Hello Daisies! How are we into the fall months already? I can’t believe I’m sharing my October setup!
I have to tell y’all something. I LOVED the September kit. The Book Club Kit just spoke to my heart and my love for reading, and it has been a joy to use it this month! But the thing I love best about Cocoa Daisy is that when I’m sad about leaving a favorite kit behind, another gorgeous one shows up on my doorstep and gets me excited for a new month! It really is a big box of happy!
OK, let’s dive in to my October setup! But first, a question: How many of y’all have been with me through my years with Cocoa Daisy and seen me switch planner sizes and styles every month (and sometimes multiple times in a month?) ? My lifestyle and my needs have changed over the years, and my decades long personal planner wasn’t practical anymore.
Sooo I have jumped sizes, styles, layouts and more trying to find what worked best for me now. Another thing that’s great about Cocoa Daisy is the wide variety of planner kits available, so I always had a gorgeous kit waiting for me no matter what planner I was in! And I know some of my friends (cough Kristine cough) switches planners a lot as well, and she regularly gives me planner envy on how gorgeous she makes everything and tempts me to copy her and switch! But I’ve realized that I’m not a switcher. I’m someone who needs a planner that will stick with me day in and day out for weeks, months, even years. My planner is more than just keeping track of my appointments (and I do have a lot of appointments. This week alone I had three out of five kids at 8 different doctor’s appointments!). It’s also keeping track of jotted down notes, memos about how many times to give my son a certain medication they just switched him to, a phone number that I’ll need to call in three weeks to set up a portion of another doctor’s appointment, gift ideas, things to remember, and more. It is, quite literally, my brain. And it’s next to impossible to switch sizes and styles on a regular basis and transfer ALL of that over every single time. So inevitably, I’ve been digging through old planners, old inserts, old papers trying to find an obscure piece of information that I KNEW I put in a planner – I just couldn’t remember which one!
So I finally decided: No More! I knew I loved a6 rings, and I couldn’t figure out why I was so frustrated every time I tried them. I finally figured it out the other day: I missed my old style Foxy Fix with the snap closure. I had been using the new style with the elastic closure, and as much as I love that style, for some reason, the snap closure makes all the difference for me. Isn’t it funny how the same size, but a different style can completely change how we feel about something? That’s exactly what happened to me! So, drumroll please, may I present to you my new planner:
It is a Foxy Fix a6 binder with the snap closure, and y’all. It’s PERFECT. The color, the style, everything So let’s dive in to my setup!
As soon as I open my Foxy, I see my October dashboard. I just cut one of the dashboards and stuck it in a clear Foxy pocket. I am obsessed by with the colors in this month’s kit and this dashboard shows all of the colors perfectly!
The back side of the dashboard holds my Betty card, opposite this gorgeous vellum. Obsessed doesn’t begin to cover how much I love this view! Betty even has one of my life mottos! Hahah.
My first section is my List section. It just houses some List inserts from SewMuchCrafting, and I just keep a running list of things to do, people to call, things to add to my planner, etc. It has basically taken the place of my old Inbox section. It still functions mostly the same. I made the dividers once I switched back to this size. It’s a top loading divider with glitter tabs, and I just cut the Cocoa Daisy papers to size and slip them in. It is so easy to change out papers each month! Usually I layer some pocket cards over the paper, but I loved this chevron paper so much I couldn’t bear to cover it!
One of the things I love about rings is how easy it is to add extra Cocoa Daisy papers to my planner to add a fun pop of color and pattern. I use clear dashboards and just slip some paper in!
The back side of my dashboard, and some more gorgeous vellum! (The size of the vellum is perfect for a6 rings, by the way. Cut in half, it makes two sheets that are exactly a6 size!)
My next section is my Personal section . This paper is a print from a shop on Etsy, and this is basically my default position so of course I had to have it! This section houses my reading list, finance section, and any other “personal” insert. Right now, it’s also holding some SewMuchCrafting vacation inserts for my upcoming trip in a few weeks. It will also hold my Christmas planning inserts once I get them.
At the end of my book inserts, I slipped another dashboard with more Cocoa Daisy papers!
The back side. I LOVE the wood grain of this pocket card layered on top of this gorgeous plaid!
My next section is my Calendar section, and since this is for October, of course I had to use my Hocus Pocus girls! And isn’t the acetate PERFECT on top? The colors match exactly! And on the back side I have this perfect fall quote card! This section holds my yearly overview, as well as my monthly, weekly, and daily inserts. My monthly has taken the place of my old pre-planning section. I use a sticky note on each monthly page and jot down the plans as they’re scheduled, then when I get to the month I decorate it with the current Cocoa Daisy kit and write the plans in.
One of the things that comes with constant planner switching is Cocoa Daisy kit switching! When I was trying out a standard TN, I used the standard CD insert as a daily. Each page was a day and I either ignored the sections, or used it to break up the day depending on my needs. I got the idea from Jen and it’s one that I carried over to my rings. The only problem with that was that by the time I switched, all of the a6 inserts were sold out in the Cocoa Daisy shop! I was lucky enough to grab a b6 off the bst, and I got it today and immediately cut it down and punched it, like I used to do last summer before they released their a6 doris. I’ll make sure to grab an a6 for November and change my kit! Hahah. I absolutely love using this for my daily. It works perfectly and I love seeing all of the beautiful colors and patterns every day! I use the hobonichi date stickers to mark each day.
My next section is my Family section. How perfect is this pocket card for this section? “The days are long, but the years are short.” So true and so fitting for a family section! In this section I keep some school inserts, and I have a section for each of my five children, for any sort of information I need to keep for them. Gift ideas, notes, etc.
This is a dashboard/divider/dashboard combo – I told you I couldn’t resist all these colorful CD goodies! That rainbow card with the Anne of Green Gables quote might be my favorite of ALL time. One of my favorite books, one of my favorite quotes ever, about my favorite season, on those colors! Just stunning! This last section is for Notes. This basically is my overflow section, where everything else goes until I find a place to put it!
That’s a wrap! Y’all, I can’t even begin to put into words how much I love this kit. I love that it just shouts “Fall!”, but with gorgeous, bold, rich colors. It looks like the leaves changing in my yard, every time I open my planner, with colorful mushrooms and fairies sprinkled through, like little bits of woodland magic all throughout my planner! I absolutely love it and am so excited to open my planner every day.
Thank you all for following along with me on my planner walk through, and for following on my journey to planner peace! As always, come find me on Instagram as well as in the Cocoa Daisy Facebook group. I can’t wait to share more of this month with you all!
Xoxo, Jenn