How to Make a Custom Planner

Ever since I was in high school I got into the talent or recreating products and coming up with DIY ideas, the goal wasn’t  to save up on money (of course that’s always a bonus) but for me, I always liked a challenge. I wanted to prove that anything can be re-made, weather it being a pair of funky jeans or a backpack.

More recently, I took on to paper, scissors and glue and took up scrapbooking and creating cards. A few weeks ago I wanted to buy a new planner, for the longest time I used an 18 months daily Moleskine black planner. But when I went to buy a new one I found it becoming ridiculously expensive and I saw a few other options, some of them really provoked me, because they were basically made by local companies but they were ripping off other brands ideas and promoting it as their own. Of course not all of them do that but there were a couple of complete rip-offs down to the cover colors and how its packaged.

Long story short, the DIYer in me decided to make my own planner: a. to have the flexibility to change the layout of the page as I want. b. to design my own cover and customize it as much as I want with my own color choices.

So I went to my favorite stationary shops (i.e. Samir & Ali - Alwan) and got myself some supplies:

•  80 pages notebook
• Plastic cover
• Colorful fabric tape
• Plain white and black paper
• Double face tape

I also went to my pinterest to find inspiration. I came across this blog: http://www.elizaellis.com/2016/03/free-printable-irma-weekly-planners.html

She has printable planner pages and covers that you can print, I used this initially for my personal planner, before I decided to design my own covers.

I included a YouTube video here of how I made it and here are the instructions:

1. I first cut the A4 paper to fit the outside of the notebook, to do that I have to use two sheets of paper and cut one of them to go all around the notebook, and the other cut just to cover the front (covering the missing piece from the first sheet.

2. I designed my covers on A4 so I can then cut them into two, and adhere one to each side if I wanted, or just save the second one for later. I usually get them printed on 150 gm paper in Xerox business center.

You can download them for free here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B62tsdNcZvnJd0JOMnhHc0puYnc

3. If I am using a transparent cover I would adhere the cover page first them tuck the notebook inside. If I am using a dark or opaque colors for the plastic cover then I will usually decorate it using markers, a punch and some glitter foam and fabric tape from outside.

4. The next step is to look for inspiration for stickers or download some free stickers from Pinterest and print them on sticker paper (also at Xerox) and use them inside.

5. As for the inside of the planner this is completely up to you how to design it and basically a pencil and a ruler can just be enough to get it designed.

If you recreate this, tag me on social media, or leave me a comment here or on YouTube. I would love to see and be inspired by your recreations.

Enjoy!

Follow me on Pintrest to see what inspires me:

https://www.pinterest.com/shahinazhussein/