of you who have been reading my Tweets over the past couple of days may have noticed that my family and I are MOVING BACK TO SCOTLAND in just two months!!!!!!

And those of you who have been reading my blog for awhile will know that this is wonderful, wonderful news!!!!!!!!

We'll be moving back to where we lived before (not the same house, alas, but the same area). DH has a permanent position this time so NO MORE moving every year or two!!  Seriously, in the past 20 years we've moved 26 times and I am TIRED of it!

I am beyond thrilled that we are moving there, indefinitely, to the place we all love and want to settle. This is a decade-long dream come true for us!!

Aaaaaaaannnnnnddddddd, as you might imagine the impending move has thrown me into a planner tizzy!

So far I've managed to resist actually moving into a new planner, mainly because my self-drawn weekly + monthly works so well for me. I honestly don't think anything else would work as well. But that didn't stop me from toying with my Uncalendar Half Size and my Filofax cotton cream week on 2 pages.

And I'm still using my pocket Moleskine day per page diary as a daily record, although I did agonize over the idea of moving into a larger daily (either my Large daily Moleskine that I'm still trying to get back into the habit of using as my journal, or my Quo Vadis Notor I bought earlier this year "just in case.")  I got through a 3-day turmoil and am still using the Pocket, because I love the layout and my kids' drawings in it, but I do wish it were bigger.  I wish Moleskine would come out with a Medium size that's 12 x 17 cm, that is such a great size.

So anyway, I'll keep you posted on our move progress and the resulting planner nuttiness!!

Paper vs. Electronics: Sustainability and Longevity

Last week I had a very interesting conversation with someone younger and much more technologically inclined than I am. The main topic was why anyone in this technological age would choose to use a paper planner instead of an electronic one.

After all, an electronic planner on your device is much more convenient, right?  Well, no, in my opinion. I know battery life is getting better, but having to plug in would still be a major issue for me, especially while traveling. Also, I know you are supposed to back up your info on your computer, but even taking that into account I've heard too many horror stories about people's devices locking up/ going dead/ being dropped in the pool and whatever else, causing them to lose all of their info.

I also don't like having to go screen to screen to enter a note or appointment. I want to open my book, write it in, and know that any time I open my book for ever after that it will still be there.

My techie friend asked me if I or Plannerisms readers feel bad about chopping down trees to make paper planners. I was really confused by this question. No, I said, because trees grow back. They are a renewable resource. Especially if the trees come from a well-managed forest, or the paper is made from recycled materials, paper is very much a sustainable material.

The conversation moved on before I could point out that the same is not at all true for electronic devices. The metal, plastic and rare earth minerals used in electronic devices are not renewable, and are dwindling in supply.  So if you are looking for a "green" option, paper is definitely it.

Later I went on to explain that a big reason why I prefer paper planners is the long-term record keeping. People have been writing on paper, clay and even lead for thousands of years, and it's these writings that record day to day human lives. Hundreds of years from now there will be a huge gap in our history of this time of things that are lost to technology. Remember floppy disks? Do you still have access to information you stored on floppies? And that was just a few years ago. Technological information storage evolves so quickly that much is lost as technology moves on.

But my friend's reply was, "What about the internet?"  I didn't understand this at all. He seemed to be implying that the internet is permanent.  I doubt that people 50 years from now will read about their grandparents' lives by reading our blogs on the internet. Undoubtedly technology will be vastly different by then, and the information that's currently on the internet will be lost or inaccessible. Unlike paper, of course, which can be read for hundreds of years.

It was a very friendly conversation, and he was honestly curious so it was in no way a debate over the merits of one or the other. But the whole conversation left me confused. I know I'm from a different generation than he is. He doesn't remember a time before computers so it must seem very permanent to him that the internet and electronics always have been and always will be the way to record information.

I take a longer view: Paper and other forms of writing have been the way human history has been recorded since the beginning, and only tangible forms of record-keeping will survive decades and generations into the future.

What do you think?

Poll results: Why do you use a paper planner?

Here are the very interesting results of this poll!

Of 144 voters (each person was able to choose all answers that apply):

Time management	104 (72%)
Goal setting	64 (44%)
Creative outlet (art/ writing etc.)	44 (30%)
Record-keeping	66 (45%)
My job/ school doesn't let me use electronic devices	5 (3%)
The visual and/ or tactile aspect of the book/ paper	123 (85%)
Technology just isn't my thing	10 (6%)
I remember things better when I write them down	113 (78%)

I found it fascinating that more people use a paper planner for the visual and tactile aspects of the book than any other reason.  It makes sense, after all there's probably some device that would technically be more efficient, but the point of using a paper planner is the physical aspect of the book, turning the pages, the feeling of the paper on your hand as you write.

I was also surprised more people don't use a paper planner as a creative outlet. Maybe most people use a notebook for that? I like the idea of doing art or writing in a planner since it goes everywhere with you.

I found it very interesting that most people aren't using a paper planner because they are technophobes. Only 6% replied that technology isn't their thing.

I definitely identify with the folks who remember things better when you write them down. I definitely do, and typing things into a device does not have the same effect.

For me a big reason why I keep a paper planner is record-keeping. I still have my planners from previous jobs with all my contacts, records of trainings I attended, and everything I did. If I'd only kept that information on my computer at work, I wouldn't have any of it now.

Did I miss anything? Do you keep a paper planner for reasons other than those listed above?

Uncalendar Monthly planner

I've used Uncalendar Full Size and Half Size spiral bound and ring bound planners, but this is my first experience with their Monthly planner. As usual with Uncalendar, it doesn't disappoint!  Uncalendars stand out from the planner crowd with their excellent Goal setting pages.

The Monthly planner is stripped-down and straightforward, while still retaining many of Uncalendar's excellent features.

Inside the front cover there is open space to brainstorm your goals for the year. The right page gives you structured space to break down those goals by month.

The huge monthly layout (page size 8 1/2 by 11 inches) gives you tons of room to write in your appointments and plans, and the spaces at the beginning of each week are great for reminders.

At the back there is an overview page to write in another year, and handy reference calendars.

Inside the back cover there is space to record contacts or other data.

That's it!  For less than 5 bucks, this is a great calendar. I bought a bunch of them on uncalendar.com.

At only 14 pages it's extremely slim and weighs next to nothing. I plan to magnet it up onto the fridge or pin it to my corkboard. The flexible card cover lets the planner conform to the inside of your bag, but is sturdy and will easily stand up to a year of use.

The undated format allows you to start any month of the year, and goes for a full 12 months. These are great for tracking projects, and each team member can have their own copy so everyone knows deadlines and can track milestones.

I'll use one as a big academic-year calendar to plan out the whole school year and keep track of everyone's activities. I love that I can start it in July, which is hard to find in a monthly calendar, so that it will end in June at the end of the school year.

I'll use another one to track bills due and paid every month, and paydays for myself and my husband so we can budget each month. In the data spaces inside the back cover I can keep monthly totals for savings, checking, and credit cards. I'll paperclip bills to pay onto that month's page so I don't forget them.

There's a million possibilities for this simple but highly functional monthly calendar.

Another great planner by Uncalendar!