Prior to my recent purchase of the Inkwell Press planner that I will be talking about today, I never really felt a particular need to plan. I've always had planners throughout my life since I was about 12 yrs old, though not something that I really thought about so in depth about. I mainly enjoyed buying extremely kawaii decorated planners and stickers and the decorating process.
After moving out of my parents' house, I began finding myself writing down reminders on post-it notes and frequenting my Google Drive to keep track of my finances. So when I went to late last year, I came across cute Asian stationary store. Naturally, I was drawn to it and found myself trying to hoarding up the entire store. (Thanks to my boyfriend for bringing my senses back.) When I came to the area of endless cute planners, a feeling of realization washed over me. I should get a planner to keep track of my daily to-dos and events rather than having loose post-its all over the apartment. And that's exactly what I did.
Fast forward a few months later, I found myself talking about stationary with one of my business users at work. She sent me a video on someone doing a 'Plan with Me' and I was hooked. I began binge watching all these Plan with Me videos for inspiration and ideas on how to organize and decorate my planner and most of them always used the Erin Condren & Kikki.K planners. They peaked my interest on what other planners targeted towards adults were out there. Several people did video comparisons on a bunch of planners and that's how I found out about the Inkwell Press, which retails at $54. It's definitely a huge splurge on a planner.
There aren't that many videos out there for this planner compared to the others, but this was the layout and features that screamed out to me the most. This planner starts from July 2016 so I have a full month before I dive into using this. Let's take a look at what this planner offers!
This planner is thick. My small planners I'm used to are about 1/4 of the size and less than half of the thickness of this one. This will definitely be a planner that sits on my desk rather than in my bag. It also has a nice weight to it.
Attached is a ruler/bookmark to that will be handy for drawing lines as well as marking where the current week is.
The monthly tabs match the color schemes that coordinate with each month.
Here is the monthly overview. I love the box on the right side with the lines. It will help me keep track of any videos I want to film for that month.
This is the monthly mission board. I love this feature! I think it'll help me keep track of my yearly goals. On the right side is the notes page. This will serve as the area where I draft out my video ideas after deciding which ones I want to do that month.
I purchased the Flex version, which is the horizontal box layout. They also have the vertical, but all my old planners were in the horizontal layout so I prefer this. The vertical one would be good for people who are into Bullet Journaling though! Each day has 3 individual boxes on the side for you to keep track of any events, water consumption, appointments, meal planning, etc.
The Gift List feature was something I've had in the past and I never really used it because I don't really buy gifts for people anymore. When it comes to gift giving, I honestly just go to the mall and if I see something that I could give to someone, I will just grab it.
The vacation log feature was something that I found very interesting. It only has 2 pages, but it works perfectly for me since I only go on 2 vacations tops every year anyway. If you go on more, you could always purchase a traveling planner separately.
Here we have a movie and book list on the right. I don't think I'll be using this much though. Most of my movie and Netflix selections are totally random. It's all based on whatever I feel like that night. On the right, we have the finance tracker. This I am excited about! Up til now, I've been using Google Sheets and a tiny notebook to keep track of my finances. This will allow me to put everything in one place.
The last couple of pages in the planner are for note-taking. There's a tiny box at a top for date and subject. The rest of the sheet is in graph paper.
Lastly, we have the calendar for the next 2 years as well as a double-sided folder where you can put loose sheets of paper.
Finally, attached the back cover of the planner is another folder. This one is more enclosed so its easier to store any stickers, small pieces of paper, page flags, etc. I saw a few people DIY an enclosure with a string and tab to wrap around, which is an awesome idea, just in case some stuff decides to sneak out when I'm not looking. :P
That's all I have for today! I hope you enjoy this overview of the Inkwell Press Academic Planner. I'm not in school anymore, but I didn't feel like waiting until December to buy a new planner. I plan on posting some weekly spreads to keep me focused on filling out my planner otherwise it's always 'Out of Sight, Out of Mind'!
Do you guys have a favorite planner? What ideas do you guys have for organizing your planner?
disclaimer: I purchased this with my own money and all opinions are my own.
Thanks for reading,
Angela
