Wow 2020 is certainly keeping things interesting. Being active in a community that thrives on planning, organising, controlling (we think) our lives, Covid-19 certainly sent us into a spin! I was happily planning in my on the go combination of a Hobonichi weeks and digital. At home I was using a customised A5 Personal Planner for school/family things and memory keeping in my Vertical coiled planner. Then lockdown happened and I got put onto furlough and suddenly planning took a huge back seat. What even do you plan? So I dropped it for a few weeks whilst I got my head around it. Bearing in mind I was also trying to home school a 7 year old, which I discovered I am not cut out to do at all!
Once I began to get an albeit slippery grip on my days, I found the Personal Planner A5 to be useful. I used it solely to capture everything and track home schooling, meal planning, home tasks and online orders. However I started to become a little frustrated with the lack of note pages and ability to add stuff in. I had already determined that more than one planner was not going to help (my mental capacity is not as it should be in a crisis!) So I had a rummage in my old planner box and pulled out my Filofax Finsbury personal in cherry. She was only used as a Christmas planner every year and deserved a less seasonal trial. So I set her up with what I had, then printed out some daily pages I purchased from Organise With Katie a while ago. It worked really well for me. Even when I return to work it looks likely I will do much more home based working going forward. Therefore the bulkier/heavier Filofax is less of an issue as it will not be carried around as much.
As is always the case with a planner nerd, I took to YouTube to watch various personal Filofax set up videos. I wanted to see what had moved on since I last used one, for example the inbox concept (GTD) (explained here by Rachel at Ellie Beth). I started to see all the lovely Malden’s in Ochre and felt a huge longing to be back in my beloved pocket one. But I know that a pocket size is presently not big enough to suit my needs. After chasing a few on E-bay with little success (those suckers hold their prices well and are in demand,) I popped an appeal out in the UK Planner Addicts selling group. A lovely lady I shared a table with at the The Big Meet 2019 contacted me to say she was selling her Filofax personal Ochre Malden. That my friends is how I came back to a personal sized Filofax Malden in ochre, just a bit bigger.
I did a little poll in UKPA recently asking what planners people were in. Interestingly the personal rings came top! It’s an interesting time for planning and I do wonder if we revert to something we feel safe with in difficult times. There certainly seems to be a resurgence of ringed planners this year. I have also become better at printing and cutting my own inserts. This means I have so much opportunity for a massive variety of insert types now. I’m waiting for dividers to arrive. When I do if there is interest I will share my set up. I’m back browsing Philofaxy too!
That is where I am so far. I’d love to know what your 2020 planner journey has been? Have you reverted, stopped altogether or looked to use something new? Let me know your thoughts.
Take care out there.
Plan It Zoe 
You must be logged in to post a comment.