Category: DIY

How to create a Planner page for important events or projects.

So here I am standing on the edge of the “planner girl” world. It’s not an unfamiliar feeling for me really. I like to take the best from many worlds and go with it. So I like only the best of Country Music; I’m fussy. But that means I can still thoroughly enjoy a good round of Daft Punk or Wintergarten or Handle or Kimya Dawson. It means that I love Pretty Western Shirts but ones with elegant patterns, not such bold, crazy patterns. It means I still prefer my Blunnies over Ariat Boots. And I still don’t feel incline to wear copious amounts of make-up. I stand on the edge of a few different worlds in the hope of Staying very true to the person I am meant to be.

But here is my planner girl story: I have spent time looking at planners with some confusion and some wonder. Some of the Asian overseas students at school were big on them with lots of “Hello Kitty” type papers and do-dads inside. I’ve had some such thing before. However I have never been a diary or journal keeper.

Being a Station cook changed that. Blogging became a regular thing and sitting down on monday to map out my menu for the week was very important to stay on top of my job cooking for 20+ people. The habit is sticking so far.

Introducing my planner:

I had a trial one for 2 months before this while I discovered precisely what I liked. This one is leather and comes from Kikki-K. It is acting as both diary and journal and general place to play with cool bits and pieces that I find in the scrapbooking world that otherwise I would hardly use (my art just doesn’t involve much from that world).

The right page, I use for a weekly spread; it has what I will do with what I did do added on Friday. I get to play with stickers and practice cool writing. The left page is for scrapy notes: post-it notes, lists, stuff that I need to remember but doesn’t fit on a day. I might doodle there or cover it with “washy-tape”(there is a prime example of a Washi-d page in the how to pics)… its a no rules page.

But when I start to get lots of notes and lists together on a specific topic, I figure its time to give it a page of its own. So my car got one. A page to dream of all the cool mods I’d like to do to it like Dual Batteries, and Funky Rims. But also a page to record more serious stuff like the internal light needs replacing and the front sway bar bush needs some TLC.

So my how to is a Quick Demo on my Process for such a page in my planner:

I grab an A4 landscape sheet of paper and size it up against one of my homemade custom planner pages. I want the fold out to fit nicely in with the other pages to avoid overhang and therefore unnecessary wear and tear on this import.
Here you can see the fold.
I then bunch the holes. I have a somewhat cheap puncher so I punch the holes then repunch as I go to cope with paper thickness.
On the back of the page I apply two strips of paper. On the left will be the “title” or cover. It wants about 4-5 cm only because it will be decorated. Washi Tape is good too. On the right is the back; It is the strength of this foldout.
Repunch those holes… and you can see how this is going to work out now I hope.
On the inside I start applying paper or tape and stickers.
Layering tape and scrap book stickers over the holes creates depth and provides reinforcement for the paper. I hope to be accessing the page a fair bit.
Add the Pretty Stuff to the front. And start trimming the over hang.
This is the inside spread. I’ve chucked the offcuts from the gorgeous floral sticker on the front. I keep the edges fairly low key; no wider than 4 centimetres.
And there you go. All ready to use.
Outer spread

So for this particular foldout, I’m collecting the ideas I have for a girls night in that I like to have with my family. The way I see is, I can keep all my notes in one place now and then I can add photos to the page after the event as a memory keepsake. For me part of the joy of an event is in the planning of it.

So I’ve decided that my guests fit nicely on this side: it’s a working page. You can see I can add or remove as I continue planning.
Inside I keep my lists and brainstorming. Activities, food Ideas and drinks. This is where I might stick a post-it note with an on-the-go idea like “jellycups” for the food list that way I don’t get to the event and realise the event could have been even better if I’d only remembered that one cool Idea I had while driving to work. Other things to consider; location! Good grief… quick add it to the page now. Oh wait, themes! Maybe we should all wear pyjamas.

 

Every title page needs a title, So I’ve whipped out the brush markers and put the event on the front: another chance to practice nice writing but sticker letters would have been just as handy here.