Friday, January 4, 2013

Organizing My Thoughts in 2013

On Pinterest I came across  a journal comprised of index cards.  There were 365 cards tucked into a bowl. Each day a person is encouraged to write one sentence about their day. The bowl with index cards was cute and I love the idea of journaling a simple sentence every day.  However, knowing me...I need to have my cards bound together. Plus, I want them to be reflective of me.  I wanted something that screamed, "Nacole made me!"  My sister and I headed over to Walgreens. They had the little Five Star Notebooks on sale, buy one, get one free for $2.87.  I looked at index card books, but they didn't quite have enough cards.  I decided this notebook would be ideal. Here is what I started with, a black little notebook.
This project was perfect because it happened to fit in with the Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Get Organized Crawl! I started by designing the cover. I had some paper that I fell in love with and purchased on a whim a few months ago.  I didn't know at the time what I would use it for, but this project was the perfect use! The paper is from Simple Stories and is part of their Documented line. As I pieced the cover together, I added some ink to distress, a strip of brown rib, a gear to look like a flower, and of course used my Cricut to cut out tabs, letters, and numbers. The tabs are from the Elegant Edges Cartridge and the letters and numbers are from the Plantin Schoolbook Cartridge.  On the letters I did a shadow to match the tabs and topped with the letters I cut out in chocolate.

After the cover was done, I decided to add just a little more to the covers. This is the inside cover!
This is the back cover. See that last tab? It has a hidden surprise!

I added a secret pocket! You know, for those fortunes out of fortune cookies, special photos, clippings, etc. that sum up that year! I tucked a silly little card in to the pocket so you could see it.

This is how the tabs turned out. I staggered the tabs and the numbers.  Finally, I updated the first three days of January.  My biggest challenge? Just writing a single sentence about the day. I am a very verbacious person, so one sentence is a bit tricky. I planned to use a half of each side of the page per day.  I'm glad I did, because I have been filling up my space! 

This was a fun project and I'm so excited to have a fun way to organize my daily thoughts in 2013!