What is a MONTHLY and how could you SET it UP?

Last time I wrote about long-term-use pages, and collections.

Now I try to explain, what you could do with your short term things. Basically Ryder Carol’s Bullet Journal system has four planning area: yearly log, monthly log, weekly log and daily log. I don’t really want to put an important thing in 4 different places, so I simplify this a little bit.

I have my long term things: like collections, yearly list and planners, and yearly tasks in the first part of my book. And I put my short term (actual) things in my actual MONTHLY PARTS (called monthlies). I use the actual MONTHLY during the whole month; I put all the information I actually need here.

As I mentioned previously, all the long term/collection things I pre-settle when I start the actual bullet journal book, and I use these pages all along I use that book. But the monthlies are different. I create only the actual one, and I will set up the next one only in the end of the month. (For example: today is 01/07/18. Now I use my JULY’s monthly part, which one I set up on the end of June.) 

I started bullet journaling in May of 2017, so until now I made already 15 monthlies. My monthly set up evolved during usage, so I often changed some parts and pages, try some new things or cancel which one not works for me, but the main contains is almost steady for a while. 

Bytheway, sculpture is steady, but I choose different “theme” for every month. So every monthly has it's own style with significant colours or art technique, or with special drawings and tools etc. This give a unique feeling for every month, and it is a fun for me too. But first I tell you only about the contents of my monthlies.

My MONTHLY basically contains the following pages:

1.  MONTHLY PLANNER (double page)

Usually bullet journalists have welcome pages for every month. It’s nice, but a little bit wasting the pages for me. (sadly I never have ENOUGH empty pages in a book) So I mix all the main things of the actual month in this MONTHLY PLANNER MAIN PAGES.

My layout is almost steady more than a year now. I like it, because every important thing is here at the same place, so it is really useful and helpful for me.

I have a full month planner for date specific things in the left. On the beginning of each month I put my previously planned things (occasions, important birthdays, parties, meetings, vacations, etc.) from my yearly planner to here. It is really good to see your full month in one place. It is easy to plan with it, and when during the month I have new important meetings or programs, I can see with one blink, I will be available or not.

On the right I have a monthly to do list, called TASKS. Here I put all the not-date-specific things I should do or not to forget during that month.

Next to it I collect my GOALS and IDEAS for the actual month. This trick works really well: I use this double page very often, so I always keep my goals in front of my eyes. (And my tasks and my goals sometimes belong to each other’s.)  
Usually I mark this page side with a washy tape or something, because with this I can find easily the beginning of the month.

I use these BASIC CODE note signs with these too:

Under the tasks I usually have a “QUOTE OF THE MONTH”; I always choose something for my actual feelings, goals, or my monthly theme. This quote is usually very important to me, and sometimes it is works as the law of attraction.

Next to the quote I have a simple CALENDAR, to help planning. It is not a normal month calendar, I always put a week from previous month and some weeks from the next month, because it is usually really really helpful, to think and planning continuously.

2. PAGE FOR EVERYTHING (single page)

Next part of my monthly is an almost blank page. I put all my sticky notes, and not to forget notes here, which are refer to the whole month. It is my “youngest” and am most changeable page in my monthly, but I love it. 

Before using that I always lose my sticky notes, and quick notes, but now, I put all of them here and keep them safe. Here I stick e.g. my actual shopping list, my receipt note, the phone number of the repairman I actually need, the details for my program ideas etc. Everything is here, which belong to the whole month, not only to a special date or week.

3.  BUDGET (a pull-out page stick on a single page)

As I mentioned in my previous posts, BUDGET planning is very important for me. To fulfil my yearly budget pages, I collect all our monthly financial data here. This layout transform the most during the months, but now it is finally perfect. (For me of course.)

In the end of the last year I had only a few empty pages left, so I had to glue some pull-out pages so I could finish that year in my last bullet journal book. That time I realized, that pull-out pages are great for monthly budget too, because it is more flexible with free space. Sadly I cannot surely predetermined, how many space I will need for example our costs. In some months 2-3 columns are enough, but other times I use more than 6, so this pull-out page is perfect for this.

Budget layout includes our monthly budget goals, all of our expenses and any kind of incomes. In the end of the month (or mostly in the beginning of the next month) I summarize the costs in different categories. I collect here all kind of expenses together, because I needed to follow our expenses precisely to change our bad habits and stop unnecessarily money wasting. So my EXPENSES chart content these columns: DATE, AMOUNT, and CATEGORY CODE (for final summarization) and ITEM (here comes all the important notes too: what this cost about, where I buy that etc.)  I usually fulfil it every evening. With these data I can have extremely sharp picture about our finances.

And usually I put an inspirational QUOTE here too. Just for safe. Low of attraction, you know. :)

4. MEMORIES (single page)

It’s a kind of free minded memory page. I drop here all the highlights of the month with entry-words, small draws or doodles. Sometimes I put here the bad things too. After a while this page a one-blick show about that month for me. (These are about my last summer)

5. GRATITUDE AND SADNESS PAGE (double page)

Gratitude page is a useful tool to collect our good memories and focus on the good in your life. For me it is not too easy to write down the same mound of good things in every day. So my daily gratitude page transform early to a whatever whenever-style gratitude page. That is why it is not pre-numbered. Every day I fill my book (mostly in the morning or in the evening) I wrote here the heart-warm, funny, or lovely things from my day.

Sometimes there are many, but there are days, when I can’t find so goodthings to put here or I’m just not in the humour to write anything here. That is why I create a “sadness-page” too. It is the opposite of gratitude page. If I have big troubles, or very bad thing in my day, I put them here. Do you think it is unnecessary, because we should remember only the good things? In fact, this is useful too. If you write down your displeasure, you are exactly put it down from your mind, and relieve. Furthermore, if you read it later, maybe it is much more ridiculous, as annoying, so you can leave it, and free yourself from it. But otherwise, to see which things (or persons) give you bad times regularly, could be important too. I called these pages SUNSHINES and RAIN, because it sounds cool.

6. MEGATRACKER (double page)

This is my favourite part of the month. I love to track many things, because it gives me a lot of information. That’s why I collect all my trackers in one double page, called MEGATRACKER. These are monthly term trackers, but I track here daily, weekly and occasionally habits too. It is really complex, so I will wrote a full post about it next time. But here aresome pics to show you what is this about:

7. WEEKLIES (4 or 5 double page)

Then come my weekly planners. These are not really ordinary weekly log pages. It is mostly a mixture of weekly and daily spreads. It is fits for my life and tasks. I love this layout, I use it mostly from the beginning; only simplify it a little bit. (Here are all my weeklies from July 2017.)

I will write about this more in the future, but you can see here the main lines. I have a box for each day and an extra box for the weekly tasks and I have a big free part for the actual weekly things. I put here my notes, my lists, my not-to-forget things, sometimes my actual favourites, anything which belongs to the actual week. 

This layout is super flexible, and it has usually enough space for me.

So this is my MONTHLY. It contains approximately 16-18 pages/a month. I hope you understand everything, but if you have questions, freely ask me in comment.

And next time, I will show you, how my megatracker works. It’s tricky, but genius! :) Trust me, it is worth to wait. 

*these photos above are all from my bullet journal books, these pages I made myself, if you share please ask me before: createmysunhine@gmail.com.

** you can find more pics from my journals here: https://www.instagram.com/createmysunshine/