The Bullet Journal

¡Hola! Last month I shared a glimpse into my bullet journal on the blog's Instagram and you guys really enjoyed it and wanted to know more. Well, here it is! I started using a bullet journal for the first time this year. Before I would use regular agendas which I loved but never seemed to keep up after I started medical school. Then I came across bullet journal videos on youtube and, after watching a couple hundred of them and researching on the bullet journal website, I decided that it could be something I could actually keep up and fitted my lifestyle more.

Here are some reasons why I'm loving keeping this journal:

• I can express more creativity and doodle freely.
• I can have a section for anything I want or need. For example I have pages dedicated to listing blog posts ideas, another page dedicated to our house cleaning schedule, etc.
• I can set up only months and weeks I will actually use. For example, my journal actually arrived in February so I didn't even bother putting in a page for January and therefore have no wasted pages.
• I set up the pages to any which way which suits me the most. I'm very minimalist with my set up and follow a simple key for my tasks.
• It is a practice in accepting imperfections. I have very OCD-like tendencies so I use this journal as therapy. I force myself to accept mistakes or find other ways to cover them up instead of just yanking out the page like I would initially have done.

• Journal (I made the label for my journal using this embossing label maker)
• Pencil
• Eraser
• Artist pens
• Brush pens (these are the ones I initially ordered but have now also ordered the Crayola SuperTips Markers as shown in the video below)

There are hundreds of channels featuring bullet journaling on Youtube! You can search and find your own favorite, mine is definitely AmandaRachLee. Her videos are pretty simple compared to others I have seen which make all out masterpieces! I do love to doodle and use AmandaRachLee as inspiration for my monthly theme (check out her instagram!). I definitely make mine even more simple than her's. That's the magic of this, it can be however you want it to be!

I start out by tracing out my doodles in pencil and then going over it with the fine artist pen. This doodle didn't require a lot of color but, after going in with the pen, I color in areas using the brush pens. Its like painting with watercolor! Above you can see how I do so for the monthly cover page.

This is my month-at-a-glance view. Here I usually include a doodle in theme with the cover page at the top and make squares for each day of the month. Each square is 3x3 dots. I add a drop shadow to the days of the week by making the bottom part and right side thicker. I finish by adding a section at the bottom where I can place events and/or important dates.

I kept doodling these clouds on my Monthly Favorites page. I have this page to keep a record of the things I've been loving during the month so by the end I have it all down in one place to prepare the monthly post (check out my March favorites here!).

On the right side, you can see what a weekly spread looks like. I keep it very minimal separating the days each 5th dot and drawing a line across (I use a ruler for straight lines). At the bottom I include an area to put in a quote that I feel goes most with how I felt during that week and a section for tasks that I have to include in next week's spread.

My key is simple: 

• Tasks are marked with a square
• Once its in process I can fill up half the square 
• When its done I fill it in completely
• Tasks that have to be moved to another day get a right facing arrow in the square
• Tasks that are canceled get a straight line going across the square
• Important events are marked with a star

And that's it! Simple! Preparing this takes me roughly 20-30mins and preparing each week's spread takes me less than 10mins. There are a couple of mistakes in the above photo but I left them because, as I mentioned above, I also keep this journal as a practice in accepting imperfections.

Do you keep a bullet journal or do you prefer a normal agenda? If you do keep a bullet journal, where do you get your inspiration from? Let me know below!

Con amor,

María Eugenia