December Bullet Journal & Planner Ideas

What is a bullet journal? It is a customizable journal for your own lifestyle needs.

I have always been the type of person who needed to write things out whether to remember something to do or just to let my feelings out at times. Growing up, I always had a diary and loved picking out my school planner for the new school year. It always relaxed me when I wrote everything down and I could plan my days accordingly.

I really started paying attention to the layouts of different planners when I got my very first Erin Condren planner. My coworker gifted me one that was customized for all of my wedding needs and it was a huge lifesaver. It had all of the important wedding lists, inspirational quotes, lined/ graph paper, special wedding stickers etc.

After my wedding, I brought another Erin Condren planner from Staples. I was very pleased with it for that full year.

This year as I was getting ready to purchase another planner before I headed back to work in September, I found myself wanting a new change.

Michaels was having a great sale on Recollection planners and I wanted to check out the layouts provided with this brand. I found the Creative Year Coral Floral Medium Spiral Planner. Once, I opened to the weekly layouts, I fell in love with this planner. (Pictures are featured towards the end of the blog post). The three box system for each day was perfect for my daily needs. I knew that three boxes would represent the following categories work, home and blog. The gold sturdy coils that held the pages together reminded me of my Erin Condren planners. And this planner came with stickers as well. I brought a couple of sticker sets from Recollections to satisfy my need of organization and of course to make it look cute too.

TIP: Always use a coupon for Michaels. They have coupons on their website and if you sign up for the mailing list, they will send you special coupons not featured on the website. Never pay full price for an item there. Also, if you are a teacher, show them your school id and they will give a teacher discount. The only downside is that you will not be able to stack both discounts.

After a few weeks of using my planner, I still felt like I wanted more from my planner. Around this time, I was dealing with major anxiety and needed an outlet to express myself. That's when I came across the concept of bullet journals. The freedom to create and use your journal however you see fit was extremely appealing. And to top it of, I was able to be creative with the different layouts, quotes, fonts, lists etc. was exactly what I needed to fill that void from my Recollection planner.

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As I did more research on bullet journals, I was drawn more to the journals that had dot paper inside of them. Typically, people tend to use graph paper journals or dot paper journals. For me, I thought that the graph paper journals were too distracting. So of course I traveled back to Michaels. I brought the Purple Dot Journal By Artist's Loft. It was the perfect travel size journal that had a smooth, sturdy hardcover. I usually don't like the color purple but I wanted a fun color that I could easily spot from all of my other books.

The journal had a table of contents which is useful to keep track of what you have through out the journal. The dot paper is useful for creating any template that you may need. The dots are extremely small and you barely notice them once you fill out the page with your markers.

I always use a pencil to sketch out my templates for each page. This will give me an outline to follow when I use my markers. Many people stress the need for high end markers but I use markers from the Dollar Tree and colored pencils from there as well. Use what you have, the main goal of a bullet journal is to help you with your lifestyle needs not to be Instagram ready.

My cover page is the featured picture of this blog. Every month I like to have a quote or drawing to showcase the start of a new design/ layout for the current month. This month I drew a classic tree with presents underneath. As you can see, the final drawing is different from the sketch I drew. I wanted a more traditional looking tree as my cover page instead of a cartoon like tree.

On my first page, I drew a calendar with space on the side for important events. Since I still use my Recollection planner for my daily tasks, I don't need to have a whole page dedicated to that. A few lines is perfect for me. Underneath the calendar, I have a mood tracker. Last month, I went into detail with what every color meant and gave myself too many options. This month I wanted to keep it simple. Since I have anxiety, this really helps me track my triggers and reflect on patterns or issues that occur through out the month. Each light on the tree represents a different day in the month.

Yes, I know I put extra lights on the tree that past the 31 days. I got carried away with drawing them while I was listening to Christmas music.

Under the tree, I have an empty gift to represent the money I saved for the month. This will visually give me an idea of my saving habits as the months go by.

On my second page, I drew a snowman throwing snowballs towards the people I need to talk to more. In our daily lives, we are so consumed with our routines that we tend to stay in our own worlds and forget to communicate with our friends and family. This is a reminder for myself of the people I need to reach out to more often. I will fill out their names next to each snowball. This list may change from month to month.

On my third page, I created a fun template to represent all the Christmas presents I need to buy this year. If the present is colored in, this means that I already brought/ received their gift. I have a couple of extra presents in case I forgot someone or thought of a person that would love an extra gift.

On my fourth page, I wanted a reference page of all of my holiday favorites. As we get older, it seems that time flies by. On the days that I don't know what to do, I can use this page to give me some festive inspiration. I loved how traditional this template is. The wreath in the center of this page is a great anchor for the topics surrounding it.

On the last few pages for this month, I created my daily template. I wanted something festive and not distracting. Most people use these daily boxes for tasks that are important for the day. Instead, I use my daily boxes for when I want to have a brain dump moment for the day. For instance, I can use it to doodle a drawing or as a diary entry.

The very last page for the month is my 2017 roundup page. This is basically my reflection page of all the ups and downs of the year. The great thing about this bullet journal is that I can add more pages to the month if I want as the month progresses. This bullet journal is always ever changing for my needs at the moment in time.

I hope this blog post inspired you to start a bullet journal for the new year!

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This is the Recollections planner that I linked in the beginning of the blog post. I love the bright colors on the cover and through out the planner. From the same brand, I brought a set of washie tape so I can personalize my monthly spread and weekly spreads. If you would like me to create a Plan With Me blog post, please leave a comment down below. I can show you many different tips and tricks to maximize your daily productivity.