Today I am so excited to share with you my planner system. It has been working great now for a couple of weeks and I finally have it perfected enough where I want to share it. I have been watching Erin Condren Planner reviews on YouTube for the past month now. I had never heard of the
Erin Condren planner until now and I am in love with it. She has such a great eye for detail and the planner is worth the money, I promise. They are a little pricey but its well worth the money. I know I said I would do this review on Wednesday, but the week just got away from me so here it is:
First I want to go over all my supplies. I got the keep it together bands for $6.95. Such a great add on. It makes it easy to stick the planner in my back pack and I don't have to worry about the pages being bent or anything. I highly recommend picking up some when you order your planner.
I also got the customized notepads. I bought two of them and they stick into the back of the planner. I made sure they were customized with my name and the saying I chose for my planner this year. I use them for random notes and ideas, as well as shopping lists. I can tear out the pages so I don't have to bring my entire planner into the store which is nice. I also ordered the customized stickers for $5.00 a sheet. I will explain more about those in a minute.
The planner comes with a set of gift labels which you see in the photo above.
The bag to the left holds my pens that I use for the planner. Lately I have been loving the sharpie pens you can find at staples, however I have been using the paper mate flair pens and I love those as well. Both can be found on amazon. My only criteria with pens is to make sure they don't bleed through the paper and both of these brands pass that test.
So lets take a look at the planner itself shall we.
First off the planner is pretty thick when you put the notepad in the back. As you can see. The band does a great job of keeping it all together so it doesn't get damaged or ruined.
I chose the paisley cover. It was such a hard decision. I couldn't decide which cover to choose but I really like this one. You can customize it to say whatever you like. Most people did the Holladay family or something like that and for the second line they did 2014. I really like the quote and its my motto for this year. It helps me to keep in perspective what I am trying to accomplish for 2014.
When you open it up you see the title page of the planner. Here I put my color coding system. For each class I have a different pen color, it helps me to know what assignments are due when. I also have highlighting colors set out which I use in my binders. This system has been great to keep me organized.
The next thing you see is a spread of birthdays and anniversaries. I have already filled this out (thanks to Facebook for making it easy). There are four months on each page and it goes all the way to December
Next you get this 18 month spread. Which is really helpful, her new planner designs come out in June so if you order in June you can actually get the 18 month planner. I think that is a great idea, I really like the 12 month planner and it makes a great Christmas present so my husband knows what to get me each year.
This is the month at a glance page. As you can see everything is color codded. I love that. I put all of our bills in black and that way I know when a bill is do. Pink is blog post ideas and I try and post every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The stickers help me know when Birthdays are and assignments are due. Here is the other side of February.
As you can see its really busy this month. I block out church activity days, Exams (this is super helpful because then I can see what days I am going to have to study for tests), Family Parties, and Temple Trips. All of these stickers I customized and ordered through her site. The Exam stickers are the best idea.
Here is a look at March:
I marked off spring break with Vacation stickers. I have a conference that month I am attending so I used the extra stickers in the back to mark that. I have an exam and an assignment due. Its really helpful to plan the month out when I can see what is happening when.
Here is what a weekly spread looks like:
As you can see I have everything planned out. The colors help me see when assignments are due and its easy to check things off when I complete them.
I keep track of meal plans and scripture reading at the bottom. School work is up in the top, I usually put homework in the night section. I always put boxes next to my assignments so when I complete one I can check it off. I just love checking things off, it means I actually did something that day.
I have loved using the Erin Condren Planner to help me keep track of assignments and daily tasks. In a way, my planners become my journals for the year because I can look back and see what exactly I did that day. Although this planner is expensive, it is well worth the investment for how it keeps me organize. Plus it is so colorful and bright it makes me smile everyday when I open it.
I hope you enjoyed this planner review. Monday I will be doing a post on tips for studying so stay tuned for that. I know everyone can use more help on how to study for those college finals and pass your exams.
Have a great weekend. Happy Friday.
XO Caitlin