my bullet journal arsenal: pens, paper and random bits of paraphernalia

As much as I love that bullet journaling requires the bare minimum of materials (a notebook and pen is enough!), I'm someone who likes to have a few more things to make my 'bujo' that bit more neat and reflective of my personality. My bujo arsenal now looks as follows...

Paper

My first bujo was a Papier one, my 2021 one was a Leuchtturm and this year, I've opted for an Ottergami one (blog post in due course!). I like notebooks with paper decent enough for fountain pen and some wetter inks and these all offer me this feature. I also like a decent number of pages in my bujo and again, these all met that requirement. 

Fountain Pens! (Of course...!)

As most of you probably know by now, I like a fine nib and it's no exception when it comes to my bujo. If I'm at home, the pens I would most likely use are:

- Platinum 3776 Century Nice - top of the picture

- Kaweco Student 70s Soul (honestly, such an underrated pen!) - 3rd pen

And if I'm out and about:

- Platinum Procyon - 2nd pen

- Pilot Kakuno - 4th and 5th pens

There are a few others I use for other purposes (I have a journaling fountain pen and a 'One Line a Day' fountain pen too - one can never have too many!) but these are the ones that seem to work best on the notebooks I choose to be my bujo. My Sailor Pro Gear is seeing a fair bit of use in it at present too... Essentially, any fountain pen will do; as long as it is a fountain pen!

Fountain Pen Ink (a natural follow up!)

My brands of choice here are Diamine (affordable, great quality and come in a fantastic range of colours), Sailor and Pilot (not pictured). I have one of the massive bottles of Pilot blue-black ink which I use to top up my work pen; alternating it with a Diamine work appropriate offering. 

Coloured Pens

I feel like one cannot have a bujo arsenal without including Tombow brush pens and Staedtler fineliners. Tombow brush pens have replaced Zebra Mildliners as my highlighters of choice too. Both of these pens mentioned look great in my bujo - not too bright or garish and just the right amount of colour to add a bit of interest to the pages. 

Monotone Pens

Of course Muji have to make an appearance here - their gel pens are a staple and having been using them for the last 16 and a half years, they had to be included. The Unipin finaliser is also great for those doodles and setting up of pages. Highlighting anything written with the Unipin fineliner is great because the ink doesn't smudge. 

A white gel pen - of course. I alternate between this Uniball Signo and a Sakura one. Both have their merits and uses. 

And of course, the Zebra Mildliner. Included here for now while they still have ink in them. Once they're finished, I think Tombow brush pens will end up taking their place. 

Other Random Bits

Kraft paper adds a bit of texture to my pages and I like how white ink looks on it. I've also been experimenting with black paper too which I quite like. It adds a nice contrast to the white pages of my bujo. 

As someone who aims to have a minimalistic bullet journal, I feel that these tools lend themselves nicely to that goal. 

Do you have any essentials in your arsenal that are similar to mine? Or any that you think should be essential for everyone that I've missed out? 

keeping my bullet journal minimalistic

Some bullet journals that are shared online are so artistic, I can only envy their owners. Given time is a major constraint for me (along with artistic skills), my bullet journal remains as minimalistic as possible. This post is to show examples of this...! 

Minimalistic doesn't have to mean boring though I do seem to have a style. I've noticed that I need to make the separation of each day obvious so I do this by making the date larger in size compared to the day next to it. 

The other thing I like to do is have solid black boxes so that I can use a white gel pen to make it pop. This can be seen below. I also clearly separated each day with a solid fine line. 

Occasionally, I'll throw in some colour and a little bit of artistic flair (or lack thereof). 

I find craft paper pretty good at adding something extra to my spreads. 

And instead of using a black fine line, I've used a colour line to emphasise a title here instead. 

More examples of my weekly spreads which are as minimalistic as possible. 

Ultimately, I've realised that I like clean lines and minimalism in my bullet journal. That said, I still try and add some minimalistic decor to it with filled in boxes, craft paper, occasional uses of colour (via Tombow brush pens). However, all I've got to offer is a pretty boring looking bullet journal but it functions excellently for me and that's what matters. (Can I get a cry laughing emoji?)

review of my 2020 bullet journal (july to december)

Considering I've now been bullet journaling for over a year, this post is a bit late. Can I blame it on the pandemic...?! 

Anyway, I first tried it out in July 2020 and used up a whole Papier notebook in the space of about 6 months. What I like about Papier is the ability to personalise and that's exactly what I did with this Miffy one. 

By the end of the six months, the notebook had expanded in density as you can see...

What I really liked about bullet journaling is the ability to make spreads that suit me. I also really liked that I could really do some trial and error with different layouts or designs each week. The other really good thing is that you can be as artistic or minimalistic as you like. I erred on the side of minimalistic with a dash of colour but ultimately, tried to stay as basic as possible. 

Although I could easily buy, for example, a Leuchtturm planner for the year, I often found pages were wasted as I don't need a world map or address section (not saying this is what Leuchtturms have - just some planners do). By using a bullet journal system, it allows all pages to be utilised in a way I would like, maximising productivity and also value for money with each notebook. Particularly important if you're opting for one on the pricier end of the spectrum. It also allows me to choose the paper in the notebook. 

As I've got older, I've appreciated reflecting a lot more. Each month, I will make a note of the days where there was exercise, books read and films/TV series watched amongst other things. Now, I often freestyle the reflection with anything I need to dump onto paper. 

It's quite nice to see when I've been most productive with exercise in particular because I got into running in December 2020 and since then, I've noticed my mood lifts on the days immediately after a run and vice versa. This has been particularly important lately as the days are now shorter which also often causes a mood dip in me. 

I've found a year to view not that helpful to be quite honest. That said, it's a spread I can't quite cut out yet as a planner doesn't feel like a planner without a year to view. 

I've been doing a 101 in 1,001 days challenge for a while now and I think I'm onto my third or fourth one? It's quite nice to have goals that require checking off as I'm very much a goal-oriented person. When I don't feel like I'm achieving, my motivation decreases. Therefore, having a challenge like this keeps me motivated in life. 

Overall, bullet journaling has been a success for me. I've enjoyed making my own spreads and customising my bullet journaling depending on what my current needs are. As convenient pre-printed planners are, there's something satisfying about creating your own planner. I'll likely do an update with my 2021 bullet journal at some point so sit tight for that to see how my spreads have evolved...! 

review: galen leather notebook cover and the everyday book (plus a discount code!)

In the last ten years or so, the quality and variety of notebooks available for fountain pen users has increased vastly. There's also been a shift to higher quality materials from what I've seen online and in person. One such company which marries the two very well is the family-run Galen Leather Co. who are based in Turkey. The pandemic caused a shift in my purchasing habits and anything family-run and not owned by a mega corp have instantly caught my attention and my support. I suppose it's seeing the demise of the traditional high street which has altered my mentality and there is now a conscious effort to try and source things as locally as possible. 

Anyway! Galen Leather Co was started by Zeynep and is now run by her brother and husband. Her story can be found here and I have to warn you, have some tissues at bay. She sounds like an amazing and inspirational lady who saw the best in everything - a quality we can all learn to have. 

I hope I can do her and Galen Leather justice with this review as I have to warn you, it is overwhelmingly positive. Just look at the contents below: it's the little touches that count and the pouch containing some samples of Turkish coffee and teas with a little tag about Galen themselves is truly heartwarming. 

Onto two Galen products. The first one is the Leather Slim A5 Notebook Cover. At the time of writing, they are priced at an extremely reasonable £33 and they come in a neat little box. 

Within the box, there is the cover itself, a card detailing the colour and who made the cover, along with care instructions. There's also a postcard with a handwritten message on the reverse. 

The cover smells delightful and is buttery soft. I can imagine it ageing extremely well and becoming even softer and more characterful with time and use. The quality is divine and feels like it would hold up well to daily use. 

On the inside, there is a card slot on both sides of the cover and also a pen loop. 

And at the reverse, we see the Galen Leather Co stamp in case anyone asks you where it's from so they can get one of their own. It comes in a whole host of classy colours including navy, 'crazy horse' navy blue /brown/forest green/tan/grey as well as in the sizes A5, B6 or A6. 

The Everyday Book in A5 fits perfectly in the A5 leather cover shown above. It comes in a box with a magnetic closure which makes ideal as place to file away documents/papers/anything else you wanted. At £23 for 400 pages of 52gsm Tomoe River Paper, it represents pretty good value. 

And just look at the paper in all its glory. It comes with writing guides as well so no excuses for wonky note taking! 

We all know that the usual reason for buying Tomoe River Paper is for the fountain pen benefits and it doesn't disappoint here... Of course there's significant show through with the permanent fineliner but otherwise, it performs as expected. 

Overall, Galen Leather Co is a family-run company who produce leather and notebook products of the highest quality. If you're after something a bit different or a gift for a stationery-lover, you won't be disappointed. 

If you're tempted, Galen are currently offering a 5% discount using the code WELCOME5.

Disclaimer: The products reviewed are complimentary direct from Galen Leather Co in exchange for a review. However, the review is an honest one and written as if I had bought the products personally. 

an updated study area: another expedit!

A few weeks' ago, I showed you all my desk and my study area, but as I was decluttering recently and re-organising the area for a more efficient workspace, it has changed slightly.

The main change is clearly not my desk as it still looks quite minimalistic:

So, not much has changed since the last time I showed you my desk...

The main difference is that the drawers on the right hand side are now gone and in its place is another Expedit bookshelf from IKEA (can you tell that I love that place?! It helped that I got this one on a discount thanks to the IKEA Family card). The open box nature of the shelves mean that this is a better solution as to where I will put my external hard drive that acts as my laptop's Time Machine. The Expedit bookshelf also provides more storage space; a good thing because I've ran out of space on my other bookshelf (yes, really - I'm failing in my quest to be a minimalist it seems).

So the top half of the bookshelf is home to stationery that I use fairly often and are arranged in a way that it is all within easy reach. For example, you can see my stapler and hole punch in the top right box, sticky notes in the bottom right and my pencil case in the top left.

Can you see the two spare shoeboxes? One is in the top right box and the other is in the bottom left box. These are for any items I may accumulate this term but can be sorted during the Christmas holidays because the items don't need instant attention.

The bottom half is messier; in the pink box are various chargers and electronically related items (e.g. batteries) and the top left box holds one half of the speakers that are connected to my iPod and also my Time Machine.

The top right is an 'open box' where I can put currently used textbooks, notebooks and folders so that they are within easy reach (barring a squat maybe).

In the bottom left box is 70gsm paper (for random notetaking, printing things that aren't important, etc), 80gsm plain paper for printing more important things and also a shoebox with some spare ruled personal-sized Filofax notepaper and record cards essential for revision.

I'm rarely fully satisfied with how my room and desk is organised because I usually believe that there is always room for improvement. However, I think this is the best way the things could be organised at this moment in time. I think I will try my best to leave it like this until the Christmas holidays and then decide if it needs a tweak (or two!).

How do you like your study area organised?

wardrobe challenge: six items or less

Last month, I opted to undertake a 'Six Items or Less' challenge. This was part of my minimalism pledge and I feel it was quite a success. I will explain why as this post goes on.

So to recap, here were my six items (well, five in the picture):

Five of the six items. The last item is a coat - originally, I had chosen an Aquascutum mac but because of the adverse weather, I changed that item to a Whistles wool coat. This meant I still stuck to the 'six items or less' rule :)

The hardest part of this challenge is being creative with the daily outfits. Six items can only mean that the combinations of outfits are less than if there were ten items, for example (mathematics can explain this quite easily). This meant that one had to be dedicated and also learn and develop the art of perseverance. Nothing in life is easy (everyone says this, and I'm pretty sure we can agree that this is true) which is exactly why this is called a 'challenge'.

Also, another problem is that you can get bored easily with such a limited number of garments. However, using the creative side of your brain can help you even if you're more of a scientific person (like I am). Even within science, creativity and the ability to think in different ways can be beneficial but enough of that and back to the topic in hand.

With this challenge a success, I have found it has helped with my new urge to be minimalistic. It has reinforced the need for me to downsize my wardrobe and sell some items on eBay this summer. And it has also taught me that I can live on fewer items too. I'm quite bad in that I love all of my clothes but I don't wear nearly half (at a guestimate).

How my wardrobe looked in my old house... and I hope it won't look after a good declutter; as a direct result of this challenge!

As a result, I believe that this challenge will help me declutter. The positives I have taken from this challenge are:

- that although it is good to have a lot of choice, a smaller number of items equates to less time wasted choosing outfits each morning and;

- that the 80/20 principle might actually be true and maybe I should apply it to my wardrobe! Something that can be related to being a minimalist too, I guess.

I have to admit that this challenge was hard. Laundry had to be done more often and I only chose one cardigan so that made my outfits a bit more boring than I would have liked. On the other hand, the positives I have taken from it has only spurred me on to get rid of more items. A massive sale is next on my list and with me being on a 'no clothes shopping' ban this year, my wardrobe size will surely have reduced dramatically in size in a few months' time.

If you have a similar problem to me - too many clothes, etc - then this challenge would be ideal for you. My advice would be to do it in the summer so that a coat doesn't take up one of the items and possibly expand it to ten items if you think six is too few, and then maybe go down to six the next month.

How do you think you'd fare if you had to do this challenge? Or have you done one already? If so, how did you find it?

a minimalism update

I've mentioned the word 'minimalism' and it's variants quite a lot recently so it's no secret that I've been trying to decrease the number of possessions I have, the clutter in all aspects of my life and also lead a simpler life. In this post, I want to reflect on how successful this has been for me so far, and also what can be improved in the future. Hopefully, by documenting this on my blog, it will lead to me being more pro-active with regards to a more minimalistic future and life.

Wardrobe

I have sold some stuff on eBay and there is still more to be listed in the coming months. This month, I am also doing a six items or less challenge. This is where you can choose six items to wear and you can only stick to these six items. Shoes, hosiery accessories and underwear are exempt (just as well!). For me, I've also made sports clothing exempt because if I were to include them, that would already be three to four items gone already!

The six items I have chosen are: a grey A-line skirt from Benetton (literally my go-to skirt. I have had it for five years now!), a burgundy dress with a peter pan collar from Boutique by Jaeger, a beige cardigan from H&M, black legging trousers from Mango, a cream pleated top from Reiss and a cream Mac from Aquascutum. All items in neutral-ish colours, so that everything will go together nicely.

All items apart from my Aquascutum mac. Also, it looks like I have stumps for legs... not true - I was just stood on a chair to take this picture.

I will evaluate this challenge sometime next month to see how much of a success it has been. Hopefully, it will allow me to see which items from my wardrobe still need to be purged.

Belongings

I used to have too many handbags, too many pairs of shoes and just too much of everything. This includes stationery! I now have a few handbags and rotate the use of each, I still have too many pairs of shoes (something I am trying to rectify by listing some on eBay!) and still have too much stationery. It is hard to try and justify too much stationery - I will need it all at some stage as, for example, going back to university means I need to include colour in my notes for exam and revision time.

A picture from a guest post I did for Carou, over at Wandrrlust

One thing I can do is to not buy anymore stationery until I have finished a certain amount of it. At the moment, that amount is a half of everything I have, but even then, I have a feeling I will still have a lot of stationery. Hm, I think this category is still a work in progress!

Internet and Computer-Related Things

I have kept my Facebook friends to a minimum as usually, I don't log in for days and when I did, I was overwhelmed by status updates and 'news' on people I didn't really care about (no offence intended with that sentence!). Now, I can log in and see updates from the people who really matter to me and that has definitely made me less stressed at using this social networking site.

In the future, I would quite like to delete my Facebook altogether but I'm not quite sure if that will ever happen. This is because Facebook has come in quite handy in my first degree when we shared lab experiment results, write-up tips, etc and I think it will be equally handy for when I start university this autumn.

One good thing about my internet use is that my bookmarks are very uncluttered and I keep things there to a minimum. I only have eight bookmarks (three of which are folders) but the ISA Saver one you see on the far right is one that will disappear once I have sorted out my ISA.

Diary

Finally, I have been trying to declutter my diary and the way I decorate it. Here is one of my weeks pre-decluttering:

and here is a week where I have tried to declutter:

So, in conclusion, I think I have been making slow and steady steps in decluttering. It is hard to part with items accrued and I think that is the crux of this minimalism issue I am having. However, I will keep persevering with this long-term project of mine and hopefully, I will reach minimalism nirvana sooner rather than later!

a minimalist desk, part II

Last year, I blogged about decluttering and minimalism and this little project of mine has been going well. I threw a lot of things out and also gave a lot of things to charity in December and January, and this process is still going on.

Anyway, in that aforementioned blog post, I showed a picture of my desk. I have since invested (if you can call it that - it is just a basic table from Ikea!) in a new desk as that one was breaking down and the colour was chipping off, etc. And with this new 'investment', I will show you how this new desk looks, how I have organised it and also how it will work for me when I start studying once again in September.

So firstly, a picture of the desk:

On my desk, I have my laptop, a desk lamp (not shown), a Martha Stewart x Avery StackFit drawer, a box of tissues, a pot of pens (just a Muji Acrylic Pen Pot) and desk tidy (from WH Smith).

In the Martha Stewart x Avery drawer, I have separated it into compartments using boxes from past orders of high street jewellery from ASOS (these turned out to be the ideal size) and also boxes or containers from other various things. Currently, it is quite empty as I am still steadily unpacking my stationery into various places!

On the top of these drawers, I put important papers that I would need within the next week or two. These include forms that need filling in, card statements that need filing away at the next opportunity or even a letter that needs posting.

Next, the desk tidy. This is useful for putting my journal, my Slimline Deco (which is currently holding my food diary) and a booklet that will be helpful in the next few months.

It also holds a wad of sticky notes, pens and other useful implements such as rulers, scissors, etc.

Finally, my pen pot!

I love that it is clear and round. I've seen square acrylic ones but I just feel that the square shape isn't as pretty as a round shape. The fact that it is clear means that it is easy to find the colour pen that I want to use. In the past, I used a tin (that I decorated with washi tape) but finding the colour pen I wanted was time consuming, and sometimes quite frustrating and so that is why I much prefer this pen pot.

The view from the bottom of the pen pot.

I have decorated it with some washi tape:

I just used simple colours (a pink and white stripe, gold and silver) to decorate it. However, if I feel I prefer it without this decoration, the good thing about washi tape is that I can just remove it and re-use it in another way.

With this desk, I love how big it is. It is big enough for everything I need, and when I come to study, this will prove very, very useful. There is plenty of space for two or three textbooks, a notepad and my laptop which may be necessary for online research. As this desk is where the studying will take place, I will need to make an effort to ensure that it stays as minimalistic as possible, so as to remove any potential distractions. This may include putting my laptop into a drawer if necessary as I have a small chest of drawers under the table at the moment!

I am thinking of moving the StackFit drawer to my bookcase but for now, I am content with how my desk looks so it will stay put.