Diary Moleskine Hack

As people know, I am pretty addicted to moleskines, and like to have any excuse to use them.

I've also been searching for the *perfect* diary for myself for years. I often start of with two, sometimes three diaries at the beginning of the year, use and compare, then get another diary around august when the academic year diaries come out. All in all, I try out about four diaries a year, and have tried most diaries out there, both in Europe and Japan.

One problem is that they never 100% suit my (very picky, very choosey) needs. The weekly view is too small, the monthly view is too small per day, doesn't have a monthly view, etc etc. So I finally took the plunge and drew my own... at least that way, if there's something i'm not happy with, I can actually tell the creator so, and get changes made to the diary! It's been just under 2 months now so I thought i'd report on the "making of" and "use of" experience.

For this task, I have used a Large squared moleskine notebook. It has 240 pages, which means after 52 weekly vews (104 pages), and 12 monthly views (48 pages - 2 pages glued as one) it still leaves 88 pages for notes (112 pages if you use single pages for monthly). I also thought the square paper would make my life easier in drawing all those lines. It also has the advantage that as the lines are closer together, you ultimately end up able to write more on the page.

Here is the cover... nothing new here:

Added a "Schedule" label with a Tepla 4mm black on white label... I find this is more durable than any other tepla lables, including the 6mm "extra strong" sticky label. I label all my moleskines, to make my life considerably easier when there are several in my bag.

I split the notebook into three sections.
1. Monthly view
2. Weekly view
3. Notes
The sections are devided by pink cards stuck on page so it's easy to see where the sections are, without being obtrusive (I didn't want tabs sticking out the sides).

Here is the monthly view. Monthly view are very important for me as that is where I do all my schedulings... It frustrates me when diaries do not come with monthly views. Before I could start drawing up the squares, I stuck 2 pages together to creat one thick page for all the months. This is because I didn't want any writing to be seen on the other side (I HATE THAT!!), and this will block any writing, regardless of what pen you use (within reason).
I created a blank column on the left hand side, to allow me to make quick notes about other people's schedules (e.g. when my supervisor is away), and also to even up the table. One thing I do not like are diaries that put two days into one square just because the month spreads over 6 weeks. So I settled on a 6 sqare by 6 square per day, which looks tidy and gives me ample space.
I have always colour coded my schedule:
Red: Important events, deadlines meetings and appointments.
Blue: Travelling info.
Black: Any other info.
Orange: Birthdays.
Deadlines are also starred and doublelined.
Events that have no fixed dates are usually written in with a pencil or stuck on a post it note.

This is one of the seprators. Glue A6 piece of card on page, and trim slightly bigger than the page. I use this space to keep notes for the following year.

The weekly view: This is basically my tickler files (for portability... I can't lug 43 folders between England and Japan all the time!). Tasks gets written here that I must do on that day. The tasks are (of course) colour coded:
Red: Tasks that needs to be done on a computer (my macbook pro is red so it's just association).
blue: tasks that have to be done at the office.
Black: tasks that can be done anywhere, or mostly at home.
(I sometimes slack off and don't colour code!)
I use circles to indicate the "waiting for"s.

Notes section: The 88 pages left are free for me to keep lots of lists. Lists like, sometime/maybe, 101 things to do in 1001 days, anything! The only thing I did do for these pages were to draw a line through them, so that I would use the pages more economically.

Book darts keep track of what page I'm on, to indicate "this month", "this week" and "Next blank page".

The whole process of creating the diary took just an evening while watching TV for most of the time.

In using the new diary:
so far, I have really enjoyed using it. Previous to this notebook, I used to carry a Monthly diary, a pocket moleskine diary (weekly) for tickler file, and another pocket moleskine (Plain) for the lists. So it's nice to have all three in one notebook. I've yet to "not have a space to jot something down" which is crucial..... and it's a MOLESKINE :D