We’re all familiar with the concept of a ‘to-do’ list and have likely used them many times in a bid to make our day super productive. We’ve probably tried to make ourselves feel like we’re winning by adding a few things we’ve already finished or got started on so we can quickly tick them off. However, sometimes, we’ll have felt disheartened when we’re approaching bedtime and discover that most of our list needs migrating to tomorrow’s to-dos because we weren’t productive enough, have too much to do, or, we got distracted by other things.
Creating a ‘not to-do list’ can be a wonderful tool to help us identify and eliminate tasks, habits and distractions which prevent us from focusing on what really matters and stop us from being as productive as we would like to be. In a nutshell, a ‘Not to-do list’ is a list of activities you choose to avoid doing so that you can manage your time effectively. This might include things like the following:
anything which distracts you on a regular basis
things which drain your energy
bad habits that you want to remove from your working time
things which don’t currently add value to your life
unnecessary tasks i.e. things which don’t need to be done
other people’s responsibilities
Ideas for items to add to your not to-do list
Your Not to-do list should be highly personalised depending on your own wants and needs but here are some ideas to get you started.
Checking your emails repeatedly throughout the day
Mindlessly scrolling social media
Checking your phone in bed – either last thing at night or before you get up
Drinking coffee after 3pm (when you have work the next day)
Going to bed later than 11pm (Sunday – Thursday)
Spending time thinking about / stressing over things which are out of your control
Reading negative news
Things that are not my responsibility
Doing tasks which would be best delegated to someone else
Multi-tasking (or attempting to)
Saying yes to tasks or events that aren’t a priority right now
Working whilst eating lunch
Spending time with individuals who drain your energy
Forgetting to take regular work breaks
Doing work after 5pm
Procrastinating by watching lots of productivity videos (binge watching) on YouTube
Keeping ideas, thoughts and must dos in your head instead of writing them down and scheduling time to deal with them
Not identifying your top priorities for the day
Eating unhealthy snacks which make you feel sluggish
Making excuses to avoid / put off difficult tasks
Aiming for perfection – forgetting that done is better than perfect
Setting too many goals at once
Final words…
I hope you’ve found today’s post useful and it’s helped you to consider tasks, habits and distractions which prevent you from being as productive as you could be. I would really appreciate it if you took time out from your busy schedule to drop me a comment sharing your top three things to add to your ‘Not to-do list’.
Welcome to another blog post where I share my bullet journal set up for the month. For October, I went for an Autumn vibes theme with lots of stickers featuring autumnal leaves, fungi, hot drinks, squashes, woodland animals and colourful trees. I hope you like my pages which took me a good while to complete!
Front cover
I decided to do an autumn wreath for the cover and was going to do a watercolour design but I decided to look for something on Cricut Design Space in the end. My thought was that creating stickers would be less time consuming than mixing autumnal watercolours to make my own wreath shape and the colours would be more intense. I was certainly correct about the lovely, bright designs but I spent ages sizing images and making sheets of stickers for all of my pages and subthemes. At least I’m pleased with the effects I’ve achieved.
I selected about 4 different wreath designs in Cricut and asked my husband to pick his favourite and here it is with an October 2024 title added in the centre and a few leaves dotted about in the spaces at the top and bottom.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Monthly calendar
As is usually the case, I wasn’t happy with my lettering on the first attempt so I practised on dot grid paper and stuck in the title I was happiest with. The paper is from Claire Fontaine and I’ve been using it for years to cover up little mistakes in my journals.
I’ve gone back to my usual 6 dot space grid calendar layout this month as I missed it in September. As you can see, I added tonnes of stickers which are mainly from Design Space but a few are from a mini Carpe Diem book I’ve had for quite a while now.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Finances
My finances spread is my usual layout with a few autumnal colours, a cute little fox design as some tiny leaves. I like to record my income and spending for each month to keep an eye on my purchases and to check I have a few low or no spend days.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Monthly goals
This is a fairly new spread for me and it’s a great way to set myself some small goals which contribute to my longer term goals for the year. This month, I split my goals into personal and business. I’ve got a few more on the list than I wrote last month so lets hope I haven’t taken on too much.
On the adjacent page to the monthly goals I’ve created a bright and colourful evaluation space so I can journal about the progress I’ve made and then summarise at the end of the month. I’ve purposely kept the box quite small so writing isn’t such an onerous task.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Weekly spreads
Preparing all of my weekly spreads took quite a while but I’m sure I’ll appreciate the effort I’ve gone to every Monday morning when my pages are ready to write in. I enjoyed choosing a different aspect of autumn for each week but it was a challenge searching for images that I liked which would be suitable for small stickers to decorate each day.
The autumnal border strips that I used at the top of the pages were from The Range and were a cheap, quick and easy way to add decor above the weekly boxes. The stickers have a transparent background so were easy to align with the dot grid.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Final words…
I hope you’ve enjoyed looking at my spreads for the month of October and they provided you with some inspiration for your own bullet journal planner. In addition to the ones I’ve shown you, I also create a meal plan each week which I photocopy and attach to our noticeboard in the kitchen. Writing the plan in my bullet journal gives me something to refer back to at a later date and it’s a wonderful record of all of the delicious dishes we’ve enjoyed throughout the season.
Let me know in the comments if you have any exciting plans for the month of October or autumn activities that you’re looking forward to trying.
For my September bullet journal pages, I was inspired by a set of washi tapes that I found and purchased from TKMaxx (even though I have literally hundreds of rolls already – you can never have too much right?) They were all in similar shades of purple with some featuring tiny stars, crescent moons, Saturn, the moon phases and text saying ‘the stars shine for you’. In addition, the set included complementary patterns, a watercolour effect design plus a ‘to do’ tape for my running task lists. I wanted to use my paints to create an original piece of art that I could use for my front cover and, after spending a while perusing various night sky tutorials on YouTube, I finally settle on this one which explained the techniques really well and discussed use of colour and contrast as a key teaching point. I decided against adding dark tree outlines to the bottom and chose to add some stars and a moon using white gouache.
The front cover
As always, I used cold pressed watercolour paper and a wet on wet technique to ensure the colours blended seamlessly and there was no buckling of the paper as there would be if I’d painted directly onto my bullet journal page. This gave me a nice, clean design which I could photocopy using my printer and stick in. I wish I’d chosen thinner washi tape as a border because the finished piece ended up smaller than I wanted but I also didn’t want to scan and enlarge the piece as the stars would have ended up too big.
My original watercolour galaxy painting – Laura Jones
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Monthly calendar
I decided to do a different calendar this month and opted for the style originally used by Ryder Carroll who is the creator of the bullet journal system. This involved writing the day numbers and the days of the week down the left hand side of the page, leaving space to write events and or happenings in the space to the write with one horizontal line for each day of the month. This allows the use of just one page for the entire calendar. I’ll let you know how I get on with it next month and whether I’ll continue to use this style or go back to my usual 6×6 dot spaces box calendar.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Finances
The one page calendar meant I ended up with a spare page to the right so I started my finance pages and then continued overleaf. Again, I’ve been making stickers for this month’s theme to decorate my spreads more quickly than drawing.
September goals
In order to not lose sight of what I want to achieve in September, I decided to create a goals page to refer to throughout the month. I opted to have two types of goal – health and fitness and business as this is what I want to focus on throughout September, aside from my work at the university.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Weekly layout
This is my first weekly, before the pen and I wanted to keep it simple so there’s plenty of room for events and a few to-dos each day. I’ll probably do a running task list for the week over the page but I intend to add some day specific tasks to the weekly calendar.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Final words…
Thank you for visiting my blog today to look at my bullet journal pages for September. I would love to hear in the comments what you think of my art work, my theme and set up.
Wishing you a lovely September filled with lots of fun autumnal activities,
Although I’ve finished doing my four traveler’s notebook journals where I documented each season of the year including my bucket list items, I decided to continue making a seasonal bucket list and adding it to a double page spread in my bullet journal as I really enjoy making them. Today I’m sharing my Autumn 2024 list in which I’ve included some seasonal activity favourites and new things to try. I hope my bucket list inspires you to create your own, whether by simple writing them down in your journal or getting creative and adding hand drawn pictures or making stickers like mine which complement the items.
Before I created my Autumn 2024 bucket list, I revisited my autumn 2023 list so I could be sure I wasn’t just repeating last year’s items. I then spent time writing down all the things I love about the season such as seeing the beautiful colours on the trees, spotting autumn visitors at my local nature reserve, making my home warm and cosy and putting out seasonal decor, trying out new comfort food recipes and warm desserts and so on. I also added new activities I would like to try such as making caramel covered apples on sticks and planning out my TV viewing for the next three months so we can have plenty of series to look forward to as we cosy up each evening.
Having made plenty of notes, I turned lots of them into bucket list items on a scrap piece of paper before making stickers for each of them in Cricut. I also used Canva Pro and downloaded images to go with each. For a few of them, I also downloaded mini pictures either using Canva photos or via Google and turned these into little stickers too. Finally, I used Cricut Design Space and Canva to download watercolour leaves to add further decor in the spaces on the spread.
My finished bucket list BuJo spread
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Final words…
I’m really pleased with how my pages turned out and I hope you like them too. I won’t be creating TN journals to record my progress but I might stick a few photos in my BuJo weeklies to evidence the items as I tick them off. I hope today’s post has encouraged you to give making a seasonal bucket list a go and I would love to see your creation if you would like to share yours to your own blog or email me at laura.j.jones77@gmail.com
Over the past week, the weather in Sunderland has cooled down and it’s been quite breezy with a few warmish rain showers. It feels like the end of summer is fast approaching and that we’re quickly heading into the autumn time. My husband reckons there are still some bright and sunny days to come and I shouldn’t pack away my shorts, vest tops and cropped trousers just yet but, although I love a nice bit of sunshine, I certainly won’t miss applying greasy sunscreen to my exposed skin before spending time outdoors and feeling hot and sweaty in bed at night despite only having a thin cotton sheet as a covering. In fact, I’m looking forward to autumn this year and will be planning lots of lovely activities for the season. Today, I thought I’d share how I’m getting ready for autumn 2024 with the intention of giving you some simple ways to prepare for what’s to come and hopefully helping you to look forward to the coming months too.
Home decor
A few months ago, I was looking at the autumnal home decor in Next and saw some really cute pieces. I was very tempted to make a purchase of yet another pumpkin but I resisted as I already have over ten in my collection. However, when I got home, I decided to look at everything on their website, as often, many of the products are not available in store. With 205 items including bedding, kitchenware and tableware, vases, fragrances, lighting, pictures and more, I found it difficult to restrict myself to just one item but I was very restrained and, for click and collect, ordered a sweet little three-dimensional autumn picture with battery operated tiny light up sections.
Cute little light up 3D Hello Autumn sign
Other ways I’ll be getting my home ready in terms of decor include:
putting away a couple of my current mugs and replacing them with my oversized autumn leaves design one (from TKMaxx)
adding our autumn wreath to our front door (I got ours from Lights4Fun)
getting out my various pumpkins to display – I have different sizes and different textures including some ceramic ones, some plush ones in velvet (including a fantastic orange doorstop with sequins on along the grooves) and a lovely handmade crocheted one which I got last year
bring my throws and blankets out of storage to place on the arms our settee and the chair in our living room
airing our thicker quilt to put on the bed as the nights get cooler
choosing a few new candles to scent our home to go with the ‘baked apple pie’ one I purchased late last year (unfortunately, Aggie, our hamster doesn’t react well to stronger smells so I’m having to place them well away from her cage in the hallway)
collecting and using pine cones, dried leaves, stems and branches to create natural centrepieces and arrangements
making my own autumn inspired decor using my collection of watercolours (for this, I will experiment with mixing different earthy and autumnal colours in my palette such as browns, yellows, oranges and deep reds)
Planning some fun activities for the season
Over the past year, starting in autumn 2023, I’ve been creating a seasonal bucket list and then working on a journal to record my experiences. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed creating these but making and finishing the journals has been time consuming and involved quite a lot of expense – I must have gotten through over 50 roller tape glues over the course of the year. So, now that project is almost over, I’ve decided to continue making a bucket list for each season but only record a few of our favourite and completely new experiences in journal pages. I’m yet to create my Autumn 2024 bucket list but here’s last years in case you haven’t seen it already.
Photo credit: Laura Jones for Keeping It Creative
Wardrobe changes
Although I have my shorts and crops out at the moment, as the season gets going, I’ll be laundering and putting them all away and getting all of my thin and more cosy knits out. I picked out a few new jumpers and cardigans last year and have already bought a gorgeous pale khaki green batwing jumper with metallic fibres from Love & Roses at Next so I’m pretty much set for the season already!
We’ll also be washing and vacuum packing our thinner summer weight duvet in favour of a higher tog but we won’t put the thickest one on until the really cold nights! And finally, my sandals will be heading into the loft and my walking shoes and ankle boots will be taking their place. I keep my trainers out for my gym sessions but rarely wear them out and about unless I know I’m only going to be walking on solid, open paths where they won’t get soggy or muddy.
Recipes and drinks
As I write this section, I’m enjoying an icy cold J2O Summer Shine to help me hydrate after an intense Clubbercise class. However, in the autumn time, I will crave warming coffees, creamy hot chocolates and tasty mochas. I’m also hoping that I will still be enjoying my new, very low calorie option, mint tea, which I believe only has about 2 calories per cup. I’ve long wished to develop a liking for herbal teas (to ensure I don’t drink too much coffee in the colder months) but it has taken me a long time to find something I can tolerate let alone grow to love!
As well as transitioning mainly to hot drinks, my husband and I will also be swapping light salads for heavier and warming soups, stews, pasta and risottos. Before the autumn season arrives, I like to pick out some online recipes to try using my favourite ingredients. I also like to fill our store cupboard with wholegrain rice and pasta, packets of other healthy grains such as quinoa, freekeh, bulgur wheat and oats, plus tins of pulses such as chickpeas, kidney beans, butterbeans, black beans and lentils. We also tend not to have ice cream when the temperatures drop, opting for warming desserts with lashings of custard such as treacle tart or syrup sponge. I’m also planning on having a go at making a pineapple upside down cake (complete with cherries in each pineapple ring) this year as I remember enjoying the ones my mum used to make when I was a kid. I just need to add it to my bucket list so I don’t forget!
Pumpkin everything?
Personally, I love cooking with the various squashes that are around at this time of year and love trying different varieties (interesting known as winter squashes not autumn!). However, I’m not a fan of the popular PSL (AKA pumpkin spiced latte) or other sweet pumpkin flavoured treats that become available. Also, I don’t want any of the sickly sweet pumpkin scented candles that can be found in abundance at TKMaxx already. I don’t mind the spice element, but I’d rather go for a nice warming cinnamon. What about you? Do you fully embrace pumpkin in sweet stuff or are you glad when they run out of pumpkin spiced stuff at your local Starbucks? Luckily, cinnamon flavoured items can be purchased alongside the popular gingerbread bits and pieces which come out closer to Christmas time so their warmth can be enjoyed in winter too.
Digital screens
Each season, I change the wallpaper on my laptop and my mobile phone. Last year, I remember having a photograph of a squirrel collecting nuts, surrounded by autumn leaves which I’m sure was digitally created but used to make me smile each time I logged into my computer. I’ve seen lots of background images on Canva Pro which I must choose from before my free trial ends. For the phone wallpaper, I usually just Google ‘autumn aesthetic phone screens for android’.
Enjoying the outdoors
As the weather becomes slightly chillier, there’s no need to stay inside with the heating on and complain about how cold it’s becoming. Going for walks in the autumn is, in my opinion, an absolute must, especially when the leaves begin to change to beautiful shades of red, orange, yellow and brown and then start to lace the ground. As long as you remember to layer up so you stay warm and cosy whilst enjoying the stunning scenes, there’s so much that nature has to offer. And if you struggle with cold and pain in your hands when the temperature steadily drops, my husband can recommend the rechargeable hand warmers that you can pick up on Amazon for a small (and very worth it) charge.
As you enjoy the outdoors, why not collect some nature elements to display at home or make art with such as pine cones, jewel-coloured leaves, branches and stems. Google autumn nature crafts and don’t be put off from doing something arty just because it says it for kids!
Final words…
The more preparation you put in prior to the autumn commencing, the more joy you’ll feel and the more exciting opportunities you’ll create. Each season has so much to offer us and rather than engaging in that popular British pastime of complaining about the weather, why not spend your time fully embracing autumn doing activities that you love or have always wanted to try?
Keeping it creative 