Review: Charlie's Planner Goodies

Hi everyone!

I am so sorry about the absence here on my blog lately. Things have been hectic to say the least but I have a few posts planned for the coming weeks so hopefully I can get back into the swing of things for you guys. I miss blogging a lot.

Today I have a review of a planner item to share with you!

This item is from a fairly new shop, Charlie's Planner Goodies. She sells her items through her Facebook page.

She sells cute items for Filofaxes/similar planners including dashboards, monthly sticky tabs as well as dividers.
I have one of Charlotte's handmade dashboards to show you today, which has an elastic pen loop attached to it! The one I have to show you is a Pocket sized dashboard, but she does them for all the Filofax sizes.

Her dashboards is made of a sturdy card stock and is covered with a patterned paper of your choice. They have a thick elastic pen loop on the right hand side.

The dashboard I have, is a very cute pastel polka dot pattern. Here it is inside my Small Lilac Kikki.K planner.

The elastic pen loop is quite thick and will hold most pens. I used a Pilot Hi-Tec-C Coleto pen and a thick Sharpie Pen in it, and it held them very well.
I think the loop is too wide to hold something like a Frixion Slim pen (it may slip through), but if you do want it specifically to hold a slim pen, I'm sure Charlotte would accommodate that for you.

When I first tried out this dashboard, to be honest, I was a little worried that it would not hold up over time and may be flimsy, but was proven wrong. I used it for a couple of weeks and it was fine and has held up nicely! I wouldn't go tugging on it like crazy, or trying to fit a huge pen in it, but if you treat it nicely I'm sure it will last you quite some time!

This dashboard will be great for anyone who wants to add an extra pen loop to their planner. I definitely could have used these when I had a Kate Spade planner as the pen loops on those can be very tight and it was hard to find a pen to fit in! But even if your planner's pen loop is fine, it's always nice to be able to carry an extra pen.

Charlotte's dashboards are $6 for Mini/Pocket size and $8 for Personal/A5 size.

Charlotte also sells some other planner items such as monthly tabs and dividers (in particular superhero/comic dividers which look so awesome!). Be sure to check out her Facebook page to see what she's got to offer! Send her a message or write a post on her page. She's super nice!

Thanks for reading, everyone! I hope you'll come back soon as I hope to get myself back into the swing of things on here, especially in the new year! ♥

*Product(s) in this post were provided to me by the company or PR for my 100% honest review. For more info please read my Disclosure Policy*

Filofax Original Patent Purple {First Impressions}

Happy Filofax Friday friends! :) 

Today I have another Planner First Impressions. {Check out my Large Kikki.K Lilac First Impressions & my Small Kikki.K Lilac First Impressions.}

This is the Filofax Original in the Patent Purple colour, in Personal size.

I kind of bought this on a whim from eBay, to be quite honest. I was looking at a few different Filofaxes, and this one was the cheapest {and was located here in Australia} so I bought it. {If you are looking for one of these, Peters of Kensington usually has them in stock.}

A day or two after buying it, I was having second thoughts.

I have had a Filofax Original before {in Fluro Pink} and loved it, but I had watched some videos on YouTube of the Patent Purple and wasn't sure how I'd feel about it. Being Patent Purple, it's shiny and glossy, whereas the Fluro Pink had much more of a matte look. A medium tone purple like this isn't something I would usually reach for, either.

Plus, the package took a whole week to get to me from just two states away, when it really should have only taken 3-4 days max. {Not the seller's fault, of course.} That was a bit frustrating, because I'm super impatient with mail.

I thought that when I received this, that I wouldn't be impressed and I'd just want to sell it straight away. 

Buuuut I actually really like it!

The leather is shiny as expected, but not in a tacky way. Some photos and videos I'd seen had made the shine look a bit tacky and unattractive. But in real life, it's much nicer! :) I love the feeling of the leather!

I'm happy to report that this Original that I have is the newer version.

The first release Original Filofax had a shorter strap and people were finding it hard to fit a lot in. The newer version's strap is a bit less than 4 inches long, and the older one was 3.5. It might not sound like much, but apparently it makes a huge difference!

I love the simplicity of the interior of the Filofax Original, but lately I've actually been utilizing the pockets in my Filofaxes - I never used to use the pockets. So it will be a bit different to go from lots of pockets in my Malden, to almost no pockets in the Original.

I also love how the Originals almost lay flat right out of the package. This one doesn't lay quite as flat as my Fluro Pink one did but it's still quite flat. The one thing that annoys me about my Malden, is that it doesn't lay totally flat on the table.

My Original didn't come with everything that a brand new Original is supposed to come with, which is the only thing I'm a bit bummed about. The seller did mark it as Brand New, but in the description they said that only the 2014 Diary, dividers, note paper {it ended up being only the grid paper}, ruler and note pad were included. I would have really liked to have gotten the top loading envelope because I don't have one {I sold all mine when I thought I wasn't using Personal size anymore. D'oh!}, but oh well. I'll get one eventually.

The Filofax itself is definitely brand new, though. I can't see any signs of use and I received it in the plastic protective packaging.

 My Original & My Malden. ♥

 As you can see, the leather of the Purple Original is pretty shiny, because you can see my reflection in it!

 Purple Original in the sun. :)

I'm super glad that I decided to try out the Purple Original. It is really nice!

Thanks for reading! ♥

Filofax Pocket Ochre Malden | My new baby! ♥

Today a new planner joined my little planner family. I actually just uploaded a setup of my Filofax Pocket Finsbury this morning, when my new baby arrived! I moved in right away.

Some of you probably think it's crazy how often new planners are coming into my possession, but I never keep them all! If I don't fall in love, I'll sell or swap it with someone. I won't keep a large collection for the sake of it as I feel like it's a huge waste and makes me feel so guilty!

Right now, I have 3 planners total in my collection and I am using two of them. I talked about that a bit in my new video.

This little beauty is the Filofax Pocket Malden in the Ochre colour. This is the second Ochre Malden that I've owned. I used to own it in Personal size too.

This is the first Filofax I've owned that actually came in a box! I've only had a couple of other brand new Filofaxes, and they came with the plastic cover sort of thing that they seem to all come with now. I was pleasantly suprised to have a box. :)

I love how the Maldens are all very unique to each other. The leather varies from planner to planner. The Personal size Ochre that I used to have, was more of a light brown, leaning more yellow than my Pocket size Ochre, which you can see is more reddish brown. The colour in the photos is pretty spot on to the colour in real life. The colour does change in different lighting and when you move it around in the light. The leather also varies in how smooth/wrinkled it is. The leather feels so beautiful and smooth. And it smells really nice too. Haha.

If you watched the video, or if you follow me on Instagram, you would know that I'm now using a Pocket size Filofax as my everyday planner! I'm really enjoying it. I can take my planner with me everywhere I go, no matter what handbag I'm using at the time. And I just love how little and cute it looks!!

I was inspired by Organized Jen's vlog, and @filo_newbie14 on Instagram to move into a Pocket size. I'm so glad I did!

My set up in this planner is exactly the same as what I showed in my video. I'm currently using DIYFish's inserts in my planner, and I find that with these inserts I have plenty of room to write what I need to which is really great.

In case you are wondering, I am still using my Kikki.K Large Time Planner in Lilac. I'm using it as my blog & Etsy shop planner. :) I usually don't need to take it with me, so it just stays at home.

Here is my video of my Pocket Finsbury, if you're interested!

Be sure to check back here tomorrow because it's Filofax Friday! ♥

My Planner Story

Hi everyone! Happy last day of June. I hope it was a great month for you.
I'm going to share with you My Planner Story today. I thought it might help some of you who are looking at getting into planners and don't know where to start. Or have no idea what this whole thing is all about.
I'll try not to blab on too much. ;)
I've always adored stationery. When I was in school I collected stationery, like pens, notebooks etc. In high school I used a paper diary to track due dates, etc. After high school I stopped using a diary/planner. Once I started blogging, I decided to start using a diary again to track blog posts. That's all I used it for, though.
Fast forward to the start of 2014. I love watching OrganizedLikeJen on YouTube, and reading her blog also. Earlier in the year I was watching some of her videos where she shared what her planner setup would be for this year. She uses many different planners but the one that particularly caught my eye was her Filofax. She also shared a list of girls she followed on Instagram who are also into planners, so I decided to look them up and I fell in love. I loved how they decorated their planners and how many options there were out there! This is where my journey with Filofax started! :)
The planner that I chose to start with was the Kikki K Mint & Gold Time Planner, in Medium size, which is now discontinued. I found out about it when they had just put them on sale 30% off, and it was also my 21st birthday, so my lovely hubby bought one for me. Kikki K's planners are generally a bit cheaper than Filofax planners, which is why I chose to start there. At first, I thought it was absolutely insane to spend a large amount of money on a planner. I absolutely adored this planner. Mint is my favourite colour, so how could I not? ;) PS. I hear that Kikki K may be releasing a new mint planner in October! It won't be the same as the old one but I can't get enough of mint-coloured-anything, and I know some of you love it too.
After a few weeks, I was getting more and more into this planner thing. I purchased lots of decorating goodies to go along with my planner and was finding out a lot more about the whole thing. That's when I bought my first real Filofax. I found one on a great deal on eBay! It was used but I was fine with that. That was the Filofax Finsbury in Raspberry.
I've had, sold and swapped many planners since then, which is a little embarrassing when I think about it. Haha. It's just taken me a while to find something that works great for me and that I love. I love keeping a few planners at a time. I don't use them all at once, however. I just use one, and switch all the inserts over to another when I feel bored with it.
That's what is so awesome about these binder style planners! You can take out all the inserts and move them to another planner. You can potentially use the same planner forever if you take care of it. All you need is to purchase new inserts for each year. It's so cool.
I also love that I can have so much stuff all in love book! Some examples of different things I keep in there are: diary/calender, to do lists, other lists (I am a huge list maker! I keep loads of lists in my planner), notes, addresses/contacts, my Etsy shop sales, pen pal trackers and notes, and more. It's so customisable. You can keep anything you like inside your planner.
Right now, I am using my beautiful Filofax Original in Fluro Pink. It is definitely bright, but so pretty. I adore the colour and I am absolutely loving the layout of the Original. I wasn't sure how I'd like it because it doesn't really have any pockets in the cover, but it's working out fabulously for me. It might be my favourite of all. In the future I might look into adding to my Original collection with another colour. Maybe a less 'out there' one. ;)

If you'd like to see my planner in action, I have a few setup videos on my YouTube channel.
I'm sorry to any of you who aren't at all interested in seeing planner posts on my blog. If you want to unfollow, it's ok. I won't be offended. I may still post nail polish posts from time to time, but I can't promise anything. I do still wear nail polish (I just don't change it as often as before, and I wear quite boring colours now to be honest) if you are wondering. :)
Thanks for reading, everyone. Hope you have an amazing week. ♥

Kate Spade Wellesley Set Up + On-The-Go Organiser

Last week I showed you my new Kate Spade Wellesley zip around personal organizer/planner. In that post you saw it exactly how I received it, but today I'm going to show you what it looks like now, after I have set it up and personalised it! :)
I'll also show you what is in my on-the-go stationery organiser at the end of the post.
If you follow me on Instagram, you probably would have seen most of this already. Sorry! ;)
This is gonna be a long post, folks!

My New Planner: Kate Spade Wellesley

Hi friends! :) I hope you're all doing well.
I'm so excited to be back with my first planner post since I went on my wedding/honeymoon hiatus.   Today I want to show you the newest in my planner collection (I actually sold quite a few of the planners in my collection recently, so my collection has gotten smaller)! I'll be showing you what it looked like brand new, before I had done any personalizing to it, and then I will do another post soon once I have moved in, organized and set it up. :)

This is a Kate Spade Wellesley. It is a Personal size, in Black. (It also comes in a hot pink, but I believe that one is a bit harder to come by.) The Wellesley is a zip around leather organizer; the first zippered one I have tried. I never thought I'd own a zippered organizer but I really love it! I like that I know everything is secure inside. The interior has some light brown leather, as well as white fabric with pink and red dots. This organizer is quite popular in the planner community at the moment. I fell in love with it after seeing YouTube videos from My Planner, MissTrenchcoat, and Erin Joy. I even sold a few of my favourite planners from my collection so that I could buy it! The organizer has 2 large pockets on the left, as well as 8 card slots (this is great if you like to use your planner as your wallet! I'm thinking of trying this). In the back it also has a smaller pocket. The Wellesley has six binder rings (like a Personal Filofax) in a gorgeous gold colour.
The Wellesley comes with some pretty standard inserts including a month & week on 2 pages, some notes pages, addresses, etc. It also comes with 6 dividers, and a set of A-Z dividers, and a flyleaf.
My pictures really don't do this planner justice, so I suggest that you check out the YouTube channels I mentioned above, to see this beauty in action. :) I hope that when I show you my planner all set up, I can get some better shots of it, that weren't taken at night in a badly lit room. :P

You can also check out my Instagram where I usually post daily pictures of my planner (as well as other things, but mostly planners!), so you will see much more of this beauty over there!

My Filofax Pages. {Week 13}

Before reading this post, make sure you've read my 'My Filofax' post first. :)

As I said in my last post, I have recently become obsessed with Filofax and planners. I've especially loved decorating my planner and today I wanted to share with you what my pages look like for this week!

I went with a peach, yellow and pink theme. I really love this colour combination.
Washi Tapes: Pretty Paper Bliss on Etsy (peach polka dot - I believe you can also get it from the Target $1 section in the US), eBay (thin yellow & peach come in a set of 10 colours - super cheap!), LycheeCraft on Etsy (pink polka dot), Kmart (pink stripe). Sticky notes: eBay (giraffe), eBay (bunny), Target (sprinkles), Pretty Paper Bliss (peach polka dot, also Target $1 section in the US). Stickers: Morning Glory (cupcake), eBay (Kiiroitori - search Rilakkuma stickers). Paper clip: eBay (snail).
Hope you enjoyed this post. Let me know if you'd like to continue seeing posts on my week in my planner! :) I'm unsure whether I'll show what the pages look like at the end of the week before I have written all over them because they'll contain some private information but we will see.

My Filofax.

Hi friends! Long time no talk! ;) There's less than 3 weeks until my wedding so as you can imagine, I have been super busy. However, I have kind of got a new obsession in the last month or so and I really wanted to squeeze in a post for you! :)
If you follow me on Instagram or Twitter, you will have seen that my hobbies/obsessions have taken a different turn lately! I have been in love with planners and stationery for about the past month. I found the Filofax community (Filofax is a brand of mainly leather personal planners, for more information watch this YouTube video by My Purpley Life) on Instagram and there was no turning back! ;) I've always loved stationery, as far back as I can remember. I loved buying new pens and switching out my pencil cases for school. I had a pretty large collection of pencil cases haha. I wasn't a huge planner fan as a kid, but in year 12 at high school I found my diary/planner to be crucial for me to get things done. I didn't start using a planner again until last year when I got a bit more serious about blogging and decided it would be a good idea to have a planner to track my blog posts and big events in my personal life, so I could keep organised. I also really need a planner at the moment to keep up with all the wedding related things I need to do! Now, since my little planner love started a month ago, I have acquired more than one planner. (You might be thinking, umm why does she need more than one planner?! - I'll explain later.) I'll just be showing you the one that I am currently using as my everyday planner, and I'll talk about the other(s) in another post soon. :) I'll also answer some FAQs that I've been asked on Instagram about Filofax/planners at the end of the post if you're interested in learning more! I purchased my first real Filofax secondhand on eBay. It is a Personal size (refer to this page for the different Filofax sizes) Finsbury in the Raspberry colour. Since it was pre-owned, it does have some scratches on the outside but is fine on the inside. The colour is just gorgeous and I love it.  I really wanted to own a real Filofax but since they are made of real leather, they can be quite pricey brand new. That's why I bought my first Filofax secondhand. Having said that, they are fantastic quality and if you take care of it, a Filofax could last you a very long time so in the future I would probably fork out the money for a brand new one (it would have to be for a birthday or special occasion though haha). Filofax is very popular for the reason that their planners are ring bound, which means that they are like a binder! You can put in pretty much anything you want, and you could use it every year for the rest of your life! All you have to do is purchase (or print your own) new inserts. At the moment I am using my Personal size Filofax as my everyday planner. It is small enough that it fits in my handbag but it's big enough that it gives me enough room to write and holds everything I need it to on the go.

*colour is a bit darker and less purple in person!

Here is what you see when you open up my Filofax. The first thing you see when you open up my planner is my 'dashboard' as people call it. I printed off a picture I found on Pinterest on photo paper at Kmart, and then cut & hole punched it to fit in my Filofax. I keep a clear flyleaf in front of it to protect it from getting damaged. I love having this as my first page in my Filofax. It makes me smile every day. :) The Finsbury Filofax has 6 card slots on the left side, and one large pocket. (Different Filofax models have different setups inside.) In the card slots I am keeping these two magnetic page markers from Kikki K. They're so cute! I just like having them there to look cute at the moment. I also have an old Peter Alexander gift card that is holding some grey washi tape that I pulled off a package to use again (stingy haha!). I also have some heart Post-It notes. In the large pocket I'm just holding an important note that I need to remember.

Here are my dividers/tabs inside my Filofax. I have monthly and weekly tabs, as well as a tab for lists (I ♥ lists), my blog, God (at the moment I've just written Bible verses that I like, as well as some song lyrics etc.), addresses and extras (where I keep extra note paper etc).

One thing I have been especially loving is decorating my planner pages! ♥ I am so in love with washi tape! It's so much fun to decorate my pages with cute tapes, stickers and sticky notes because it makes me actually want to open up my planner and get things done. These were my weekly pages from last week. I did a green and purple St Patrick's Day theme. (Yes, I did blur out some things such as to-do's and places I went as I don't feel comfortable sharing them.) The page inserts I am using are from my Kikki K planner.

And lastly, in the back of my Filofax I have a Filofax zip lock pocket that I bought at Officeworks which holds some extra sticky notes and paperclips which were kindly included by the person I bought this Filofax from. :)  In the back of the Finsbury there is also a zipper pocket but I don't have anything in there at the moment. There's also a leather pen loop where I'm holding my purple Pilot Frixion pen at the moment. I love these pens because they're erasable! So that's a basic overview of my planner. I plan on filming a YouTube video giving a more in-depth look at my Filofax soon. :) I have also made some of my own printable inserts for my Filofax (and other sizes)! I will hopefully have these up for download on my blog very soon! :) Including a nail polish wish list!
Now here are some FAQs that people have asked me. FAQs
1. What is a Filofax? A Filofax is a brand of personal organizers/planners. They make mostly leather planners. What drew me to them is that they are ring bound, like a binder. So they are super customizable unlike most planners. 2. Why do you have more than one planner? At first I didn't think I would be one of the girls with a whole collection of planners. But let's face it, I like to collect things. I collected pencil cases, iPhone cases, nail polish of course. And I think this is the same thing. Filofaxes are kind of like an accessory! Haha. People change them out like they'd change their handbag, wallet, or nail polish! Once I started seeing all the different models, sizes and colours that Filofaxes come in, I couldn't stop at just one. ;) Filofax also comes in a range of different sizes that can be used for a range of different purposes. 3. What do you use for decorating your pages? I love using washi tape (bought from shops like Ned's, Kmart, Big W and online from Etsy and eBay), sticky notes (also from the previously mentioned places), as well as cute stickers. I'm very inspired by My Purpley Life's decorated pages! 4. What pens do you like to use in your planner? I really like Pilot's Frixion pens, which are erasable. I also like my Pilot 5 colour Coleto pen (bought from JetPens) and Stabilo Point 88 felt tip pens. 5. Do you use a colour coding system/another system for planning? At the moment I don't really have a need to use a colour coding system in my planner. In fact, I don't really have any type of 'system' at the moment, to be honest. However, next month once I am married I may find that I need a system of some sort for organizing and planning, so if I do end up creating a colour coding system or something similar, I'll be sure to update you. Now, for those of you who are wondering. Yes, I do plan on posting some more planner/organization related posts on my blog. I'm sorry to those who don't care for this sort of thing but this is my blog, where I plan to post whatever interests me. And right now, planners are what is interesting me most. :) Like I said, I don't have much time for blogging at the moment - in fact, I shouldn't even be blogging right now but I felt very inspired to write! :D