What I use each year for planning and how I organize my binder.
Each December I look forward to some down time to start planning out my goals and dreams for next year.
I’ve had many people on social media ask about what I use, so I thought this would be a wonderful time to showcase my binder and how I have it set up.
This is also the first time I’ve loaded a post up with pictures so enjoy! (All of them open up to larger versions in a new window if you want to see details.)
Since 2013, my favorite life and business planner has been Leonie Dawson’s Life and Business Planners (disclaimer: affiliate link). She has wonderful pages and questions that ask you to reflect back on the year to celebrate your wins and learn where you fell short, so you know where you need to improve for next year.
After that, you’ll go through your intentions for the upcoming year and set up your goals for multiple areas of your life. With the business planner, you do the same thing.
This year Leonie’s offering a print version that combines the two books into a colorful bound version. (I was too impatient to order mine, so I just printed the pages I needed, avoiding duplicates, and put them into a binder. 🙂 )
Once I had the major parts of the Life and Business Planner done, I started setting up my planning binder.
As much as I’ve tried to go all digital, I just can’t. I’m a very tactile person so I need a paper planner of sorts to keep me focused. (That being said, I’d be lost without my Google calendar. My reminders are synced with all my devices and the alerts remind me of appointments and tasks all day!)
I’ve tried a variety of planners over the years and was so frustrated with them, that I decided to create my own. There were several features I liked from a variety of sources, so I cut/pasted a new layout. Since I’m pretty good working in Illustrator, I designed my own and printed them up. Voi La!!! (The advantages of being a graphic designer!)
Because I love creating my own planners, I needed something that was extremely customizable. As soon as I saw the Arc Planners from Staples, I fell in love.
Last year, I used a small Junior version as it was easy to keep it with me at all times as it fit right into my purse.
I was able to print out my custom weekly planner pages, along with pages from Leonie’s planner and everything fit perfectly into place!
This year, I decided to advance to a larger planner to accommodate bigger plans. Also, the junior version didn’t come in purple and that was really bugging me last year. 😉
So nice to keep my mottos front and center.
Every category I need fits in perfectly.
Keeping on top of budgets and financials is super important and therefore comes first. – I modified this version, however you can get a digital copy by the amazing Amber McCue here.
Don’t forget to keep track of your income. Money loves to be payed attention too!
Big picture planning with a year at a glance calendar. Vacations and the days the boys are home from school are the first things that get blocked off.
The beautiful Monthly calendars I print in full color from the Life/Business planners by the talented Leonie Dawson! Yes, she did all the artwork for these amazing pages!
My own week at glance calendar pages for balancing my workload. Since I have select hours each day for my business stuff and client work, I can schedule it in here and don’t overbook myself! (Or, that’s the point anyway. Sometimes life happens…)
Last month I came across this beautiful Daily Planner page that I purchased and I’m using that this year to stay super focused. Most all the other planner pages in my binder are work related, however this one I use for both the work and family stuff I have to do each day. You can get your copy here. Super inexpensive and worth it if you have trouble making your own. [Update: After a week of trying them I found I didn’t like using the daily planner pages so I increased the layout and design of the week at a glance pages and use them instead. You can grab a copy of the new pages at the bottom of this post.]
In addition to a section for notes, I also have my list of 100 things I’d like to do in 2015 (yet to be filled out), to keep front of mind so I can add them to my calendar. I also keep all my goals from the planner written down, along with next action steps so I can add those tasks to my calendar as well. (Didn’t do so hot with that last year, so not many were accomplished.) Action is key my friends!
I also have some sections set aside to keep a list of blog/newsletter topics and monthly reflection and tracking. It’s good to review how the previous month went to see what went well and what fell short so you can re adjust for next month and not go into a downward spiral. 😉
These are a few of my favorite planning tools. I found these amazing Frixion clicker pens that are erasable. They are the first erasable pen that I’ve found that works without tearing the paper up. And they come in my favorite colors! (Purple, pink, turquoise) The others are multi-colored Gel pens. And I found out last month that Frixion also sells erasable markers! How cool is that!!! They work just as well as the pens. I can’t wait to fill up my planner with beautiful colors. 🙂
I was turned on to Washi tape by a colleague back in September and instantly got hooked. Looking forward to trying out all these beautiful patterns in my planner pages as well.
Now that my binder is set, I will read through and fill out the Desire Map workbook and create my new vision board for this year.
After that, I start setting up my Marketing Action Plan (promotions, blog posts, teleclasses, social media schedule, etc.) and content creation schedule. (Those will be topics for other posts. 😉 )
Hope you enjoyed this and if you like my custom weekly planner, mention it in the comments below. If there’s enough interest, I’ll create a blank copy for you to download for yourself. 🙂
You asked, here it is! Download a blank copy of the Weekly Planner Template.
Take care and happy planning!
[UPDATED 12/31/14] I found that I don’t like using the daily sheets so I updated my weekly planner to 2-pages-per-week. You can grab a blank copy here.
Wife, mom to 3 boys, dark chocolate lover, entrepreneur, marketing strategist/web developer and author of Online Marketing Simplified:
The Beginner’s Guide to Using the Internet to Market Your Local Business 
Would love a copy! And even more so interested in how you do and keep track of your marketing action plan- do you use a separate calendar, notebook, list- help! I’m challenged with this!
Just uploaded a blank copy of the weekly planner template Suzanne. For planning my marketing action plan, I’ll be creating a new blog post on that this month. However I will say that I have some things mapped out on another calendar for the initial planning, then I’ll transfer them over to my editorial calendar on my website and my monthly calendar in my binder so I can view the big picture. 🙂
Would also love a copy, I’ve customized planner pages as well for a small planner and ended up not using them, I think I’m more the full-sized binder type of person.
Lisa, you can grab a copy at the bottom of the blog post. 🙂 Yes, this year I’m excited to try out the full size binder. I’ve used the half-sized ones for the past 2 years. It will be easier to fit everything in. 🙂
P.S. Thanks for sharing your amazing, creative and grounded job of putting this together for 2015 – and well before the start of the year. Exemplary!
Thank you Lisa!!! It helps me get my mind in the right place heading into the new year.
Love how you’ve put this together in the Arc… It looks awesome. Do you use a special hole punch with it?
I do a very similar process, combining part of Amber McCue’s, Leonies Life & Biz, a 3 month at a glance calendar (per quarter), my inventory spreadsheets (tracking all of my digital assets) and a customized ‘month at a glance’ planner with blog posts & newsletter schedule. It’s fun to keep refining your own systems year after year, isn’t it?
Yes Loralee. I purchased the Arc punch that way I could add any types of pages I wanted. 🙂
I love customizing it and adding new things I find throughout the year.
Love what you’ve done! Will need to look into something like this for myself 🙂 And I’m ALWAYS interested in your weekly planner! Thank you for sharing!
Thank you Tamsin. I’ve added the link to the download at the end of the blog post. 🙂
I love that you take the best of the planners you love and make it your own. I’m using a mix of Leonie’s planner, Amber McCue’s planner & Sage Grayson’s planner. I love the different perspectives, mix of life & biz, and planning, dreaming & scheming!
Thank you Kerryn! Yes, having the combination of different planners allows me to think about all the areas of my life so nothing gets missed. The different perspectives of the authors is great because they ask you to think about different questions/insights.
LOVE IT! I’m a planning geek but haven’t had time to do mine yet. Now you have inspired me to get going on it!
Jenn, I have to say, your orighal 2015 planner post has helped shift my life. I’ve totally gotten into the Arc & Levenger disc planner concept, am loving it! Have a way to go with consolidating all scattered info, but is so inspiring to know there’s now a place for everything. Between that and online Asana, am “getting it together.” (Levenger punch is on it’s way, by the way!). Secondly, picked up my order of FriXion pens from my local office supply store yesterday … including red pens to be used for proofing pages of a monthly print mag I’m editor of. I have a feeling this is going to be a game-changer, an new era of editing mark-up. Got a red pen for my proofreader too! The Washi tape is next up. But mainly, THANK YOU for the inspiration. It’s rippling out to others I know as well, because your post has been so very inspiring – I’ve since experienced the disc binding system first-hand, because of you. Like you, I’m very particular about “planner” type pages that actually fulfill my unique needs. I am very appreciate that you have a similar ethic and feel for what works. Thank you for taking the time to share your process, your beautiful creation for the coming year, and for your obvious love of creativity. I’ll take a look at the weekly planner page asap. ~Lisa
Lisa,
I’m so happy for you. Thanks so much for sharing. 🙂 When I found the Disc system it changed my life too. I’ve always had a hard time being consistent with using my planners because all the pre made ones didn’t work the way my brain works. I loved being able to make up my own and be able to track and manage all the things “I” needed to in my life.
This was the first one that “stuck! And I even found, after testing the daily pages for a week, that I didn’t like the daily, but the week at a glance worked better, so I updated my weekly planner pages to a full, two page spread and I’ll update a link to a blank version of that later today too. 🙂
I don’t mean to be Chatty Kathy here, but Jenn, the red FriXion pens have changed my life! I’m not kidding – as an editor, have been using them for the first time ever in editing the final page of North State Parent mag’s January issue. I can’t tell you how fantastic it it to be able erase as needed to keep editing notes clear for our graphics dept. This is a new era for sure. Many thanks to you. I didn’t know about these pens until your amazing post about the things you love in relation to creating your 2015 planner/journal.
You’re very welcome Lisa. I love them too! I love using color and was bored with just using pencil. I love the flexibility of using color in my planners that aren’t permanent!