Planner haul, pt.2

Continuing from part one... One thing I noticed lately is that Erin Condren's shipments have gotten where they come noticeably faster than they used to. I knew that EC had opened a retail store in Austin (they're based in California, so I was a bit surprised about that) but actually it turns out that they opened a whole distribution center in Austin as well. Which I guess explains why my shipping has been so fast - they're physically only 100-odd miles away from me now. It might not help quite as much if you live on, say, the east coast.

I wanted to show a little bit of the actual guts of the planner, so here's a page that I just set up lately. This is about the most decorating I do ahead of time on a planner page, unless it's a holiday or something. (I do have a weakness for holiday stickers.)

I've seen people who pretty much cover up the whole page with stickers, but I actually like to be able to write on mine. I always put washi tape across the top, pretty much - this washi is Floral Ink, which matches my new planner cover for 2019. And I've gotten fond of the seasonal date stickers that you can see there - I don't use them all the time, but I think they're cute and they don't cost much, so I usually buy several months' worth a year. (Planner stickers of one kind or another seem to be a huge thing on Etsy and various craft-supply websites. There are tons.)

(Basically what I mean about writing on the planner is that I put in appointments and work hours and such ahead of time, but to a large extent I just use the daily columns to take notes on - the top section is before work: what time did I get up, did I drive through Starbucks and what did I eat for lunch? The second section is notes on what I did at work - or what I did during my "work hours" on the other days - and the third one is what did I do after I got home. So it's sort of a diary, in the end. And I just don't really see the point of writing on stickers when there's perfectly good paper already there.)

Another reason to get the planner direct from EC is because you can choose your format and color scheme. This is the vertical format, which I think is the most popular. You can also get an hourly format and a horizontal one. I've flirted around with the idea of getting the horizontal one but really I think vertical is best for the way I use it. And then you can choose whether you get the colored version, which changes colors month to month, or you can get a neutral one. (Some of the people who use a whole lot of stickers seem to prefer the neutral one just because they don't have to worry about whether the stickers match the color that's already there.)

my current cover

Let's talk about covers. The covers on most EC planners - unless you buy a hard-bound or otherwise perma-bound one - are perforated so that they can be changed out, which just gives you another thing to spend money on. I mentioned before that I had covers in the paisley pattern I showed before, but I actually have quite a bunch of planner covers - I'm not even sure how many. Less than a dozen, but maybe not much less.* Counting my new 2019 one, I'm on my fourth planner; one cover comes with each planner, of course, plus I have quite a few more... I'm now on my second Halloween cover, because the first one (which I utterly loved) is now falling apart. I always retire the most battered cover each year to stay on the past year's planner, so I think the old Halloween cover is going to have to be the one to be retired this year. I'd like to use it one more year, but it's looking pretty sad, so I bought a new one. (They periodically do a buy one, get one free sale on the covers, so that's the time to buy your extras. From the most recent one a few weeks ago, I got the new Halloween one, and the poinsettias.)

Because I apparently can't count that high (I couldn't figure out if I had 11 or 12 covers), I'm going to let the computer count the covers for me:

1. July 2015-Dec 2016 planner with paisley cover (white background)
2. Fleur Feliz in Iris
3. Halloween cover with circular design (and bones!)
4. Paisley with dark background
5. Moroccan tile (blues and greens)
6. 2017 planner: Mid-century Circles (multicolor - reminds me of a quilt pattern)
7. Day of the Dead
8. Flamingos
9. 2018 planner: Floral Stitches (bright flowers on black background)
10. Halloween 2: "something wicked this way comes"
11. Poinsettias (ivory background)
12. 2019 planner: Floral Ink

*Not less than a dozen, it seems. Four years of planners, and four BOGOs, I guess.

(For the record, there will be one more part to this, and that will be up tomorrow.)