New York City Skyline Weekly Layout

September 8, 2017 1 Comment

I Found a New Love: Skylines.

I sometimes play a game called “Cities: Skylines” but that is another story. For an Instagram challenge this month, I’ve done a couple skyline outlines and, well, it carried over to my weekly theme.

My weeklies start on Monday as I was planning the weeks, I noticed that 9/11 was on a Monday this year. The date stuck out to me. September 11 is very emotional to me. I truly consider it “the day the world stopped turning”. I remember watching in horror when the second plane hit the building after the first was billowing plumes of smoke from the earlier crash. The memory of where I was, what I was doing, who I was with, embedded itself deeply into my mind. Somehow, I knew I would not be the same, I would not look at the world through the same eyes. I am a believer in love overcoming differences so the shock of such hatred was heartbreaking to me.

I am still a believer in love no matter what happened.

Years later, the twin towers rose out of the ashes united in one building instead of two. The skyline of New York has changed and so have our hearts. The only way that we can make sure this world is a better place is by filling our hearts with love and hope.

Vivid Colors

The vivid colors on this layout speak happiness to my soul. The imagery of a sunrise says that there are new beginnings with each new day. Here’s to my memories of the day the world stopped turning, and the ability to start it moving again, let’s move in a positive direction.

Colorful New York City building silhouette at sunrise and reflection | Bullet Journal Inspiration | Weekly Log

Reflections

Above the reflections in the water, I wrote the word “reflections” – a place to include a journal entry for the week. (not shown)

Watch the video of how I created the skyline below. I tell you all about the struggles and the wins of creating this page – if you like it, subscribe. I’d love to make more videos!

Have you used skylines in your planner or journal? What was your page about and which skyline did you include?

September Week 1: Autumn Colors and Fall Leaves

August 31, 2017 Leave a Comment

Keeping with the monthly theme of “Heck Yes! It’s Fall!” September’s 1st week has an autumn look with the changing colors on the leaves.

See the September monthly spread here

I knew when drawing this out, that the leaves were small and wouldn’t hold a lot of tasks. Maybe I’ll just take the week off and relax. Probably not, but here in the US, Monday the 4th is a holiday, so I will just take one day instead.

I am a ‘sketch it out before painting’ kind of girl. So to create this weekly log, I found a simple leaf pattern and drew it out repeating the pattern with just slight differences. Many eraser marks later, I had just the right amount of whimsy to the branches and leaves. I labeled the leaves to make sure I had drawn enough!

After sketching it out, I sampled some chocolate of course. Then I watercolor painted in the tree branch and the leaves. The paper tends to get wavy when I add a lot of water or paint. So I kept as much whitespace as I could. I love the whimsy of this page not to mention the fall colors. I like to fantasize about the day when I paint hyper-realistic and you can’t tell the picture from reality. But I am not that kind of painter – at least yet. This page is nowhere near realistic

I like to fantasize about the day when I paint hyper-realistic and you can’t tell the picture from reality. But I am not that kind of painter – at least yet. This page is nowhere near realistic, but I love it nonetheless for its bright hues and whimsy in the curves of the branches and leaves.

Even though I live in Atlanta and it is still dreadfully hot, I think I need to sip a cup of hot cocoa in honor of this page. Fall here I come, ready or not because I am gearing up for cooler weather, crisp nights and a school schedule for my kids.

Tag me on Instagram (@ChocolateMusingsCreates) with your fall creations or weekly layouts. I would love to see your creative muse at work.

Here’s my process for creating this page in a super speedy video. Enjoy!

I just noticed that I have a pen mark on my left hand from when my kids couldn’t get a ballpoint pen to write. Ah well. The things you do for kids.

A pile of gathered leaves and Autumn inspiration await you. Jump right in!

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Want to know what I used to create this spread? I’ll tell you.

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All opinions expressed were solely mine and from my heart.

September Set Up

August 29, 2017 3 Comments

Hello, September.

How I’ve missed you.

Fall is a time that gives me the…well warm fuzzies. Even though September is not yet full-on fall, there is a certain deliciousness that comes with the crisp nights and cooling weather, the warm hues all over the tree tops as the autumn colors dot the horizon. The reds, oranges, yellows, soft browns, and PURPLE! Purple is a fall color I swear.

Apple strudel is definitely on the menu. I don’t care if I have to eat the entire pan by myself because no one else in my family likes it. I wouldn’t say that is necessarily negative, I consider it a perk.

September feels like a great time to cuddle up with a fuzzy blanket and read a book. I thought maybe I could have this Monthly Intro Page do double duty as a book tracking page (I’ve also heard the page called monthly cover page/splash page/monthly greeting or welcome page) whatever you call this “Hello September” page, I love the way it turned out. I added touches of iridescent watercolor paint after coloring with Papermate Flair Pens and using a water brush for blending.

As with most pages that I paint, I get caught up in the artwork and want to keep it for the beauty of the art. I don’t want to write on it! We shall see if I decide to deface the cover page and turn it into a reading tracker.

See how pretty that paint is? It shimmers.

Sigh.

Monthly Page Layout:

This month, I shrunk the size of the day’s boxes and am adding a smaller habit tracker fto the side of the page. Another reason I love fall is the return of a regular schedule. Don’t get me wrong. I love summer for the freedom it allows, but fall provides needed structure in my life (and my children’s lives!).

Blending Tombow Dual Brush markers has fascinated me. I’ve seen it all over instagram – so I tried it. Surprisingly, I really like the color combination of the orange #933 and the purple #636. I plan to write in black so scaling the numbers up in the day boxes and using them as a ‘background’ was perfect.

I wanted more fall colors and leaves. Lots of leaves. I never realized how hard leaves were to draw! Using a variety of the Papermate flair pens, I drew out basic leaf shapes (you can see my pencil marks) and filled in with colors and used a water brush to blend the colors. The flair pens don’t blend completely, but I really like the look it gives in this case. On some of the leaves, I went back and outlined them again.

The return of the habit tracker

Since fall is the return of schedules, it is the return of the neglected Habit Tracker to my bullet journal. Using the space on the right-side of the page, I added a baby-step tracker filled with only the essential items. Habits that I truly need to form {or break!}. As you can see, there are a lot of personal-development items on my habit tracker. It’s time to get my personal life back into shape!

For creating an effective habit tracking:

I am rather pleased by the colors and the layout for September. I added the washi tape for goals and the ‘to do’ section quite by accident. They are actually covering a hand-lettering mistake. The tape is sparkly orange and I wrote on it with a white “Recollections” opaque marker that I found at Michael’s in the loose pen aisle. I mark the monthly spread pages with washi tape for easy navigation. I added the white dots to the lettered titles too. I like the texture it gives and gives the text even more whimsy.

I wasn’t intending to add leaves to the boxes on the calendar, but it became necessary as I smeared the ink on number 13. I can’t tell, nor do I care because I like the added leaves! The number 25 may need some of the same help. Or maybe I should fill that day with plenty of fall activities that I will never know otherwise.

How do you fix errors on your page? Washi tape? Art? Stickers? Just leave it? Bullet journaling has taught me that it’s ok to make mistakes and to love them for what they are. Let me know what you do in the comments below.

Here’s to September, the beginning of a new season. A time to embrace what comes and to reignite the flame for schedules and planning.

Follow me on Pinterest for even more ideas. Come say hello! On Instagram find me @ChocolateMusingsCreates

Eclipse/Space Layout – Shield Your Eyes!

August 17, 2017 1 Comment

The Eclipse is Coming! The Eclipse is Coming!

Warning: Shield your eyes from what you are about to see or make sure you have the proper viewing spectacles for your eyes.

Nevermind, you can look.

Monday is the eclipse across North America – and we are very near the total coverage area in the south. We are checking the kids out of school and trekking our way to a better viewing area. Thank goodness we have family in the area and don’t have to find lodging. If I owned a hotel, I would crank up prices because people would pay them to see this once-in-a-lifetime {for some} event. I am not a hotel owner though.

Perhaps I should make a calendar of when the next eclipse will be and where so I will be more prepared the next time. Well… if I’m still around on this earth. I should learn more about them. I’m sure that I just cursed myself – it’s predicted that my kid’s future science fair project is probably on eclipses. Great, can’t wait for that karma. That doesn’t lessen my excitement about this eclipse, though. So now, enough with the chit-chat.

Here is the layout for next week in honor of the Eclipse!

First off, I have to tell you that I didn’t have a compass of any sort in my possession, but I wanted to make circles. I actually wanted imperfectly overlapped circles, so it looked like the eclipse either coming or going.

I scouted around my kitchen for two glasses with different size openings. One needed to fit inside the other – but just so I could make the circles pretty close to overlapping. I offset them just slightly. On the first page, I wanted the emphasis on Monday, which is when the eclipse was happening. I chose to do a repeating pattern for the facing page. Watercolor was so much fun on these pages!

I left a large area for notes since we are making a big deal of it for our kids, I plan on recording the events here so I can tell them about the adventure in years to come. Maybe you will have more patience than I did to splatter white paint across the pages to make it look more like stars.

Did you miss the eclipse but like the layout? This layout could be used for space/celestial/cosmos theme.

What layouts did you do for the eclipse? Anything special?

What objects have you used in a creative way?

Pin this layout for later (and follow me on Pinterest for more ideas!) I’m on Instagram too, @ChocolateMusingsCreates. Follow over there for bullet journal ideas/layouts art and hand lettering.

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Here is the layout with a couple of close-ups.

Leave me a comment below and let me know what objects you’ve used in a creative way.

Minimal Open-Side Square Weekly Spread

August 15, 2017 Leave a Comment

Minimal Open-Side-Square Weekly Spread

{with Monday Start}

Great layout for a minimalist design
the names on the side added variety to change-up the layout.

The day-to-day planning is down the center of the page (except Sunday) and all the other planning is on the edge of the pages.

I left a big part of the page on the right for a quote or to do list. You’ll notice that the week starts on Monday. Not typical for the calendar I use, but I’ve really been liking the Monday start to the week. Whether it’s in my head or not, it makes me feel like my weekend is not disjointed…and possibly longer? Whatever extends the weekends right?

I tend to lay things out in pencil before adding color or pen, it reduces mistakes. After getting it drawn out, I decided the sides would be the best place for the days of the week names. Below is the video of me lettering the names. Yes, I forgot to cross the “t” on Saturday and dot the “i” in Friday – what in the world was I thinking?! Details! I discovered it later and added them as you’ll see in the final layout.

To create this layout:

Start from the center – and leave one dot to the center of the book, you could move it closer if you wanted, but it makes it easier to add tasks and notes you don’t have to write into the center of the page. I have tried to allow for white space in my bullet journal. (And let’s face it, white space in my life too!)

I always leave 2 square heights for the meal planning – it just makes it seem easier to plan meals that way. I like to have a place to jot down miscellaneous ‘next week’ items. On the right side, I included a square for blog posts and “to do” for those tasks that are not assigned to a day. But in that space, you could have: To Do Lists, Shopping Lists, a place for notes or journaling, mini-calendar, a weekly habit tracker or a myriad of other things! I love having space ‘as needed’. If you were making your own, you might decide to mash Saturday & Sunday into a “weekend” box instead. I think I might do that next time.

Pin these layouts for later (and follow me on Pinterest for more ideas!) I’m on Instagram too, @ChocolateMusingsCreates. Follow over there for bullet journal ideas/layouts art and hand lettering.

Pin this layout for later!

Leave me a comment below and let me know what you think.