My 2018 Bullet Journal

I finally started a bullet journal!! Whoop whoop :)

Thanks to Vivianna (The Anna Edit) and Shelby (Little Coffee Fox) for your ideas and inspiration!!  Also thanks to my hubby for the book I am using (part of my Christmas gift :D)!

I have honestly tried a bunch of journals in the past, both written and digital,  and always found myself short of space for certain days and activities, and wasted pages on others.  I also found most to be too bland for my taste.  As soon as I heard about bullet journals, I was skeptical, it seemed like a mammoth task to figure out the spacing, what to include, etc.  But, as soon as I did some research, I realised it can be easier than it sounds.


I am a visual person and, as such, always imagine what I am going to do and say before I do.  Perhaps it was a bad idea to think of this whilst man-down with the flu :P

Anyhoo, I was very quickly inspired and here is what I did with my journal:

First I started off with normal, boring calendar entries for the year ahead.  This I did in a week per two-page style.  I do not have a lot to-do on a daily basis as I have a full-time job with a separate work calendar for things to do there.  I plan to also write my meal-plannings into these sections.  This is what mine looks like:

After finishing this section, I got distracted by Vivianna (The Anna Edit) and Lily (Lily Pebbles)'s blog and vlog tips series of videos on Youtube (HOW TO BLOG & VLOG: TIPS & TRICKS).  Thanks you two!!! :)  Sooo, I took some inspiration from them, turned into a bit of a copy-cat, and made two checklists in the front of my journal (I had the clever spark to leave space open before the calendar entries - YAY!).  This is what my lists look like:

Now, onto the last few pages.   I made a statistics page where I can follow how many viewers and followers I have each month, a #hashtag page to keep track of what I used on Instagram and Twitter previously, and finally a blog ideas page! :) I also made provision for a videos ideas page, but since I am still to scaredy-cat to upload videos, the page is simply a blank canvas and I won't bore you guys with it :D

Here are a few last tips from my side:

• Make a list of all the topics that you would like to include in your journal before you start;
• Count the pages in your journal and plan your lay-out accordingly (this way you will know how many pages you can allocate to which topics);
• Customise it to your needs: incorporate topics that you would actually use, not what you would want to use (this will just clog up your journal and make you feel overwhelmed and under-accomplished);
• Insert your own style and colours, it is your journal, make it so that you like it (P.S. I still want to add a bunch of stickers to mine - I loooove stickers); 
• Use a pen/pencil that is easy to write with and smudge-proof (some can make your handwriting look like Picasso's and other like Michaelangelo's).  A ruler can also come in handy to make straight lines (remember to pull from the left to right on the right hand pages to avoid wavy lines).

There you have it, another bullet journal to add to the 1000's already on the web.  I hope that you enjoyed my post and gained some tips and tricks to help you set-up your bullet journal.


Bye bye :)

Michelle Smillie
Let Life Be, Let Love In