The Charmer

Malden was such a big news last year, it was starring the talks everywhere and everyone seemed to be bitten by the Malden Bug! Well, so was I.


I was looking for a treat for completing my Master's degree and the Vintage Pink Malden just came out. There were loads of different opinions on it, but for me it was exactly the colour that helped me decide - I already knew which model to get, but... Black? Too usual. Ochre? Too rough. Crimson? Red is so no me.
While Vintage Pink seemed warm and creamy and feminine and even still professional looking.

I ordered it online without seeing it in life first, and I loved the colour when it came. I set it up immediately and was using it faithfully. But it wasn't a good-for-Malden period of the year, you see: I just saw Imy's famous video on her Amazona and couldn't get it out of my mind.
So at last this lovely one went back into its box and far away into my stationery drawer. But I guess it was because of the pocket layout mostly - the binder just didn't seem comfortable enough.

Well, like I said... After having used Finchley in Teal through the springtime, Urban in Slate this summer and then the Aqua Chameleon later... I just so longed for the warm, creamy colour with autumn beginning! I was suspicious about the Malden, though, having known we just haven't bonded before.

But surprise, surprise - the chemistry was there immediately and all I did was transfer the contents directly into it! The funny thing is, now I cannot be without it! I even tried and teased myself by installing other binders, but I didn't even manage to stay with them for a day - back to my Malden it all went! :)

So in case you're interested or just like peeking into other people's planners as least as much as I do... here, let me give you a tour around it!

The front pockets are stuffed with various sticky notes - a vow to myself for this season: no dull stickies, please...:

My Diary is the first section and has no separate divider page; I just use the frosted ruler as a Today marker. Otherwise, only 4 tabs left: Me, Lists, Daughter and Info:

Off to my Diary section first!

Usually there are no blank spaces in my diary, odd... my planner pages tend to look as the right one in my Diary: 

I'm developing a Timetable, in which I'll incorporate all my repeating weekly routines - be it beauty, domestic, reading or whatever-wise; until I find the right setup, I have them written in pencil:

I also use a yearly fold-out planner for 2013 at the end of my Weekly diary.

My Me section is organized by top-tabs (oh, the photo is still form my previous Chameleon!) and these sub-sections are Blog, Finance, Journal and Life Organizer:

My Blog section: Ray&Steve's Month per view for keeping track of my blogposts:

And in that same section, to-do lists with blog ideas and Angela's too cute Blogpost planning inserts - I find them so helpful in managing my blog!

Finance section - track of my spending, saving and planned purchases:

My journal - I  now use the standard W2P with an occasional added ruled page, and transfer the whole lot into a stay-at-home journal occasionally:

Life Organizer's Mindful Questions: Something I've been back to completing obediently, having realized my life always turns out better when I do:

The next section which has added to the weight of my Malden significantly recently is the Lists section - I have so many new projects and plans and a list for practically anything! Filofax ideas, Ways of improving myself the current month, Wishlist, Reading List, Random tunes I love, Appartement decoration ideas, Best beauty buys - just name it, it's there! :)


And then the Info section (I omitted my daughter's one because it keeps her very personal info) contains my urban encyclopedia - bus schedules, web pages, contacts, cards...:

There. Can you imagine how chunky my organiser must be? Can you really imagine??? See this and weep! :)

And please don't yell at me about it, ok? :) And don't ask me how much it weighs, please, because I have actually weighted it and stood in shock staring at the scales - I take the news on my bodyweight much better! :)

But you must agree, it is soooo satisfactory when you pop your Filofax flat open and find the searched-for info immediately! :)

So, as you can tell, things are going on harmoniously for me planner-wise and it's nice to be calm and comfortable finally (my apologies to those who face major planner fail recently, I know there are quite a few of you out there!).

Now, the only dark cloud I see approaching is this:

Yes, the colour started to peel of, and I even don't abuse my Filofaxes badly (ok, apart from stuffing them mercilessly full)!!! It came off like this in just 2 weeks time of use and as I write, the peeled-off areas appeared on the corners and borders of the cover, too. I haven't heard of this happening to Maldens out there... 

Have you ever heard of this? 

What do I do? 

All Stars Guest Post: Lime Tree - Filofax Swap 4!

This is such a treat, people: a guest post from the JUICY LIME TREE for all of us to read! :)
I'm so fascinated by her intense character, amazing Filofax photo shoots and artwork - if you need a daily pick-me-up and a reminder for your Inner Goddess, just pay a visit to her blog! Oh, but you already know that! :)


Yessss!!!!!!! here we go!!!!

I am moving on with my Filofax Swap Saga, showing of a gorgeous Filofax AND guest posting for a blogger that totally "gets" this Filofax gorgeousness! What a treat!!!! Thank you so much Vanjilla for having me here showing it all! :D

Soooo, what came after Chamomile?

And what am I talking about, you ask.

I am talking about my quest to find the perfect Filofax fit for me.

Oh, and I said perfect! sure thing that won't happen, HA!
Which is good, thou, I can keep going with my Filofax Swap posts indefinitely, hehehe

So, here is the swap list in case you need to catch up:

• Filofax Swap (The original!)
• Filofax Swap 2 - The attempt
• Filofax Swap 3 - The "Chamomile" attempt!

So, now, let's get back to the question: What came after Chamomile?

can you guess? can you guess?

Take a peak! hehe

yessss!!!! The love of my life, BAROQUE!

Now, seriously, I am totally in love with pink, yellow, orange and the like.

Did you notice what happen there? ME with a BLACK Filofax?
That is something I had never envisioned. Only a Baroque to make me take the leap!

And I liked it :D

We had a lot of fun!

Yeah.... had, I said. :-/
That was just ONE major reason that made move out of it. And it is not even the Baroque's fault! (it is never the Baroque's fault obviously!*)

But we will get to it :)


Let's check out the good times we had:

Totally filled with good times!

I literally transfered the juices of Chamomile into the Baroque.
I still don't like those vertical slots, in case you are wondering. So I kept the pocket card slots in there for easy access.
On the left hand side I just stuffed in some informational cards, business cards and a decorative card.

I have a set of month per view and a week per view. The month per view is very straight forward - the standard one from Filofax so I am not going thru that one.

The week per view is my problem.

Since the beginning of the year I am trying to figure out what kind of combination works for me.

I need to have a glance of the week but need daily planning as well.
I tried Flavia 2 pages per day and despite of its gorgeousness I could never make it work.
Finally a couple of weeks ago I found a good home for it! :)

So, the week per view.
I certanly deeply dislike the white cheap paper with weekends squeezed in.
A while back, Josh was very nice sending me his week per view in cotton cream. Wonderful! Great paper and equalitarian distribution of space! yes!

I was happily married with that set up for a while.
I spread out my tasks throughout the week with a little check box on the side of each task. Like this:

Pretty straight forward!

It worked well for a good chunk of time.

My problem started when I couldn't do something, say on a Monday, and would re-write for Wednesday and most likely again for Friday. That, I gotta say, made me always feel very bad as I wasn't accomplishing my little deadlines. I always had to "postpone" the deadlines to later in the week. Made me feel bad.

So I decide to play a trick to disguise my mind.
What if Thursday was the final deadline but I could visually do something that implied I should start working on pieces of the task on Monday?

I then started writing my tasks along long lines that would encompass more then one day.
The page on the right was my first attempt:

See how that worked?

For example "post Spring A5" I gave myself from Thursday till Sunday to accomplish. That way I didn't feel so bad if it wasn't done on Friday; I was still on the "time-frame".
I sure got excited with my idea, but besides the fact that is a pain to turn the whole organizer to write vertically like that (and later on the neck, to read it!), I couldn't connect days from the left page to the right page.


The solution? Steve & Ray's inserts of course!
After a lot of struggle of my part and help from the authors I altered their Vertical Week Per View to look like this:

Now I could connect all the days I needed with a big line! Plus the absence of lines would help with my irregular writing. And there it is a week in use:

See that I could assign a huge task to the entire week like "prep for NY trip" at the bottom.

I was very happy with it!
No lines make me feel more comfortable to write AND I didn't feel a total failure because a task was retricted to a day and I didn't finish it that day. Very happy with it!

One thing thou: the darn rings.
I mentioned here how I really dislike those humoungous rings that don't let me write close to the edge of the pages.

My solution this time?

A mock up of the Circa system.

I did little cuts on each whole.
That way I could easily slide the pages away from the rings, write on it and put it back in place.

That worked very well for its original purpose but certainly because the design of the wholes is not made for it, I had to be careful turning pages. If I turned single pages too eagerly, they would just fly away!
I had no problems at all turning chunks of pages together.

Ok, so to almost finalize, pen loop struggle!
Why not right? I am yet to find a Filofax that holds my fat Bic 4 colors.

In this case I can't even hang it by the little "arm" because the pen squeezes my tabs. I ended up just sneaking in the pen between the snap closure and the tabs.
And it actually sits great on the tabs. It doesn't squeeze them much:

The problem is that most of the times I forget the pen is not secure at all, open the organizer and there the pen goes straight to the floor. Hehe

Now, last pic, I promise!

I know there is no need to show my stickers' storage but that is my excuse to show off that pattern gorgeousness again, hehe:

So, I got to say, all that juicy beauty and it would mostly stay closed inside my purse. Occasionally at work I would remember something and would take a quick note and put it back in the purse. 

Not fair to that gorgeousness, isn't it?

To finalize - now seriously! -  here we go, the reason I had to move out of that delicious Filofax...

pen loop? nah! 

humongous rings? .....mmmm.... well, related to it because...

...it was just TOOO HEAVY people, too heavy for me! Too bulky, too much!

(*see, it wasn't really a Baroque's issue per say, it was my struggle with personal size. Baroques are always awesome! hehe)

It certainly was VERY convenient to have all my notes with me all the time, including travel plans but oh boy...... I really couldn't handle the weight.

I love you darling Baroque but you sit prettier OPENED on my desk at home. ♥

So, I moved out.

If you hang around on Twitter and/or  Instagram you may had seen already where I had headed to?!

No?

Here it is a sneak peek of what is coming next:

oh yeah!

Don't miss it! 

The saga continues. Always! :)

--------------------------> Filofax Swap 5 - A Classy Attempt! -------------------->

Coming soon , on a blog pretty close to you!

Many smooches and hugs to you all,

LT

****

PS: Thanks Vanjilla again for hosting my Baroque post! I really had fun writing it :)

Dear Lime Tree, I hope this is just the beginning of your guest posting here! :)  And I'm fully inspired by your ideas again, my Sister in Baroque! :)

Filotecture and Constant Curiosity

(Warning: this is a post without a single picture!)

I mean, really. May has begun while my posts got stuck back in February. I really am dissatisfied with myself because I know I could've written a dozen of them at least, I have been experimenting around Filofaxes a lot all this time!

Yeah, well.

During this period of gathering input from various awesome Filofax - related blogs I checked with myself a lot.

Which models resonate with me the most?
How do I decide which ones are a must in my collection?
Why am I perfectly happy with the standard Wo2P diary?
Why don't I like cotton cream paper?
Which size works the best for me? 
How about materials?
How do I respond to their names?
How do I decide which pen to use in which binder?
Is there a perfect set-up for me?
And so on and on, those were just some of the questions and I didn't get all the exact answers, but it made me think.

And I realized a couple of things:
a) I have already found my favourite model (I loved all your comments on my post about Filofax Piccadilly - thank you!),
b) I don't care so much about the specifics of the inserts as long as they are helpful enough to organize me for my daily basics; I have also gotten really used to my 4 quadrants in classic Filofax Wo2P so anything else confuses me too much,
c) I love the ordinary white Filofax paper, its thinness and smoothness and the rustling sound the pages make when I turn them and
d) I definitely support the "one life - one Filofax" philosophy, but something is making me collect those binders.

So the total amounts to the conclusion that I probably won't come up with any revolutionary new organizational tools in my career of a Filofax user because their "architecture" is what matters to me the most.

As I have written once, I perceive a Filofax as a personal space and my challenge is in making that space really comfortable and personal. Whenever I yearn for a certain Filofax or decide to put a next one in use, it is driven by my desire to make it a visual and tactile pleasure.

I love the process of "taming" a new Filofax into something that starts to breathe the air of you and your surroundings, I love the moment it begins to resonate with you and mirror your individuality, the way it starts to behave with your use.
(In psychotherapy very often one of the indicators of the person changing is their need to rearrange and redecorate their house. It'd be interesting to see how much setting up your own Filofax helps/reflects your inner structure changing!) 

So I think this must be the explanation for my growing collection of Filofaxes (My family members: "But what do you need another one for??" / Me: "Need? Need??? It's so not about needing it!"): the beautiful binders are a great "blank canvas" for such experiments, each of them a lovely little house, waiting to be inhabited. And there comes my curiosity when I see a binder: how can I tame this one?!

So in the next posts I'll mostly share my experiments of bringing various Filofaxes to life - hopefully you'll enjoy them, too! :)

On a true Filofax love affair, finally, and on how to do to-dos... and it looks like this isn't the end yet!

It's three weeks of me being back to work after a year of maternity leave - need I say more?! :-)
I planned weeks ago to make this blogpost, and even promised to some of you to do it, so... let's go to work without any further delay!

Just to remind you where we stayed at last time: there was a christmas present which shook my ground, and it came in the shape of an Apple Green Personal Piccadilly.
Can you imagine what are the odds that someone who knows absolutely nothing about Filofaxes (apart from seeing me clearly having trouble with my self-control around them) gives you a brand new Piccadilly in 2011 (I gather they were sold between 1998 - 2001)?!
Only one person in the world is capable of that. My mum.  :-)

I have read about the Piccadilly before and frankly couldn't imagine its addictive powers. Well, now I have tested them myself and to put it short and simply: after the Malden and the Amazona and many binders in between as well, this one is without a doubt my favourite.

I can't exactly tell you why. It's hidden somewhere in the mixture of the pockets layout, its vibrant colour and great soft padded surface, I guess. It's like coming home to a soft, worn, comfortable couch. There's just the chemistry that wasn't there with the previous ones! :-)

Hm, but let the pictures do the talking!

It lays perfectly flat out of the box and its brilliant colour was just calling for a brand new decoration... you could see me searching through decorative paper like never before and then actually making new dividers for it - now that must be love! :-)

I couldn't imagine any other pen to go with it than the trusty old Bic Orange, I think it just completes the uber comfortable look and feel of the organiser!

The other part of this re-decoration was my new DIY post-it accessory.











The set up didn't change much though, as it was working great for me as it already was: Diary, Me (with various Lists that are marked with small top tabs each, Journal and my Finance section with the punched envelope for receipts and odd banknotes that I hide from myself), Info (Adresses, Bus Schedules, Passwords, Doctor's numbers ect.) and my little one's tab with all her important info. The only new tab was given to my Projects... now that the work began again, haha... 

I hope you liked it so far, and now off to the second today's topic, the to-dos system, which is my new improvement in the use of my Filofax.

I always use week on two pages; not just because I have countless numbers of them, arriving with each new Filofax, but also because I find them as the best compromise between the available space and still bearable bulk of the organiser.
The nature of my work is quite predictable appointment-wise, so I use the daily space mostly for my to-dos.
I use different colour pens, but solely to pretty things up, I colour-code my writing only occasionally, I don't have the time or the nerve to pick the appropriate colour when on the go!

Therefore I use another coding method to orientate myself quickly: I divide a day's space mentally into 4 quarters, and the quarters mean:

• left upper one = priority stuff, usually work or doctor's related 
• left lower one = to-dos related to household and family
• right upper one = my pleasure activities, yay, I often write here the type of tea that I drink that day (very important journalling info, lol!) and
• right lower one = events and things of that day that I want to remember, i.e. my baby's milestones... or simply the arrival of my new Filofax Compact - ooops, but that's another post! ;-)

While I have my to-dos on day's space, it is easy to check them up later; but then there are some to-dos and reminders that I want to keep in sight every time and I had to invent a hack for it. The basic idea was to write them on a post-it and move them from week to week, but I didn't like the post-it covering my days, so finally I came up with the solution: I put a transparent flyleaf in between the week's sheets and used it as a dashboard for my post-its. Ray with his incredible inventions was most helpful here, giving me the idea of diy transparent flyleaves.So this is how my dashboard looks like in action:

Hopefully, any of this will be useful to you, too... and please, do share any comments and ideas!!!

So here I am Filofax-wise so far; loving the binder and satisfied with the system. But. But! Of course there has to be a "but" now. And it has to do with both the binder and the system.

Firstly, as I said, I love this Piccadilly like no other model so far and am already on the quest of buying all the existent Piccadillys in the world to make sure I never again remain without one. The problem with this current one is because it gets scratched sooooooo easily! After only a month and a half, the marks of use are clearly seen, and as my little one is especially drawn to it (now at least one gene of mine she's gotten...), its future is quite predictable. I guess it has to do with the binder's age and maybe dryness that, ironically, obviously even Nivea cannot fix completely.

The other problem that surfaces constantly is the thickness of the binder. I love the idea of one life - one binder, but mine is as thick as a telephone book now! And since I don't use it just at home as I used to, lugging it around along with other necessities is quite a work to do.

Therefore I have a few open challenges again:
1. I'll probably put my Piccadilly to rest for a while now, so I don't ruin it too much too soon. Hardly, because I cannot imagine any other binder replacing it, but it'll be necessary, I guess. But on the other hand, I did have the idea to change the binder with the change of seasons last year, so the new challenge would be - which binder to use for the nearing spring? :-)
2. I am considering a compact size binder, especially with the forecasts of the new Filofax range being a bit more compact - oriented. But will it really suit me?

Ahhh, the never ending adrenalin in the land of Filofax... ;-)

The Great Mini

My first Filofax ever was an A5 Graphic Zip (I was still a student back then and needed something spacious and secure, so this seemed a great option and I turned it into a tote crammed full of things!)
When I went to work, I lugged it around with me for a while, but suddenly it was so bulky I couldn't stand it anymore (and its masculine look as well - I suppose that was a sign of me growing up, hehe).
So off to the pocket size we went - a pink BCC surely was the real opposite, wasn't it?

For more than a year now this was my main Filofax size (but not the binder, obviously, ah!) and I somehow struggled with its much smaller size, keeping in all my stuff: diary, to-dos, notes, even a journal.
Just as I'm writing this a thought occurred: how come I switched from A5 to pocket size directly, without even considering personal size? But then I remembered: I wanted something of a personal size, but there was a thing about it that was always bothering me: the look of a personal sized sheet. I simply didn't like its proportions - so narrow in comparison to its width, they were similar to nothing I was previously writing on! So I chose pocket size instead, its papers look lovely - more compact, more squarish and chubby!

As my needs developed and because I invented a need needed a gift for myself after finishing my Master's degree, I finally got the personal sized one. I got used to the enigmatic personal size in an hour or so and am loving it ever since!

Before I get too carried away with my filohistory - I just wanted to illustrate how the mini size Filofax was never even an option for me - at the time I cannot imagine even using pocket size (which is a pity with some lovely Sleeping Beauties dreaming away in my drawer!). But I saw some posts on philofaxy (of course! this site is making me obsessed!) that made me curious and I knew the mini experiment was just a question of time.

And so I knew the time has come when I I found an used mini Amazona in what was once called "brown" (because when I saw it later in reality it was rather "brown beaten to almond"!). I have always had a huge weakness for Amazonas and even the quite poor state of this one didn't stop me, I thought it will be a good trial wallet anyway. And oh yes it was! In both dimensions: as a size and as a poor little beaten Amazona, too.

So, how is this mini working for me?


I keep my most used cards in the front so they're easy to reach (the little white dandelion post-its only cover personal info!). I added a few post-its for my quick notes.
In the secretarial pocket that is so awesome an invention that I-couldn't-live-without-it-now-that-I-have-tried-it are my driving license, receipts and some coupons. The first page is a plastic envelope filled for decoration only, I keep some photos of my family on the back of it.

 And then it goes as the tiny icons show: credit cards, loyalty cards, expenses sheet, to-do lists and documents.

My to-dos here are in fact my shopping lists - it's great to finally actually have them with me when in store!

The expenses sheet is how I try to keep track of my consumerism - a major underreporter I am!

Then there's also the back zipped pocket - see how innocently it looks when closed? But I assure you, this thing can really hold a lot of coins! This is what I was especially happy to get because the coins were one of my biggest issues when deciding to try a mini as a wallet. I just didn't want to carry a coin purse as well! 

 

 OK, the pen does get in a way a bit, but it is no struggle, and it writes so smoothly and looks so cute due to its mini size that I cannot bring myself to replace it!

As all minis (I think), this one, too, has a full length pocket where I keep my banknotes.

 So this is it in the pictures and words. Now how about an explanation or two?

1.Why I love the mini size so much?
= because it is not that small at all, it actually gets too big sometimes! And because it holds my cards comfortably - you know, no fiddling when paying. AND because it is big enough to make some necessary notes and shopping lists, too.

2. Why do I love this poor Amazona? :)
= It really looks battered, but I somehow got used to it and what I love the most about it is the softness of its hard used leather! It's amazingly soft and I didn't know that Amazonas age so well  until now -  the other ones that I have are brand new and still feel somewhat rough. Can't wait for them to age (although... knowing how careful I am with them, they'll never get the opportunity to develop a character like this one did).

So things have come so far that I loved the size of the mini so much I decided to buy a real one after this successful trial period, and already got a stunning one, and also prepared it ready to go. But... but I somehow just cannot part with this Amazona! Which is outrageous, I'll show you why:

The mini in waiting is a mini Balmoral, a gorgeous style that isn't produced anymore - what a pity, I'd buy it in every size!!! It is amazing one...  I tried my best to make the pictures that will show it in all its glory, but I'm no photographer and - damn, these shiny black things are difficult to capture! I had similar problems with my post on personal Amazona, it just turns silvery on the pictures no matter what the surrounding light is! So, please, before you proceed - imagine a blackest black, glossy leather that was lacquered over and over!

No secretarial pocket in Balmoral, though, I really miss it! But it has a cute popper-pocket for coins at the back!

And the binder has two popper positions so you can adjust the strap - isn't that a luxury?! I wish every binder had that!

I wanted to show the dimensions here - both of the pen and the binder. And to show them both off a little, I admit! Yes, unlike the Amazona, I treated this one to a genuine Filofax mini Barley pen. I didn't hear too good reviews on it, but I must say it writes and feels lovely.

The full length pocket again...

  
See? This is my dilemma: the Balmoral is just awesome and so chic... but for some reason I'm stuck on the Amazona and cannot move on! :) What do you think, which one would you use? Please, post in the comments!

I know, this has been a marathon-long, picture heavy post, but I'll just explain shortly about the accessories that I used for setting this mini up:  I made the credit card holders out of the old plastic documents folder that I tore apart, while the little icons pictured at the beginning come from an old Moleskine. I got the idea from this beauty, but since I am nowhere as neat as she is, I just stuck the Moleskine icons on Avery divider tabs and cut those to the right size.

Thank you for reading this all through, and to rest your eyes a little... please sit back with me and take these  4:38 minutes more!

This is the loveliest time of the year and this song that just has to be a part of it... It brings so many beautiful memories to me, I hope it does the same for you!  :)

With love,

Vanjilla.