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| Green Moleskine for this year with my new Inkjoy pens! |
Last year I came across something called a "Bullet Journal" and my planning, organizing, to do lists, and life was changed...
Forever!
Okay, that might have been a little dramatic, but the point is, I rarely forget things now, and I just overall feel more on top of things like housework, my exercise, bills, kids' schedules, my schedule, and my coursework. This has been the best system for me, and the part I like the most- it's completely what YOU want out of it. You make it, you customize it, you change it- it's ALL about YOU.
If you would like to read the original post and the updated one halfway through the year, they are
here and
here.
So, this year I have started a new one, for a new year. I've made a few changes from the past two, and so far, I'm loving it! Instead of breaking it down into sections (to do lists, school planner, exercise planner) I've kept everything together. It seems to flow easier for me, and I don't have to be worried about not having left enough pages in one of the sections. Also, I was sent some pens from
Smiley360 and Papermate Inkjoy to test and give my opinions on, so I thought this would be perfect for that! Matter of fact, I'm loving these pens so much, that I've started using them more often than the others I originally bought for this.
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| Key that I try to follow- though sometimes everything just gets marked as a "task" lol |
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| 2015 Page |
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| Contents Page |
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| Important Dates Page- This is where I put important birthdays, anniversaries, etc. |
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| January Monthly Calendar- I used washi tape on the side to help me flip to it faster. Also, I decided to refrain from writing in pen on my calendar because too many things change. I still use my key (+ for medical appointments, etc), but no color. |
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| February Monthly Calendar- Notice I switched up the washi tape color! |
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| March Monthly Calendar- Since it isn't March yet, I haven't added the washi tape yet. |
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| Future Planning- this will probably stay pretty empty until I get closer to the end of the year, but this will be helpful when we have medical appointments scheduled further out, weddings, baby due dates, etc. Take note of the silver clip here- it's called a book dart and I will talk about it later. |
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| What's Due Page is my bills. This helps me remember what is automatically getting drafted and when and what I need to pay on about what day. I included the monthly at the bottom because things like car taxes, trash service, and subscriptions only get paid or renewed so often. The Cleaning Schedule Page is actually something I literally just finished putting together and implementing a few days ago. So far, it is working great! I just flip to this page when I'm mapping out the next day's list, and I add the tasks. It's helping keep my house in order. And no, I didn't skip the kitchen- my husband does that, so I didn't include it on *my* list! ;) |
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| Bookshelf- books I want to read...running out of room already! LOL |
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| Movies and Tv Shows I want to watch... |
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| I left a blank page, just in case I thought of something else...the back side of this is my monthly "to do" list for January. Notice that I coordinated the washi tape with the monthly calendar with the monthly to do list. Hoping it will make it easier when I'm looking for something. |
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| Monthly To Do List- again notice that I coordinated the washi tape with my monthly calendar and my monthly to do list. I've also included a place where I write things that I don't want to forget to do in the Looking Ahead section. For instance, this is for a doctor appointment that I need to schedule for one of my kids, however the office was not that far ahead into scheduling yet, so I have to call back in a month or two. I also plan to include things like reminders about field trips, school events, etc. |
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| This is an example of my Exercise Journal. I just start it on a new page wherever I am at in the journal. This is kinda personal for me, so I didn't really include any shots of exactly what I fill out, but you get the idea. |
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| Daily To Do lists on the left- pretty self explanatory. This is before I started my cleaning schedule, so this is just everyday tasks that I was keeping up with. Also, on the right, I am doing a Currently List. Basically, its just a way for me to journal about myself and what's going on in my life and how I'm feeling once a month or whenever I feel like doing it. As you can see, I haven't even done February's yet. I just fit this in whenever I feel the need to do it, but I am trying to do it at least once a month. |
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| Monthly To Do List for February on the left (nothing there yet!) and Daily To Do Lists on the Right for February. You can see where I started on the 4th with my cleaning schedule (and that's when I took these pics, lol) |
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| And lastly, this is another page that just fits in wherever in the journal. It's my checklist for my class that I have every week. Because I'm doing all online school, I have to keep up and manage my time wisely or else I will get so far behind. So very far behind. So, I combat that issue with making a planner each week that focuses on what I need to get done for that week. Also, I want to point out the book dart here. It's a thin silver clip that bookmarks my pages that I use frequently. They are awesome because they add no bulk, but help to keep me from "loosing" my pages. |
So, that's the 2015 Bullet Journal. It's pretty simple, but it goes everywhere with me, and keeps me in order. I really do wonder how I managed to keep it all together before I started doing this!
Now, before I was using a combination of these cool pens by Stabilo and my black fine point Sharpie pen. I still love my black fine point Sharpie, I don't think I will find anything that will replace it. However, I really am loving the new Inkjoy pens I got from
Smiley 360. They provided me with a gift card and a new pack of pens to review.
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| My Walmart's Selection |
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| Decisions, decisons! |
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| I already owned a pack of the Inkjoy 550 RT, so I chose to get another pack of the 300 RT (Smiley sent me one pack already) and a pack of the 700 RT. I also already have one purple 500 RT that I had as a sample from a while back. I gave my daughter one of the packs of the 300 RT pens because being in high school, we decided to help keep her on task to make her a bullet journal, so she wanted some cool pens, too! |
As mentioned above, I already was a fan of the InkJoy pens before, however I had not really tried the 300RT pens. I guess I had assumed that the larger number meant "better", and I already had the 550RT series pens. But, when I started using the 300 RT series pens that I was sent, I remembered expressively *why* I love Paper Mate's InkJoy series. They write very smooth, have vibrant colors, and are easy on the hand. I know that sounds crazy, but sometimes, your hand is just not comfortable with a pen and it actually starts to hurt while you are writing with it. That doesn't happen with these pens! And as you can see above, the color is a great addition to my bullet journal and makes it more fun to look at and pretty to write in. I can't tell you how many compliments I get every time I pull this thing out!
**Disclaimer: I received the Inkjoy pens for free to review and provide
honest feedback from
Smiley360. All of the opinions expressed here are my own.
And here's some Amazon links to purchase some of these items-
Moleskine in Green
Inkjoy 300RT Series
Sharpie Fine Point in Black
Zebra Cadoozles Pencils
Washi Tape
Stabilo 88 Pen Set
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