Using stamps for journaling

For embellishing my journals I carved a couple of journal stamps.



A pot stamp for the food we've cooked.



A tv stamp for the movies we've watched.



And two circle stamps for pointing out special events, like meeting with friends etc.



I still have many ideas for further journal stamps, so I will keep carving the next weeks...and I'm back home by the way. :)

February "We ♥ Mail" snail mail

February's theme for our We ♥ Mail project was either "Love" or "Carnival". As I'm not that much of a carnival fan I decided to go with the love theme. :)

I'm sorry for the bad quality of the pictures. I finished the swap shortly before I had to leave for a business trip (I'm still away from home), so I had no time to take proper pictures in sunlight. :(

My idea was to create the swap and especially the symbol "heart" with different techniques.

Like the crocheted heart garland...



...stitched heart cards...



...washi taped tags, stamped stickers, heart buttons...



...heart shaped clips, a knitted heart purse and lov tea.



Wrapped up and ready for its journey to Agustina in Argentina! :)



Wish you all a great week! :)

I ♥ my RoterFaden! - The extras

I showed you the main parts in the last post and this time I would like to show you the extras I especially arranged for my RoterFaden. As all the clips where occupied by the three notebooks, I used two elastic bands from my former X17 to add extras.

The extras



The first elastic band includes a dashboard for my current todos categorized into urgent and general todos, as well as a current shopping list for the next time I'm in the city, ...



... an overview of the We ♥ Mail project (including all the themes and monthly pen pals), as well as all of my current correspondences.



The second one holds all the things I like to use for embellishing my calendar, like sticky notes, photo corners,...



...stickers, clips...



...and washi tape samples.



And last but not least, stamps for all the letters I'm sending out and some sheets for notes.



For my blog organization/project idea notebook I made clips with a tab to create an easy access to the different categories.



As you can imagine, my RoterFaden is quite heavy, but I love to carry it around with me every day. :D

I ♥ my RoterFaden! - The main parts

I've always been a lover of filofax. I used them for years during school and university.
What I didn't like about them were the metal thing in the middle, as I always had troubles, when writing on the left page. I also never really knew how to keep the used pages, so it's always been kind of a mess.

Fortunatelly I found the RoterFaden, 100% made in Germany! It's quite pricy and I struggled with myself for quite a long time, but at the end I bought one. :) More than 2 years ago and I still love it! :)

The idea is just genius! The great click system allows you to use whatever notebook, calendar, journal or paper you want for your individual setup.



So this is how I use my RoterFaden currently....



The main parts
First clip - My journal calendar I've already shown you in the last post.




Second clip - My blog and project organization.
Every month I make an overview of the monthly project theme, write down a list of the todos and register when I publish a post via sticky notes.



On this page I organize my posts. I got this great idea from this youtube filofax organization video. On the upper section I write down post ideas on sticky notes. If I'm in the middle of doing the post ((f) I took pictures for the post, (t) I wrote the text for the post), I move the sticky note to the lower section. If I'm done with everything, (f) and (t), I can move the sticky note to the weekly overview to decide on which day to publish the post.



You think that' too organized? ;) I would love to do my posts more freely, but I have a fulltime job and in the winter I only can take pictures on the weekend. So the organization helps me to keep blogging. ;)

In this notebook I also like to write down project ideas, like new stamp designs or things I want to crochet, knit or sew (see the other tabs).

Third clip - A notebook for personal stuff, like general and longterm todos, list of easy-to-make (low carb) recipes, gift ideas for family and friends, my ultimate wishlist, book recommendations, blogs and shops I love, a general packing list etc..




So this was part 1 of my RoterFaden! I would love to hear about how you oganize your calendars, journals or blog posts. :)

How I keep my journal

I like to keep the memories of our daily life, how we spend our days and the experiences we made. I love to browse through an old journal and read about our life and things I already forgot. :)



As I don't like to keep a journal with white pages, I used calendars as journals the last years.





In addition to merely write down facts, I often embellished the pages with stickers, washi tape, drawings and snippets like receipts or tickets.



This system worked for me the last years, so I decided to continue using a calendar for journaling in 2014 too. :) These are some pages from this year.





The last years I mainly wrote down plain text for journaling. But when looking at the pages later on, sometimes I find it quite confusing and hard to find special events. So this year I would like to modify my journaling with more sketches and "structure". This means highlighting special occasions or activities by using a different color, stamps etc..

So this is going to be this year's challenge and I'm looking forward to doing it. :)

February project: Journaling our life

This month is going to be a quite busy one and I will be away for about a week and a half (work stuff and a couple of days vacation too). So I wanted to find a project I can accomplish during my travels.

Soooo...this month's topic is "Journaling". :)



And this is my plan for the month:



Wish you all a good start into the week! :)