Well, it organizes my life anyway. So, if it could help you too, I figured it should no longer be a secret. (Disclaimer: Though I am going to link to their website and greatly tout their product, I am in no way being compensated for endorsing this product. It just really is that great!)
This is my Circa notebook. You can view all the Circa notebook products at Levinger's website. This little baby keeps me organized. At first glance, it may look like your ordinary, run-of-the-mill organizer, but that is why you need to take another look.
See those rings that make it look spiral bound? Those are actually just round discs. Those disks hold the filler paper in place and allow you to remove and add pages as needed. You choose your cover (they have some very nice leather covers and such, but I just went with the basic cover and customized it with a pic of my brood), and you choose your filler pages (I have a calendar and a lot of lined pages, but they have lots of different filler papers).
This is what the calendar for this week looks like.
This is the beautiful part. With their special hole-puncher, you can make anything stick in your notebook. Here, I've punched a clipping from a magazine that I hope to blog about at some point. Then, I can just insert it into my notebook wherever I need it. I also punch coupons so that I'm sure to have them when I'm at the store, appointment reminder cards, papers the kids bring home from school with field trip information, etc.
I can also create my own pages on the computer, hole-punch, and insert them. This is the list I use to inventory the kids' clothes at the beginning of each season. One of these for each kid can be found in the "Shopping" tab of my notebook. That way, when I'm out and stumble upon a deal, I can check to see whether it will fill a hole in that child's wardrobe. I also create a chart like this for use with Christmas shopping. It lists who I need to buy for, what ideas I have for them, what I actually buy them, and then has a box to check off when the item is actually wrapped and under the tree. Having this in my purse at all times, helps when I'm out and see something that someone on the list might like. These customized lists are easy to make and insert because the paper for this Junior-sized notebook is just half a letter-sized piece of paper. So, I just make my documents in landscape, print, and fold in half before hole-punching.
My notebook has tab dividers for each of these categories: Calendar (which is where I write down scheduled events and my to-do lists for each day), Shopping, (where I store the clothing inventory lists, Christmas list and an on-going shopping list for when I have opportunity to make it to the Big City), Blog (where I record ideas for upcoming blog posts), Projects (where I can record the measurements I need from the fabric store, make notes about my price comparison shopping for pest control, etc.), Reading and Writing (where I can take notes on my book I'm reading for Book Club and keep a personal journal), and Addresses (so I'm never at the post office to mail a box and then realize I don't remember the destination's zip code).
Now, I know that most people would just rely on their phones for this kind of thing. I do use my phone for lots of things. I love, for example, the Grocery IQ app, which organizes my grocery list into aisles for me and saves me tons of time every shopping trip. But, I've tried several times to go techy with my planner, and I've always ended up coming back to pencil and paper. Maybe I just like something tactile. Anyway, this is the best planner I've ever had, so I thought I'd share in case anyone else is looking for a great way to keep everything you need in one handy location.
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