Ok so I realise it was only 2 months ago I was showing you my new travellers notebook and was so proud of it as I had made it myself! I was so determined to have one planner for everything, but going to the UKPA Big Meet changed everything!

After being gifted my first ever Erin Condren (EC) Life Planner, by Erin herself, it felt rude to not then use it! My boyfriend had also bought me some Happy Planner (HP) bits back from America which again I wanted to use… Thus why I have gone from one to two planners. And two much bigger planners for that matter!

However the added space has been well worth it! I wanted to have a separate space for any work related projects I had going on from my personal daily life stuff. These two planners have given me the perfect balance and space to do this too!

My Happy Planner

So the HP is the classic size, and I actually built it myself. My boyfriend had bought me a small extension pack, so I got diary and notes pages as well as the disks individually. Then to give it a personal touch, I had my cover made by Sunday and Serenity and I am totally in love!

I use the monthly spread to plan out my blog posts.

All my personal posts as well as my guest posts are listed here so I can ensure I have a good range of content for each month, without repeating myself or doing too many similar posts in any given month.

It’s also great for me to be aware of any up coming guest posts I have to get done so I can have these written in advance of submission.

Then the weekly sheets I use for my job, to track mileage and work locations, note all blog posts due out, any course notes I need or social media stuff linked to my blog. It’s very technical and boring so no stickers included here.

My Erin Condren Life Planner

My EC is used for personal planning and therefore, unlike my HP which is only colour coded, my EC is full of stickers!

This is where I plan my week, any relevant events and to do lists. Daily tasks, housework etc all goes in here.

I absolutely love the space of the EC and even though I was on the path to having smaller and smaller diaries, they were also getting wider and wider.

Now reverting back to the bigger diary I am discovering that it is the space I need to plan effectively for me.

Using two planners successfully

I’m not going to lie, this is genuinely the first time I have successful used two planners! In the past I have never quite managed to do this properly, or had every intention of using more than one and then never following through on it.

For me, I feel it is working now because I am making a much more conscious effort to keep my work and personal life separate. Therefore having two diaries helps with this mindset, especially when working from home knowing the kids are also there. It can become all too easy for work and pleasure to almost blend into one.

My HP gets filled with scribbles too and is easier to add or remove pages from so works really well as a work planner compared to the EC. I can scribble away and then discard as necessary, whereas what’s in the EC is permanent.

Why move from strings to coil/disk bound?

One of the reasons I jumped ship from rings (ie. Filofaxes) to strings (Travellers notebooks) was due to the ease of writing. It used to annoy me having the rings in the middle of my page and I loved the flat surface.

However, though I could get the flat surface, what I continued to struggle with was space. Some weeks I had enough but lately I found I was needing more and more space as my life became more and more packed!

With both the EC and HP they can be folded back on themselves so I can still have my flat surface as well as the larger workspace. The best of both worlds! Thus why I feel once again, I am one step closer to planner peace…