Circa*Organizing ⋆ Amanda Hawkins | Ahhh Design

A few years ago I was completely obsessed with D*I*Y Planner. I spent hours going through templates and putting together the PERFECT planner.
And then I never used it.

I’m still fascinated by David Allen’s ‘Getting Things Done’, Franklyn Covey & the numerous other techniques/products designed to increase your productivity but I realized that as an artistic person I would never be able to schedule my life with so much structure. And in the short time that I was trying, it was having the opposite effect — I was spending so much time trying to figure out how to ‘plan’ every day it was cutting into my ‘doing’ time.

Fall of ’07 I was watching a livejournal community where people (mostly young women) would post pictures of their planners filled with doodles about boys, poetry, school schedules, homework, to-do lists and magazine collages. It was all very stream of conscious and the complete opposite of what D*I*Y Planner seemed to represent. They were combining their planner, journal & sketchbook all in one and sharing it as art. I loved it and started creating templates that followed their example.

Templates

First, I drew a set of 4 x 6 planner templates by hand.

DOWNLOAD: 4x6-templates-ahhhdesign.pdf (1325 downloads)

I designed the dates and months to be filled by the user — I know that no matter how much I love my planner, there are going to be days (maybe months) that I don’t touch it. This way I’m not wasting paper and printing templates I’ll never use. There aren’t very many notebooks and supplies made for 4×6 notecards either. For a gift for my brother ‘n’ law I ripped apart a cheap 3×5 notebook and put it back together as a 4×6 notebook. (photos – I’ve been thinking of writing a tutorial on this, if anyone is interested?)

While my brother ‘n’ law (and many others) have super-itty-bitty writing (and reading) abilities, I do not. So, as I was working on a planner for my sister I redesigned the pages in an 8.5 x 11 format.

DOWNLOAD: letter_black.pdf (4487 downloads)

This format is my favorite, by far. You can buy a three-ring binder in wonderful colors and any divider/folder you could want at your local office supply store to go inside. Plus there’s so much room and flexibility!

2009

The whole point of this post though… is to introduce my new 2009 templates!


They’re 8.5 x 11 and the most minimal so far, to leave tons of room for personalization. The most fun feature for me is the dashed month in the top left, ready for outlining and coloring in. The Download includes a 2009 year-at-a-glance, 12 months and a blank notes page.
DOWNLOAD: 2009_diyplanner.pdf (3505 downloads)