It doesn’t seem possible that a new year is only a month away! If you haven’t decided on your 2019 planner system, now is the time. I have used almost every planner known to man at one time or another, so for this year my goal is to concentrate on what actually works for me, and keeping it as simple as possible.
I’ve tried just about every planner under the sun, but I always end up coming back to Erin Condren so this year I decided to stick with what I know. My main planner this year is the Erin Condren LifePlanner in the vertical format. It’s been a few years since I used a vertical, but a few factors led me to change. For one, since I am not longer working outside the home I don’t have nearly as much to schedule and juggle. My planning has morphed from time management into more to-do’s. Another factor is that I want to simplify my style and use less stickers. I was inspired by Stef.Plans super cute pen-only spreads!
I’ll be carrying over a few things from my current planner. I still like memory keeping in the 12 monthly boxes, so I will start that in this planner as well. I like the idea of tracking household tasks, etc. in my planner but I got entirely too detailed in my last one. In the new planner I am going to try to simplify the system I started.
In addition to my main planner I will be using an Erin Condren On The Go Folio. I like the charcoal, personally. I will be keeping an Erin Condren daily and monthly planner in here, as well as my Moleskine which is basically my brain-dump journal. I am going to use the daily planner for my mundane daily tasks and the bulk of my to-do’s. I am going to use the monthly calendar in this one to keep track of my blood sugar. The monthly planner is going to be my budget planner for 2019. I like to write bills on the day they are due/which paycheck I am paying them out of in the monthly pages. I am tracking how much I put in our sinking funds in the sidebar. There are plenty of note pages to track debt repayment, etc.
There are two planning systems I am tentatively adding to my 2019 lineup. One is a deluxe monthly planner that I am considering using for a faith and gratitude planner. I love how Scribbles of Grace set hers up, and I copied her even down to the cover. I’m not sure if I NEED a separate planner for this, so we’ll see how it goes. I am also using my B6 TN for journaling. I haven’t pulled this out for a while, but recently I won a bunch of inserts from Yellow Paper House so I decided to use them for my daily journaling and scripture writing. Lately I have been following a monthly scripture writing plan either from Sweet Blessings or from Debbie in Alaska. As far as journaling, I basically just diary what is going on in my life day-to-day. I figure it might be fun to look back at some day.
I think the main theme of my 2019 planner stack is simplicity. While that many planners probably doesn’t seem very simple, my focus is on functionality. What am I actually using? What is making my life easier vs. just becoming another task I have to complete? Follow along on Instagram to see how my 2019 planners play out.
