Philofaxy

Free For All Friday No 172

2012-03-02T02:30:00.001-05:00

So the first Friday of March, Spring is about to Spring or the leaves are about to turn to Autumn depending which hemisphere you are in.

So do you record the first sign of spring in your Filofax? The first daffodil in bloom, or the first or last cut of the grass?

But as it is Friday, you are of course free to discuss anything Filofax related.

THE NEW LIMITED EDITION ‘TEMPERLEY LONDON FOR FILOFAX’ COLLECTION

2012-03-01T00:00:00.014-05:00

Spring 2012 ushers in the highly anticipated arrival of the Temperley London for Filofax “Your Life in Your Hands” limited edition collection. Bringing Alice Temperley’s signature style from the catwalk to the palm of your hands, the new collection encompasses two exquisite organisers, The Guinea and The Affair.

With a self-confessed magpie like approach to finding inspiration for her fashion designs, including a penchant for collecting memories, notes, photos and sketches, as well as keeping a hectic schedule organised, Alice Temperley has been using a Filofax for years. Alice was inspired by her experiences to create her dream Filofax for others to use, in the signature Temperley London delicate feminine style and tailored to her own specifications inside and out including bespoke stationery and content.

The Guinea harks back to the charm of vintage accessories. Made out of luxury quality pony skin, in a unique black and white print pattern inspired by guinea fowl feathers, the textured surface is soft to the touch. The cover is edged with a gold finished frame with a zip closure, adding an evening clutch feel. The interior features crocodile print calf’s leather and includes a smartphone pocket creating a practical accompaniment to modern day life.

The Affair is designed with luxurious black Italian lace bonded onto cream leather, inspired by lingerie against the skin, resulting in an elegant, sensual style. The Affair features beautiful detailing such as the patent leather strap and snap fastener with a signature Temperley London button and nude cord lined interior, with contrasting patent leather pockets. Containing a bespoke Flex by Filofax A5 notebook as well as a full complement of personal organiser stationery, The Affair is a perfect place to capture private thoughts, dates and memories.

Alice Temperley says, "I wanted to create something unique, beautiful and functional that contains personal information to help organise, plan and collect things for our busy lives. Throughout the design journey I looked at every element, from how I use my Filofax to my vintage collection. I thought a lot about how to combine its form with function and how to introduce Temperley London’s detail and femininity to Filofax. The Guinea and The Affair, two beautiful and stylish functional accessories, can be used and treasured for years."

The limited editions come with their own bespoke range of inserts featuring a varying selection of unique content. Alice Temperley shares some of her own ‘loves’ including favourite festivals and world markets. Talented chef Mark Hix, a personal friend of Alice’s, makes a contribution, providing especially selected recipes for the uniquely designed Filofax pages. Both The Affair and The Guinea are presented in elegant zipped pouches and contain an exclusive Temperley London for Filofax logo badge as a mark of authenticity.

Filofax is enjoying a timely renaissance in the hectic digital age, as self-fulfilled creative individuals hark back to the privacy, importance and simple pleasure of making hand written notes. Temperley London for Filofax is a truly remarkable collection which embodies the heritage of both premium brands and marries together beautiful form and function.

The Temperley London for Filofax range, priced £375 - £399 and are exclusively available in Filofax stores, Temperley London boutiques and Selfridges now.

Product information:

The Affair, £375/$595. Available in one size to accommodate an A5 note pad and personal size inserts
The Guinea, £399/$625. Available in one size to accommodate personal size inserts

Temperley London for Filofax inserts include:

Temperley London designed front sheet, with handwritten message from Alice Temperley
Alice Temperley’s favourite festivals
Alice Temperley’s favourite world markets
Seasonal recipes by Mark Hix, one per season
Birthdays pages by month featuring birth stones and illustrated with star signs
Illustrated star signs and Chinese birth years
Illustrated 2012 calendar block page featuring hand drawn illustrations of seasonal produce
Calendar block pages
2012 week on two page diary
Address and contacts
Fold out world map
To do list
Leather tabbed indices, with gold embossed text
Leather tabbed A-Z with gold embossed letters

All paper fills use the Filofax luxury cream paper with black print

Thank you to SlamPR for sending us the full details and images.

Filofax 2012 release dates

2012-02-29T12:00:00.003-05:00

Here are the projected release dates of the new ranges/new colours see earlier posts for details.

Petal - March
Jack Vintage - April
Domino - March
Domino Mix - July
Apex - March if anyone cares!
Metropol - March
Swift - March
Pennybridge - June
BCC - April
Finsbury - March
Holborn - March
Malden - March
Filofax Classic - June
Luxe - June
Osterley - June

There might be other new products to be announced later in the year, no details as yet.

Reader Under The Spot Light - Ray

2012-02-29T00:00:00.002-05:00

It is an honour to introduce to my 'partner in crime' sorry I mean my partner in the creation of the Philofaxy Diary Inserts... Ray.

Ray is a Filofax returnee, a one-time user who returned to the format to find that an internet community had sprung up in his absence. He recently started a blog, My Life All In Once Place in which he has shared a number of downloadable and printable Filofax projects as well as a few makeable accessories. He has recently worked with Steve to produce a range of printable free diaries for the Filofax. An avowed Excel and VBA geek, he lives with his wife and three sons of 14, 12 and 9.

1. When did you buy your first Filofax and what was it?

It was bought for me. My employer sent me on a course to learn about time management, as part of which I was given a Filofax and taught how to use it. It was a brown leather Buckingham.

2. What other brands have you used or considered using?

In the 90s I followed the herd onto a succession of electronic platforms, but after a number of years realised that none of them worked as well as paper. On my way back to Filofax I spent some time with Moleskine and other bound diaries and notebooks. Interestingly, my wife stuck with Filofax throughout my flirtations with electronica, which she crows about whenever the opportunity arises.

3. Out of the organisers you own which is your current favourite (Style and Size)?

My Personal Malden. It feels just right in my hand and it’s just individual enough to look good, not so wacky or extravagant as to stick out like a sore thumb.

4. How many Filofax organisers do you own?

Half a dozen or so. I only use two at any one time, though.

5. What do you use your Filofax for?

The Personal Malden is what I currently use to organise my life. It tells me what I’m doing, when and where. It holds my lists of things I need to do and buy and helps me track my business expenses. I use a lot of notepaper, too, because anything that’s not written down tends to be forgotten. I use a black A5 Kensington as a business tool. Its contents vary depending on what job I’m doing and for which client, but it generally impresses the hell out of people.

6. What was the feature about Filofax you like most?

I love that no two people’s Filofaxes will ever be the same. They are infinitely adaptable and configurable and you can add your own content.

7. If you could design your own Filofax what would it feature?

Don’t think I haven’t thought about this! For me, it’s all about functionality, so it wouldn’t necessarily be decorative or flashy. It needn’t be leather, either, although there’s a practicality about leather that’s hard to beat. It would have a pen loop that had a little more tolerance for pen size than the Malden’s does. It would have no zips on the internal pockets (am I the only person who dislikes zips inside binders?) nor around the outside. It would have a magnetic press-stud, too; there are lifespan issues with the purely mechanical ones.

8. How do you carry your Filofax?

In a backpack or messenger bag usually.

9. Which Filofax in the current range do you like the most? Are you going to buy it?

I still like the Malden. I’m not planning to buy anything else.

10. What is the most you have ever spent on a Filofax? Which model?

£30 for the Malden in the Filofax UK half price sale. All my others have been eBay bargains.

11. Turning to Philofaxy, what do you like the most?

The enthusiasm. There’s always someone who can answer a question and the advice people offer in the comments is generally excellent. I’m often inspired by seeing and hearing how other people use their systems, so I’ve really enjoyed the recent ‘How do you use’ series and hope it will continue.

12. And what do you not like about Philofaxy?

Like everyone, I struggle with this question, because I love the site and wouldn’t change anything. All I can think of (and it’s probably more about me than Philofaxy itself) is that the discussions of different binder styles and colours does little for me. What interests me more is the content and the ways you can use what’s inside the binder. That’s why you won’t generally see much binder talk on my blog.

13. What was the last music album CD you bought or downloaded?

I bought two at the same time. One was Pearl Jam’s first album, “Ten”. Pearl Jam are a band that passed me by entirely, but a friend recommended it. It’s a great album and I’ll be buying more of theirs. The other was Steven Wilson’s recent solo album, “Grace For Drowning”, which I can’t recommend highly enough.

Thank you Ray for offering to step under the spot light... and another big thank you for your help with the diary inserts..

Free Monthly 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

2012-02-28T09:00:00.019-05:00

So today Ray and I are releasing the Month on one page and Month per View (2 page) files for both A5 and Personal size. These are layouts each covering the whole of 2012, but this time for both the Filofax Personal and A5.

The A5 ones are created as A4 documents with each A4 sheet yielding 2 double-sided pages.Print the sets double-sided. If you have a duplex printer, set it to flip on the short edge. If you don't then you'll have to print odd-numbered pages and then refeed to print the even-numbered pages on the reverse.

You might have to experiment to find out how to refeed the paper. Then guillotine right down the middle and punch.

The Personal pages are also set to print to A4. On one side of each sheet you'll find crop marks. Use a craft knife and a steel ruler to release the Personal pages and punch them. The templates are set up with mirrored gutters to accommodate the holes.

You can print these on any paper you like, which will please fountain pen users particularly.

As an alternative to printing your Personal pages on A4 we've also included versions you can print straight onto Filofax Personal-size paper if your printer can cope with that.

So, here are your downloads.

1. A5 Month on One Page

Download Word File or PDF File

2. A5 Month View

Download Word File or PDF File

3. Personal Month on One Page

Download Word File (A4), Word File (Personal Size) PDF File (A4) PDF File (Personal Size)

4. Personal Month per View

Download Word File (A4), Word File (Personal Size) PDF File (A4) PDF File (Personal Size)

Of course. We will also make the source files available so that fellow bearers of the Geek gene can tinker.

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

Free For All Tuesday No. 56

2012-02-28T00:00:00.002-05:00

The last Tuesday spot of February 2012, I hope you have got some good questions lined up for us to have a crack at.... Fire away!

How do you use: Year Planners?

2012-02-27T00:00:00.001-05:00

So this week let us focus on people that use a 'Year Planners'.

So the Year Planners, they are standard in most sizes, there are a few variations, Horizontal and Vertical formats, 1 year, 2 year, 4 year.

So if you use year planners.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the year planner do you use... etc etc.

Philofaxy Meet Up - US Mid West - 2012

2012-02-26T15:00:00.003-05:00

Sandra is organising another Mid-West meet up in late spring/early summer, yes soon. If you are interested in attending.

Do you want to meet up, talk about Filofax organisers, enjoy a meal may be, share the details of your Filofax set up, generally meet up with like minded people and oh have a good time...

In the first instance contact philofaxy at gmail dot com and we will put you in touch with Sandra, please put USA Meet Up in the subject of your email, it helps me sort them.

Date for your diary - Saturday 3 March 2012

2012-02-26T00:00:00.004-05:00


New York	London	Paris	Jakarta

We are going to run another conference round-table voice chat using Skype.

I'm sure we are gradually getting to know each other's voices, but I will make a point of going 'around the table' to get everyone to introduce themselves this time.

So...When, Where, What, Who and How?

When? - Saturday 3rd March from 9am (US East Coast time), 2pm London time, 3 pm Paris time 9pm Jakarta etc. See the clocks at the top of this post to see roughly what time you should be on line. We are going to try a Saturday for a change, I will judge afterwards if it is worth alternating between Saturday and Sunday for future roundtables.

Where? - an on-line chat using Skype.

What do I need? - just a micro-phone and some head phones(in ear phones work fine) and a free Skype account. Using headphones reduces 'echo' on the call.

Who - All of you... connect up with Philofaxy and we will attempt to get as many of us linked in to the audio conference as possible.

How -

Connect to Philofaxy by firstly searching for Philofaxy in Skype, I will then add you as a contact.
Then 'Start Chat', I will then add you in to the chat room.
Then if you request it, I can add you to the audio conference as well. But if you just want to chat via keyboard that's fine. That way it's slightly less hectic for me!

Come and join in the fun, even if you only pop in to say hello...

As with previous round-tables there will also be a parallel text chat room going at the same time as the voice conference.

If you need any assistance setting up Skype, please pop a comment in this post and I will try and help you get one line. Skype is free for computer to computer calls....

Here is my post on how to improve your Skype audio with headphones or a headset.

Hope to be chatting with you on Saturday 3rd March 2012.

Download source files for the new Personal-size diary layouts

2012-02-25T12:00:00.019-05:00

As we did with the new A5 layouts, Steve and I are making available source files for our Personal-size ones, too.

We're releasing them so that those of you who want to can tinker and tweak to get the unique layout that is perfect for you. These are the source files Steve and I built to produce the 2012 sets. The same ones will also produce sets for any year you care to choose. In each of the data source files, you just need to change one date - the starting date - and the file will calculate all the other dates for you. I've highlighted the cell with the date you need to change in each of the files like this:

Look for the red-outlined cell - that's the only date you should change

1. Personal TM Week Per View

Download Word file and Excel file

2. Two Days Per Page unlined, lined or lined with icons

Download Word file (unlined), Word file (lined), Word file (lined with icons) and Excel file (same one works for all three versions).

Have fun, and please share in the comments any interesting modifications you make.

Next on our list are Month Per Page and Month Per View layouts, both for A5 and Personal sizes. And, by popular request, we'll be releasing some Pocket-size layouts soon, too.

Web Finds - 25 February 2012

2012-02-25T00:00:00.030-05:00

Another busy week with a bumper crop of Filofax blog posts. Sit down take some time out of your busy day and enjoy some excellent blog posts. You didn't have anything planned for the next hour or more now did you????!!!!

On a true Filofax love affair - Vanjilla
I seem to have enabled myself - Paper Pens Ink [puts hands up, not guilty... this time!]
Filofax Land - Imysworld
Moving into the Aston Part 1 - Paper Pens Ink
Packages in the Post - Vintage Giraffe
Moving into the Aston Part 2 - Paper Pens Ink
Oh Osterley How I love thee - Modern Musings
Rings rings rings - Imysworld
A good idea from Alice Temperley - The Life of the Perpetual Student
My Filofax Lists Frankensection - The Suburban Mom
New Filofax - Within Dreams We Live
Mini-Review: Filofax Piazza Mini Blu - Stationery Happiness
My Malden Predicament - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
Alice Temperley reveals all... - Selfridges
Cornell notes templates for the Filofax A4 and A5 - My Life All in One Place
She's a real hard working girl. My new Personal Kendal - Sense of Gravity
Studio Filofax - Tea and Talk for Two
A Holburn Zip Dilemma - The Life of The Perpetual Student
The Tracyley - Rapunzel's World
Moleskine gives it's life to a Filofax - The Crazy Suburban Mom
Filofax Overload - Lime Tree
Filofax White Paper v Cream Paper - Sense of Gravity
Moved in to the Aston - almost - Paper Pens Ink
New Filofax Obsession - Serendipity
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy.

Free For All Friday No. 171

2012-02-24T00:22:00.003-05:00

It's the doldrums of winter for the northern hemisphere. What do you have planned to liven things up until spring comes?

Feel free to discuss anything Filofax-related!

Guest Post - Alice - Erin

2012-02-23T00:00:00.022-05:00

Thank you to Erin for sending in the details of her Cuban she calls Alice!

This is my A5 Cuban Filofax in Chili that I named "Alice." There's a story behind the name.

My parents, who both recently passed away, had a great sense of humour. My Dad used to joke with my Mom that he hoped they would never get Alzheimer's Disease.

For a joke, he called himself Al Z. Heimer and he called my Mom Alice Heimer. So, I don't mean to make fun of anyone with this horrible disease, but they used this terminology as a fun way to call each other these pet names.

He called her "Alice" so often that many people thought it was her name. So, I named her Alice in honour of not "forgetting" anything since I have my trusty Filofax to write everything down in.

This is Alice's inside cover and my cover page. I love dogs so that's why I chose this piece.

This is Alice showing off her spooky Halloween sticker...Alice leaves me lots of room to write in the day per page format.

These are Alice's brightly colored tabs "To Do" "Books" "Finances" . I have a few blank ones that I need to figure out what to do with.

Alice's inside front cover showing the Filofax page cover sheet and a drawing that reminds me of my husband and myself.

Thank you Erin for sharing your photos and story with us.

Free Personal size 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

2012-02-22T00:00:00.003-05:00

As promised, today we're making available the Personal size 2012 diary sets. These are layouts each covering the whole of 2012, but this time for the Filofax Personal. They are created as A4 documents with each A4 sheet yielding 2 double-sided pages.

Print the sets double-sided. If you have a duplex printer, set it to flip on the short edge. If you don't then you'll have to print odd-numbered pages and then refeed to print the even-numbered pages on the reverse. You might have to experiment to find out how to refeed the paper.

On one side of each sheet you'll find crop marks. Use a craft knife and a steel ruler to release the Personal pages and punch them. The templates are set up with mirrored gutters to accommodate the holes.

You can print these on any paper you like, which will please fountain pen users particularly.

So, here are your downloads.

1. Personal TM Week Per View
Based on the first of our new A5 layouts, we've made certain compromises to get this onto Personal size pages. There is no room for the mini-calendars, nor for the communications and coming up sections. But we're really pleased with the result.

Download Word Version or PDF version

2. Two Days Per Page unlined

This one is a very straightforward implementation of our 2DPP A5 layout.

Download Word Version or PDF version.

3. Two Days Per Page lined
Again, we've just adapted our 2DPP A5 layout. It's the same as no 2, but with lines.

Download Word Version or PDF version.

4. Two Days Per Page with icons

This one is a bit of fun, and results from a special request. Based on the lined version, each day has a vertical strip of icons. As well as a set of weather icons (sun, cloud, rain, wind, snow) which you can use to record the prevailing weather each day, there's also a little face for you to draw in a mouth line representing your mood - a smile, a frown, a wide 'O' of surprise, perhaps even a little teardrop.

Download Word Version or PDF version.

We're not done yet with Personal layouts. I am working on a week per page layout and we also want to produce versions that can be printed straight onto Filofax Personal paper, plus undated versions. Of course. We will also make the source files available so that fellow bearers of the Geek gene can tinker.

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

Discount Code for City Organiser....

2012-02-21T18:00:00.002-05:00

Our friends over at City Organiser have shared with Philofaxy a 15% off discount code, you can use this code when you purchase from their on-line store and use the promo code at the check out of andy15 this code will run until 30th April 2012.

I'm a keen customer of City Organiser, excellent customer service, good prices too, keen and fair delivery charges including for overseas buyers.

Nothing in it for me... I'm just a satisfied long standing customer.

Free For All Tuesday No 55

2012-02-21T00:00:00.003-05:00

It's Tuesday again folks. Time for you to fire away with those questions.

Wanted - Reader Reviews

2012-02-20T09:00:00.005-05:00

So with so many new organisers coming in to the Filofax range, I naturally can't afford to buy all the different ones, let alone have a need for them all! But I'm sure amongst our readership we might have people with say one of the new models.

So would you like to do a Readers Review? We can feature these on the blog from time to time. Pictures of course will save explaining things in great detail, although we would appreciate honest and frank opinions on the good and bad points of a particular Filofax design.

If you would like to do a review of a recent Filofax purchase even if it is not from latest 2012 range, then please contact us at: steve[at]philofaxy[dot]com

How do you use: Monthly Pages

2012-02-20T00:00:00.007-05:00

So this week let us focus on people that use a 'Monthly' diary insert.

So the Monthly inserts, they are standard in most sizes, there are a few variations, Month on one page or on two pages with some available in cotton cream.

So if you use monthly pages.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the monthly inserts do you use... etc etc.

Guest Post - Do it yourself – Tabbed Month on 2 Pages for your A5 Filofax

2012-02-19T00:00:00.012-05:00

Thank you to 'Jotje' for sharing this post with us....

Like many many Filofax lovers and users out there, I am hugely disappointed that Filofax is one oft he few that doesn’t spoil us with MO2P inserts. Boxes and tabbed please!

Well, we could surely wait until we are in our eighties, because – you know – one day they might actually listen to us!

Or … we could just make them ourselves. That’s what I did and I must say I’m very pleased with the result:

On the front page there’s a list of To do items with check boxes. This is where I can note work-related to do’s of that specific month:

Same sheet is on the backside of the monthlies. This is where household, private and family related to do’s can get noted. I use colour coding, so private stuff gets written in purple, limegreen is household and pink is family.

And now we get to the crafting part.

These are the supplies needed:

1) 160g heavy printer paper. I had the colour Ivory already at home, and it turned out to be the exact same colour as the standard cream coloured Filofax tabs!

2) A paper cutter

3) A Filofax hole punch

4) A sample page of your favourite Filofax paper for the front and back of the MO2P. I chose the Todo pages from Sweden. Love them, cos you can have such long Todo lists on one page!

5) Tabs. I chose last years Daytimer Flavia inserts in Classic size, which I still had.

First you need to slice the A4 paper exactly in half to have 2 A5 sheets. With a paper cutter that’s just a breeze!

Next you put the paper in your printer (I used an Inkjet). Next: go to the Outlook calendar and print out Two pages per month. Now, this won’t work well if you actually USE Outlook as your calendar, because then you’ll have all those appointments and notes on your printed pages. Unless you’d want that, of course. Outlook lets you chose A5 format in the page setup. You then get to choose the begin and end date. Otherwise, if you are on the 10th of the month, it will print the current week, plus 4 more. Now that’s just plain stupid! I got to work around that, but not all months are to my satisfaction (e.g. “august” on my month says “juli 2012 – September 2012” – DUH!). There’s probably a good solution for it, but I got frustrated trying and just settled. Leaves me more time to play around with my Filofax, ya know?

After I had punched the pages, I placed the Swedish ToDo sheet on my copier (one of the advantages of an All-in-one-printer ;-)) and first copied it to all the front pages of the month, then I turned the sheet on the copier and printed the backsides. That way, I ensured that there was enough space for the holes.

Next step: cut the tabs off the old tabsheets. Like this:

Obviously I could have chosen to only cut of the tab itself, but I was getting lazy and figured this would make aligning the tabs so much easier. I was – however – wrong about that. I’ll show you in a minute.

Now I put glue to the tab and stuck it on my monthly page. Since the Daytimer Classic format is slightly longer than Filofax A5-pages, I needed to cut of the last millimeters at the bottom:

In theory this should have worked brilliantly. Until I got to December and discovered that the darn tab didn’t fit completely on my monthly page. So I had to cut some at the top and the bottom.

And that’s why the December tab seems to hide a bit behind the November tab. Maybe he’s shy?

Still, I’m extremely pleased with the result! Here’s a picture of the tabs in my A5 purple Finchley (sorry about the glare):

And in my A5 Adelphi:

The thick paper is lovely to use and write on. It’s thicker than the normal Filofax register tabs, but thinner than the monthly pages in the Erin Condren planner.

Thank you Jotje for sharing this very creative project with us. You might be interested to know that Ray and I have some Monthly insert designs that we will be releasing soon.

A5 Undated Diary Layouts

2012-02-18T06:00:00.062-05:00

So as well as the dated versions of the new diary layouts3 that Ray and I have been working on. We also have undated versions of the same layouts.

You can print these off as and when you need a week or a day to plan a specific event. Or if you just want to try out these new layouts without printing off a whole load of pages.

Enhanced TM Week View (Undated)

Download Word file or PDF file

Vertical Week View

Download Word file or PDF file

2 Days Per Page Lined and Unlined

Download Word file (Lined) or PDF file or Word file (Unlined) or PDF file

Day Per Page

Download the Word File or PDF file

Day on Two Pages

Download the Word File or PDF file

All of these files will print on to A5 paper or A4 paper using booklet print mode of your printer.

And for our next trick.... tune in next week!

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

Web Finds - 18 February 2012

2012-02-18T00:00:00.019-05:00

And so another week and some great finds this week, some for the first time I think.

My First: A Love Story - Stationery Happiness
The perfect A5 Filofax notepad - The Life of The Perpetual Student
At Home with Malden - Well Planned Life
Ray did the heavy lifting - Filofax Fixation
Filofax Hole Punch - How to Make Your Own Paper - Cats Corner
What's inside my Finsbury A5 Organizer - Rencoutrer Pauline
Journaling Prompts - Kikki.K
Finally the New Filofaxes - Whimsicality
Amazona - Filomaniac
How I came to own two Domino Italia - Stationery Happiness
It didn't look that big on the website! - Filofax Fixation
Scratching the Pocket/Personal Itch - Paper Pens Ink
Planner Archives: A Necessity? - Well Planned Life
Filofax Debulkafication - The Crazy Suburban
New (to me) Filofax - Fantail Designs
The pH of Filofax Paper - Maudie.Made
Top Tab Thursday - Filofax Fixation
Storing my Filofax inserts - Sense of Gravity
Trying to work like clockwork - And laugh at guilded butterflies
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy

Download source files for the new A5 diary layouts

2012-02-17T07:28:00.000-05:00

Hopefully you've found one of the new diary layouts that you like. But perhaps it's not quite exactly what you want. Perhaps you'd like the lines to be pink rather than grey, the dates to appear in Comic Sans font. Or perhaps you'd like to produce a diary now for 2013, 2014 or 2525. Maybe you want to print a diary for a particular period rather than a calendar year all in one go. If that describes you, you're in luck.

Today, we are making available the source files that Ray and I used to create the 2012 diary sets. Equipped with these, you can tinker around and design exactly the diary page you want, then get your PC to calculate and print it for any date range you choose. In each of the data source files, you just need to change one date - the starting date - and the file will calculate all the other dates for you. I've highlighted the cell with the date you need to change in each of the files like this:

If you want fewer dates, delete full rows at the bottom end. If you want more, drag the formulae down into more rows. If you mess up, you can always download the file again and start over.

As long as you have some basic Word and Excel skills, you should be able to give this a go (I know that some of you already have, using the source files Ray provided in November for the Day on Two Pages and Day on A Page layouts.) You'll need to be able to set up a basic mail merge file link, and there are plenty of web tutorials that show you the way - Google using the search terms: Word Excel Mail Merge 20xx (where 'xx' is 02, 03, 07 or 10, depending on your version.)

Depending on what version of Word you're using, Word may put section breaks between every record, which will throw out the mirrored gutter formatting in the layout. If it does, the solution is quite simple; do a find and replace on section breaks (^b) to remove them all. You'll also need to add a single page break to the front of the merged document so that each 2-page spread has gutters in the middle for the holes.

Now, if you just read all that and understood at least some of it, get downloading and have a go. However, if it might as well have been Venusian, then you might be better off just downloading the pre-prepared 2012 sets.

Here are the source files.

Enhanced TM Week Per View

Download Word file and Excel file

Vertical Week Per View

Download Word file and Excel file

Two Days Per Page unlined or lined

Download Word file (unlined), Word file (lined) and Excel file (same one works for both versions).

Have fun, and please share in the comments any interesting modifications you make. Post some pictures to the Philofaxy Flickr group.

Free For All Friday No 170

2012-02-17T00:00:00.002-05:00

Friday is where we open the floor to you to discuss anything Filofax related. There are no entry qualifications, so if you only found the blog 5 minutes ago or 5 years ago, you can add a comment, ask a question, open a discussion on any Filofax topic no matter when it was previously discussed.

So let discussion commence... and have a great weekend.

Free A5 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

2012-02-16T02:01:00.047-05:00

Here they are, then.

When Ray and I began talking about developing these we imagined there would be a fair bit of work involved, and there was. I don't think we realised how much fun it would be, nor quite how many people would get excited about getting hold of them.

Today we're making available the 2012 diary sets. These are layouts each covering the whole of 2012. They are created as A4 documents. To use them as A5 inserts, print the document in booklet mode on A4 paper, then use a guillotine to divide each sheet into two and punch the required holes, which the templates are set up with mirrored gutters to accommodate. Alternatively if you have A5 paper then your PC and/or printer will be able to scale the page to fit the paper size.

Of course, you can print these on any paper you like; coloured, patterned and fountain pen-friendly are all options, as is plain white A4 printer paper.

So, here are your downloads.

Enhanced TM Week Per View

Download Word version or pdf version

Vertical Week Per View

Download Word Version or pdf version

Two Days Per Page unlined

Download Word Version or pdf version

Two Days Per Page lined

Download Word Version or pdf version

Also still available are the Two Page Per Day and One Page Per Day sets.

Are these templates nearly but not quite right for you? If so, watch out for when we post the source files for you to download and adapt as you wish. We'll make them available here soon.

Also coming soon are some Personal size diary inserts, we are still refining these.

Again my thanks go to Ray for all his help and hard work in making these happen.

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

Journalling in Your Filofax

2012-02-15T00:00:00.018-05:00

Have you been journalling this year? Or journalling in your Filofax even. 'Saffy' came across a series of articles on a Australian site that gives prompts for each day.

You can read them all on Kikki.K and put them in to practice as you like. But read the notes at the start of the series.

I try to make a note of things I do each day, but I'm not the more prolific of journal writers. I will be looking at their tips to try and improve what I write about each day.

Do keep a journal in your Filofax?

Free For All Tuesday No 54

2012-02-14T00:00:00.003-05:00

Well last week was a very active week as far as FFAT was concerned. Let's hope we get some great questions and comments this week...

And Happy Valentines Day!

How Do You Use: Week Per Page

2012-02-13T00:00:00.000-05:00

So this week let us focus on people that use a 'Week per Page' diary insert or WPP to all Philofaxers!

So the Day per Page, they are standard in most sizes, there are a few variations, some have appointment times, there are some slight variations, Some have reduced space for Saturdays and Sundays. Some available in cotton cream. Single language, multi language, non-English. So quite a variety in just this one format. There are also Week Per Page plus Notes inserts.

So if you are a WPP person.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the WPP do you use... etc etc.

The picture is a Personal size WPP I've recently created, it's another one that is in development at the moment.

New A5 Filofax diary layouts

2012-02-12T16:00:00.004-05:00

Thanks for your ideas and suggestions. Ray and I have been working on a range of layouts which we're nearly ready to publish. Initially, there will be four layouts available.

The first one is a week per view layout we're calling the 'Enhanced TM Week Per View'.

Among its features are a number of things people have been asking for, like equal space for the weekend days and a 'Coming Up' section of items to carry forward to subsequent weeks.

Next we have our 'Vertical Week Per View'.

This one again affords Saturdays and Sundays the same space as weekdays and includes a field for weekly review notes as well as 'Coming Up'. You might use this to collect information and insights for your Monthly Planner.

Finally, we have a Two Days Per Page layout with both lined and unlined day spaces

In these layouts, a week crosses four pages. We've given all seven days equal billing and left an untitled eighth day space - for 'coming up' notes or tasks or anything else you might want to note on a weekly basis. Filofax do not currently make a 2PPD A5 diary.

Initially, we'll be making the four layouts available for download as full 2012 diaries. You'll be able to get them here or at My Life All In One Place. Ray has also already made available a Day on One Page insert available.

We'll also look to make source files available soon so those of you who like to can tinker and adapt.

Some of the things you can do when you have the source files are:
Make and print a diary for any year - past, present or future
Adjust the space given to different days or other template elements
Add your name or other details to each page
Make a diary for part of a year, or for any period you want
Change the language of month and day name

Ray will look in to doing some tutorials if there is demand.

Sets for 2012 should be available in the coming week. We're also hoping to make undated versions of the templates available around then.
I would like to thank Ray for his hard work and team spirit in helping me take my initial ideas in to a finished product.

Reader Under The Spotlight - Claire

2012-02-12T00:00:00.000-05:00

This week I would like to introduce you to Claire who agreed to go 'under the spotlight'.

Claire is a lecturer who lives with her OH (Ben), four cats and numerous giant African land snails in North Somerset, UK. She’s been working in Further Education since 2005 and teaches A-level English. Claire also writes fiction and poetry and her work has been published in quite a few places.

She’s obsessed with many things such as cats, reading, shoes and sci-fi, but stationery is right up there. For someone so obsessed with stationery she’s actually fairly disorganised and is often enveloped in reams of paper. Claire’s cat family ranges from Noah, who’s eight months old, to a very (un)healthy Mr Tabby who’s eighteen and medicated up to his eyeballs. Eighteen! Apparently that’s ninety-three or so in human years. She also has loads of foxes all living in the garden – probably because she feeds them left-over Chinese takeaway, Yorkshire puddings and anything else going spare most days. She blogs here: http://clairejoannehuxham.blogspot.com

1. When did you buy your first Filofax and what was it?

Apart from the obligatory fake FF you have as a kid, I’ve only been a convert to Filofax for about a year. But I’ve made up for the wilderness years (B.F. – before Filofax) very quickly.

2. What other brands have you used or considered using?

I was a Moleskine girl before. I loved the paper quality and the look of them, but ultimately I was pulled in by the lure of all the different designs and colours of Filofax. Don’t get me wrong – I still use Moleskine notepads but they can be a little, erm, black and boring. Although I notice their new range has lots more options.

3. Out of the organisers you own which is your current favourite (Style and Size)?

Definitely the Deco; I have it in Personal Ivory. It’s just so beautiful. I often find myself stroking it in lessons. It amuses my students; I tell myself they’re laughing with me, not at me.

4. How many Filofax organisers do you own?

Well, I’ve currently got nine. They are:

A4 Metropol Black
A5 Classic Pink
A5 Finsbury Aqa
A5 Domino Snake
Personal Deco Ivory
Personal Osterley Plum
Personal Malden Grey
Personal Domino Grey
Pocket Amazona Red

I’ve owned sixteen in total however. One I gave to a friend (nice me!) and the rest I sold on. One was the Personal Osterley in Brown. I loved it, but it seemed a bit silly having two virtually identical. Same with the Malden – I had three at one point (I got rid of the Crimson and Vintage Pink). I’m making room for new arrivals. I can be quite obsessional with things I like; I tend to buy the same thing in lots of different colours. I do this with everything, not just FF. It’s a habit I’m trying hard to get myself out of. My secret self is totally Zen and de-cluttered.

5. What do you use your Filofax for?

Six are in use. My Personal Deco is my everyday FF, with diary, phone numbers and all that stuff. I use the Pocket Amazona as a purse and shopping list holder. My A5 Domino is my teacher planner. SO useful. The A5 Classic keeps track of my writing submissions and briefs, while the A5 Finsbury houses passwords and receipts and all that kind of stuff you should keep but not necessarily lug around with you all day. My Malden has my book list in it; I just keep a record of every book I’ve read and the date I finished it. Apart from the Osterley the others aren’t in use. The Osterley I alternate with my Deco when I feel like a change. I’m going to sell the A4 at some point. I tried it out for work but it was just too cumbersome – no different really to using a normal A4 file.

6. What was the feature about Filofax you like most?
Where to start? The look. The feel. The smell. The weight of it in my hand. The way the clasp pops. I also love that little buzz you get when you find fellow FF fanatics. I was handing back some student work and I saw one of my A2s had a Pocket Amazona in brown on her desk. Of course, we had to discuss it. Work colleagues and students alike now come up to me to tell me about their FFs, or the one their parent/gran/brother owns. We can find ‘our kind’ everywhere!

7. If you could design your own Filofax what would it feature?

For a start some decent pen loops. They should all have that secret little stretchy bit of elastic like the Deco and Osterley. And then I’d look into a better range of inserts. Franklin Covey seem to have an interesting range; I don’t see why Filofax can’t be a bit more inventive. I just bought some amazing coloured dividers from Franklin Covey – they’re really wide and they come in a pack of six for under £3. I’d like to see some different colours in FF too other than purple, pink, red, black and brown. More green. I’d love what I call a real psycho-billy obnoxious green. In fact, animal print. A leopard print FF would make my day.

8. How do you carry your Filofax?

In my bag usually. Or if I’m shopping (with the Pocket) or going to lessons (with the A5) then in my hand. I find it really hard to leave the house without one, which is part of the reason I bought the Pocket. I started to panic – if I’m on a boozy night out and I take my Personal, what would I do if I lost it? Left it in a puddle of cider somewhere? Now if I’m going anywhere dodgy (a rare event I assure you) I can take the Pocket instead of the Deco.

9. Which Filofax in the current range do you like the most? Are you going to buy it?

Well obviously the Deco, like I said. I know it’s being phased out and I keep on thinking, should I get a Pocket one whilst I still can? The Enigma looks interesting. They feel so soft, but it’s just not that special for the price and I won’t be buying it. I think. Now if that was in leopard print…. I’ll probably wait to see the new range ‘in the flesh’. A compact A5 sounds interesting, but I won’t be going for the Malden in Purple like most of the world will be. It just looks too dark in the photos; I prefer a really vibrant violet.

10. What is the most you have ever spent on a Filofax? Which model?
£120 for the Osterley. I’m terrible – if I like something I won’t hang around for a bargain. I just rush out and buy it and then bemoan having to live on beans for the rest of the month. Quite a few of my purchases have been full price although I did get the Deco in the half-price sale that so many others took advantage of.

11. Turning to Philofaxy, what do you like the most?

I love having a nose in other people’s FFs. It’s like walking down a street and sneaking a peak through everyone’s curtains.

12. And what do you not like about Philofaxy?

ENABLING. Oh my god: the enabling. [Sorry!]

13. What was the last music album CD you bought or downloaded?
Today is the Day: ‘In the Eyes of God’ – I guess you’d call it extreme noise. I have quite eclectic music tastes, though everything is generally alternative in some guise. The Cure, Depeche Mode, The Smiths, Pulp, Fugazi. Alice in Chains, Jeff Buckley, Tool, Deftones and so forth. As you can see I’m stuck in a music time warp. I do listen to a bit of new stuff – but mainly from those bands that were in their peak in the ‘80s and ‘90s!

Thank you Claire, very enjoyable to read. And if any of our readers would like to step under the spot light then please contact philofaxy[at]gmail[dot]com

Web Finds - 11 February 2012

2012-02-11T00:00:00.021-05:00

We have had freezing temperatures for over a week.. another good reason to stay in doors with a hot drink and some time to look at the latest blog posts via Philofaxy.

Filofax - We could grow up together
Neue Umfrage: Welche Verschluss-Variante bevorzugt Ihr? - Filomaniac
Fountain pen ink on Day Timer paper in my Filofax - The Life of The Perpetual Student
Fine tweaking the A5 Cuban - Filofax Fixation
New A4/A5 Diary Templates are on the way - My Life All in One Place (see above!)
Unstuff your Filofax with an undated monthly calendar - My Life All in One Place
Preparing for Duck Pond market - Maudie Made
Brainstorming - Malden vs. Holborn Zip - Chaotic Perfectionist
Holborn Zip Personal in Wine - Plannerisms
Paper and Digital Journals - Quo Vadis Blog
New Filofax is here! - Lime Tree
How it all started - Stationery Happiness
Filofax Writing Journal - No Wasted Ink
Introducing Crazy Life Designs - The Crazy Life of J
News about new products - Filomaniac
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

And here is some videos for you to enjoy.

Enjoy and have a great week.

Fashion Targets Breast Cancer

2012-02-10T13:00:00.000-05:00

I just wanted to let you know about the latest project Filofax have done.

To raise money for Fashion Targets Breast Cancer (FTBC), They have got a number of high end fashion designers and celebrities to sign one of the gorgeous Osterley organisers.

These designers and celebrities include John Rocha, William Tempest, Minnie Driver, Matthew Williamson and Fred Butler.

This organiser has now gone on to eBay so people can bid to win this amazing prize with all profits going to Fashion Targets Breast Cancer.

Auction for the FTBC organiser:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320846470208

As a separate auction, we are also raising more money by auctioning off tickets to the Temperley London for Filofax launch party.

Auction for tickets:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320846479374

Free for All Friday No. 169

2012-02-10T00:01:00.002-05:00

I've been thinking about the A-Z pages lately. Before I had a PDA or cellphone, I made much more extensive use of them. And I used them for much more than names and addresses. For example, I'd keep a running list of Filofax inserts that I needed to buy and keep it behind "F." I'd keep Christmas lists behind "C." And in my work Filo, I'd keep info on using, say, the company database behind "D." Now I've trimmed that information way down in order to carry more DPPs.

Has anyone eliminated contact information from their paper planner completely?

Since it's Friday, all other topics are welcome, too!

Guest Post - Writing Filofax - Amanda

2012-02-09T00:00:00.002-05:00

Thank you to Amanda for submitting this Guest Post about her Writing Filofax....

I am a (sadly, as yet unpublished) writer, as well as a university tutor. I have written three novels and am currently on my fourth. In the past, I have tried all sorts of methods for planning these – large Moleskine books, ring-binders, index cards… For book #4 I am using an A5 filofax because:

I liked the size and space of the Moleskine, but didn’t like having to flick through it all to find the notes I had scribbled – I wanted the ability to file things.
So, why wasn’t the ring-binder the best choice? Do I really need to answer that? A cheap ring-binder or a Filofax? Is there a contest?
I wanted more portability than A4 so I went for A5 but I also wanted space, so I went for a Domino because of the 30mm ring size, and also the stiffness of the cover (for writing out and about).
At the time, WH Smiths were selling the ultraviolet A5 for half price. It seemed fate.

The A5 ultraviolet writing Domino

Decision made, I now needed to set it up. I knew what sections I needed and I already had a load of templates that I have used in an A4 ring-binder before. I settled down with my printer and the (hateful) filofax hole-punch and got started.

The Filofax opened up

The first section, unsurprisingly perhaps, is one on The Plot. I have a mind-map to look at all the different threads and how they interact and that’s right at the front of this section. This was done on a piece of A4, folded in half, with the right-hand edge trimmed and the left side punched so it goes in the Filofax folded, without sticking out. Behind it sit lots of pages of notes – sometimes thoughts as they come to me and some of them a bit more structured. As it is a murder, there are quite a lot of pages about the forensics! Most of these are written on home-made lined paper so I can write in fountain pen and not get irked

The plot section showing the mind-map opened out

The second section is The Timeline. This has a page with a table detailing ‘fact uncovered; how/by whom; when’ and then a day per page calendar (printed using the DIY template software) so that I can write down what is happening each day, on the days leading up to the murder(s), the murder(s) themself and the investigations (and so avoid having people finding out things before they’ve occurred or other such errors). There’s a home-made ‘today’ marker in there which is nothing more extravagant than an off-cut of thick card punched so that it sticks up a bit above the pages. At the back of this section, there is also a week on one page to summarise things.

The home-made day to page sheets and ‘today’ marker

The third section is Scenes. In here I file any jottings about any scenes (either written or to be written) plus I plan the next few scenes using a scene-builder template which I adapted from some on the DIY templates site. The front page of the scene-builder sheet covers: a one-line summary of the scene, who is involved, where the scene comes in the book, what happens in it, notes about whose point of view it is, what the character’s objective is, what obstacles to them achieving their objective there are and the outcome of the scene. There’s also space to note down dialogue, or things that must get mentioned, etc. The reverse of the sheet is lined for notes. The beauty of using a filofax is that I have planned some scenes then changed my mind about the order and been able to re-file them/look at the order of the scenes and work out what’s best, something which was cramped on index cards and impossible in the Moleskine.

Home-made scene builder sheets

The fourth section is for Notes. I jot down things to look up or check, and things that have occurred to me about scenes or the plot or a character or whatever. Again, the joy is that these notes can be re-filed into other sections when necessary.

The fifth section is for Paper. This is in the middle of the filofax to make scribbling things down easier (so the rings are less in the way). From here, notes get moved to the relevant sections.

The sixth section is for Character Notes. Again, I have my own templates for these and I write detailed notes about each main character (running to many pages) both to keep the character consistent (so they don’t have a nut allergy on page 16 and be munching away on some peanuts in a bar on page 172) and, when I am writing them, to help me to develop the character. There’s space to include the layout of their homes, pictures of their favourite outfits, details of their schools, parents, siblings, food likes – you name it, I probably have it in there!

Right at the back there is a plastic top-opening pocket to store bits and pieces in and in the notebook in the back slot, a log of how many words I’ve written at each sitting.

You’ll have seen from the pictures that all the dividers are home-made and have top-tabs instead of side ones. Because the filofax is A5, it seemed wasteful to make dividers with a side tab as it’s only possible to get one out of a sheet of card. I wanted to use this gorgeous dark purple card and none of the stick-on side tabs you can buy (Avery; Post-It etc) matched well enough, so I had the idea of making the tabs at the top. Then I could punch the card so that the top 5mm was sticking out above the paper-line and then trim the divider to make a tab. Yes, the divider is now 5mm short at the bottom, but hey, it works for me. I used a silver ball-point pen to write the labels.

The top tabs

So far, it’s working out really well. The size of the page is big enough to get stuck into but the whole filofax is still pretty portable and the ability to move things around is a huge bonus for me.

Anyway, I hope you’ve enjoyed a nosey into my writing filofax!

Amanda

Thank you Amanda and good luck with finding a publisher my wife knows exactly what you are going through....

Restoring my Buckingham?

2012-02-08T00:00:00.000-05:00

My Buckingham is my first real Filofax, bought in 2001. It has black, soft smooth leather that I previously thought was indestructible. My Buckingham has done a lot of really hard traveling around the world with me. It was used heavily for nearly a decade.

A couple of years ago I noticed my Buckingham was finally starting to show some signs of wear on the cover. Nothing that anyone else would even notice, really, just a couple of places where the leather was lightly scuffed. So to preserve its beauty, I put it on the shelf in semi-retirement.

Ironically, it has suffered far worse damage in retirement than it ever did in all those years of heavy use.

Its first major damage happened in transit here to Jakarta. I packed it in my air shipment, which was supposed to arrive a week after we moved but ended up sitting in customs for a month. In the tropical Indonesian heat. And I had very stupidly packed my Buckingham right next to a plastic-covered planner. The plastic melted slightly onto the leather cover of my Buckingham, leaving much of it shiny. I was very upset about it, and angry at myself for making such a mistake.

So I put it on my shelf with my other Filofaxes, carefully (I thought). Unfortunately I didn't pay attention to the fact that the back cover was right up against a Domino, and every time I put a book in or out of that shelf the shifting of my Buckingham against the Domino's round strap dug and scuffed the leather right across the back of the binder, much to my heartbreak.

Then to add insult to injury, the front cover of the Buckingham was up against one of my Finsbury Filofaxes. Who knew that the knobbly texture of the Finsbury would imprint itself into the soft leather of the Buckingham??

So first of all I've learned my lesson: this beloved Filofax must be stored in a box, no exception.

Another problem caused by shelving my Buckingham is that during the years it has not been handled on a daily basis the leather has started to look cracky along either side of the spine where the leather creases when the binder is open. All those years of handling my Filofax every day kept it smooth and supple with the oils from my hands. Now it's really starting to show signs of neglect.

Now I'm faced with the question of what to do to try to restore my beloved Buckingham to some of its former glory. My first solution was of course to take it off the damn shelf and put in on my desk along with all my other in-current-use books, and to handle it as often as possible. Already it's looking better--the Finsbury impressions are coming out, and the cracky areas are smoothing. The shiny plastic residue has mostly rubbed off.

But I still have the horrible scuffs on the back cover. Luckily it is the back, and the front is not nearly as marred. But I would like to try to smooth that out.

I haven't tried the Nivea creme trick, because I'm afraid the mineral oil base would remove some of the leather's dye color. I think probably the best thing to do would be to handle it as much as possible, and the scuffs will smooth out at least a little bit over time.

Which brought me to the realization: Filofaxes, especially the well-made leather ones, are like living things. They must be handled and cared for. They need attention and love. Left on the shelf to languish, they wither and die.

So please, learn from my mistakes! And if anyone has any ideas for getting scuffs out of soft, smooth leather please let me know!

Free For All Tuesday No 53

2012-02-07T00:00:00.006-05:00

Tuesday the day for Filofax questions and answers... Go on..... I know you have been stood at the back whilst everyone has been in the spotlights... time to step forward and ask your question.

How do you use - Day per Page

2012-02-06T00:00:00.002-05:00

So this week let us focus on people that use a 'Day per Page' diary insert or DPP to all Philofaxers!

So the Day per Page, they are standard in most sizes, there are a few variations, some have appointment times, there are some slight variations, Some have reduced space for Saturdays and Sundays. Some available in cotton cream. Single language, multi language, non-English. So quite a variety in just this one format.

So if you are a DPP person.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the DPP do you use... etc etc.

Guest Post - Retired Filofax - Michael

2012-02-05T00:00:00.000-05:00

Today it is great to host a post from Mike, who also writes on his Phillytyper.com blog.

Below my beloved Slimline in pigskin, Made in England--complete with gold "Harrods" stamp, where I bought it on my first visit to London in the '80s. I was never without it and burned through all sorts of inserts, which a local Philadelphia stationer would order for me. I was my first. So, here's the 1980s, early 90s….

The odd drawing inside, "Evil Paper" was done by mischievous son when he was about 11 or so. After a while (like 8 years!) it got a bit beat-up, but also couldn't handle all the pages. Sometimes you can be too thin...

So it was supplanted by a chunkier Personal in black Morocco Grain Leather, with no model name, just stamped "2MLG 7/8" -- that went out of service around 1997, victim of my infatuation with the first U.S. Robotics Palm Pilot electronic organizers, the scion of a series of disposable and ultimately infuriating little gadgets!

Also tried a few Dayrunners, but their cheapish vinyl and insets with bold type declaring, "ACTION-GOALS" and such were a bit too strivey for me! The simple "To Do" and Tels. seemed more proper, and so the Personal worked hard from early '90s to A.D. (After Digital) The last months of 1997 are sadly blank--my affairs were being tracked with a device that I dutifully plugged into a plastic cradle each day to "sync" it. It all seemed so modern… for a while, at least.

The cryptic scribble, "Spend 1 Day Week on C. Ad." i.e, Career Advancement, was advice given me by photographer friend, who wisely noted that yes, do your job, but also spend time seeking people who want you to do your job or who can show you how to do it better, so you don't end up with 20 years of experience that turns our to be all the same year!

Then, about a year ago, I made the leap--more of a stroll, really, back into the analog world of daily Filofaxing. Sure, I have an iPhone now, but I also have a Filofax Luxe Compact--which has rings that are a bit bigger than the slimline, but smaller than the Personal--like Goldilocks, I feel the Compact ring capacity is "juuuust rightttt" and hope they make more in that size.

And today, the Compact carries on--here, overlooking my son's old schoolyard. He likes notebooks, but at 15--no Filofax yet!

Both veterans--the battered Slimline and the still-crisp Personal--are wedged onto a shelf with the refills; the Slimline is empty, so I can't recall so much of what I was doing that, er, decade!… paging through the Personal, though--wow, old work phone numbers; one for a nanny named Lem-Lem--she had a tiny blue cross tattooed on her forehead right at the hairline, and a huge smile and big strong forearms… a receipt for a bass amp, tels for half-a-dozen camera shops--all closed in the wake of the digital tsunami…. can't say that looking at a bunch of blank-screened Palm Organizers brings back any such feelings whatsoever. They're not obsolete--they're just taking a break.

Well, I've certainly drunk deeply of the Filofax Kool-Aid this time 'round… so much so that I've started selling them in Philadelphia (inside a bike shop, oddly enough), and am mulling a Filofax meet up at a local pub in early February. But I'll leave it up to Steve, Nan and Laurie if they'd like to have more details on that here at Philofaxy.

---Michael McGettigan , Philadelphia USA / phillytyper.com

Thank you Michael, it was great to see those older Filofax organisers and if anyone would like the details of the Meet Up that Michael is planning in Philadelphia, then contact Philofaxy and we will forward on your emails.

A5 Compacts....

2012-02-04T06:02:00.000-05:00

Another frequent request seen on Philofaxy... a slimmer A5. I know we have all seen and commented about the Adelphi not quite being what we had in mind. Whilst it had the smaller rings it lost it with the additional bulk of the binder itself.

So in order to counteract these comments... we will be seeing compact A5's this year... they will all come with 20 mm rings and they are:

Regency
Luxe
Boston
Pennybridge Zip

I'm not sure if all of these will officially arrive on the UK website, but that doesn't normally stop keen buyers from finding what they want else where!

Availability from about June 2012 onwards possibly before.

Web Finds - 4 February 2012

2012-02-04T00:00:00.015-05:00

So no sooner has one of these been published then I start looking for new posts for the next one... and this week is no exception.

I'm sat in the kitchen with my laptop, my breakfast and coffee, and whilst you are clicking and reading going through what is now last week's (today's as I write this), I'm looking through my list of news feeds for new posts that have appeared over night, normally from our friends in the USA, it is still their evening by the time my head hits the pillow with my Kindle in one hand to catch up on some reading.

So they start on a Saturday morning normally and get added to though-out the week until I have a final check on Friday night before putting another one to bed and it is time I went to bed too!

So another week has passed and we have found some great posts for you to read << This having been written on Saturday of course is a way of hedging my bets! It is a bit like a merchant banker who always irons and presses 5 white shirts on a Sunday evening, assuming he will still be in a job by the end of the week.....

So after that rather lengthy introduction... here they are!

The Cuban Brothers - Filofax Fixation
New organisers to come! - Maudie Made
Inside the Cavendish - Bluebonnet Reads
Filofax changeover leaves the whole house spent - The Crazy Suburban Mom
Filofax dividers - Lancashire Cat
An Exercise In Futility - Well Planned Life
Not that much - Filofax Fixation
holy bologna! - Snarling Post
A new priority in Filofaxes - The Life of The Perpetual Student
Filofickle - Filofax Fixation << Templates now on Philofaxy Files Page Thank you Terri
My new Filofax toy - Rapunzel's World
Is this the Perfect Filofax? - Cat's Corner
Filoh-no! - Filofax Fixation
Filofax storyboard pages to print - My Life All in One Place
My home binder filofax a5 (now pink classic) recap of tabs 1 & 2 + tabs 3 & 4 - Loving My Filofax
The Zen of Filofax - The Crazy Suburban Mom
The Flexi Filofax, hey! - Abimarvel
Hang on I will just check my diary! - The Bright Shillings of March
Filofax love - 24 beauty live
Filofax Product Guide 2012-2013 - Chaotic Perfectionist
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

And here's a couple of great videos to watch

Enjoy.

Free For All Friday No. 168

2012-02-03T00:02:00.006-05:00

It's our first FFAF in February! It's a Leap Year, what are you going to do with your extra day this year?

With the release this week of the new styles of Filofax binders coming out this year, there have been a lot of replies (including from myself) to the effect of: new binders are great and all, but what we really need are new inserts! I keep reading about people using other brands of inserts because Filofax ones don't fit their needs and/ or are increasingly hard to find.

So, let it all out: what inserts would you like to see Filofax come out with? What diary formats would work better for you, and what other types of inserts would you use in your daily life?

And of course as always on Fridays, feel free to discuss anything Filofax-related.

Have a great weekend everyone!

The New Range... my own point of view..

2012-02-02T13:00:00.001-05:00

OK so far I've reported on the new range, but I've not really commented on it from my own point of view...

New binders... good to see some brighter colours for those of you that are considering a new or replacement organiser this year. I'm happy for you lovers of purple that the Malden will also be available in this colour... I thought last years range was quite dull in terms of colour choices if you don't include the Apex...shhhhh

I'm might be tempted by the Malden Compact Zip... but that is about it for me out of the new ones.

However, inserts... this is the major issue for me... packaging like others have said doesn't bother me.. but reducing the range of inserts does concern me.

As yet we don't know what is going to stay and what is going to disappear.

Of course Filofax is a commercial company and they have to make a profit otherwise they can't pay the bills and they will sink without trace.

People have said and continue to say that the quality of Filofax inserts isn't as good as other companies inserts and Philofaxy have supplied you with plenty of information on what fits and what doesn't, or how to make it fit your Filofax.

If however they continue with the same range with the same quality then of course sales of these items will drop off as we drift off to other solutions... so it's a catch 22 situation in a way.

So if the new designs don't improve the paper quality and designs don't please, then I'm not sure what they will do.

If they really are going to discontinue the TM Week per View insert then that is a blow, I'm using it this year and I know at least three other readers that are as well. For me this layout in A5 isn't quite perfect, but it's not far off it.

So if it is not going to be available next year then 'we' have to do something about it. To that end I've started a discussion with Ray over at My Life All In One Place.

Ray has produced some excellent templates for Day Per Page and other calendars, and I'm sure the techniques he has used are adaptable to Week Per View or Week on a Page plus notes/tasks etc. If it is possible to create such a template file I'm tempted to do one that looks similar to the FF TM Week Per View format, and one which I will adapt for my own preference, but of course you would also be able to adapt the design to your liking too.

Now that's a lot of 'ifs' but I'm sure we can come up with something to replace this particular insert design and any others that disappear. These will of course be made available for you to download and print yourself. I can't see me going in to 'production' to print these off on a for sale basis!

As I've said in earlier posts you will be kept informed with any developments either from Filofax or with our own development of substitutes.

[Update] A comment thread has been started on the Filofax Facebook Page to ask them to continue the TM inserts: http://www.facebook.com/filofax/posts/10150573385353357?notif_t=feed_comment

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part Three

2012-02-02T00:00:00.003-05:00

So to finish off our round up of the new range for 2012 and to answer some of your questions from Parts 1 and 2.

There will be a revamp of insert packaging in 2012 and overhaul of insert design and range in 2013, and by this they mean a bit more bolder and colourful in the design, although I've not seen any examples yet... may be they should employ us on a consultancy basis!! I also hear that they are cutting the range of inserts which is bad news in some ways but we don't have any specifics about what is going to disappear.

There are some iPhone cases coming in with a Malden one on show at Paperworld this week. Pity I don't have an iPhone... may be if I buy the case that will be a good enough excuse! They are also developing a range of iPad cases as well although several of the prototypes disappeared from the stand!

The Luxe is going to be available in UK in Mini, Pocket, Compact and A5, no mention of Personal size which I thought was a little odd... prices ranging from £85 for the Mini to £150 for the A5 my contacts tell me that one of the unique thing about this model is that the ring mechanism is covered in leather, just the rings themselves stick out. It's available only in Blackcurrent...

There are some changes in colours of the Metropol range and the addition of the Compact size. This one is shown in Kingfisher Blue.

Later this year there will be some new Flex covers including some leather ones in Malden and Luxe type finishes in black and pink

Malden Zips in Ochre & Purple in Pocket and Personal Compact. Interiors much like the normal binders, but both have a full length gusseted pocket. Availability of this model appears to be an Europe only model, but I guess Neal Street will have it. I'm also assured that City Organiser will be able to get it as well.

Boston in very soft napp-like leather in black and pink with metal Filofax logo on bottom right hand corner.

With regards availability of the new models, (existing ones carry one obviously) in UK they will be phased in starting in March through to about July. Malden is pencilled in for a March launch..

As always if I get any more 'news' I will let you know.

Philofaxy London Meet Up - May 2012

2012-02-01T00:00:00.006-05:00

I'm pleased to be able to announce the date of the next Philofaxy London Meet Up.

Saturday 26th May 2012

The format of the day is going to be slightly different to previous London meet ups:

Meet up at Tate Modern at 12:00 noon
Lunch at Tate Modern Cafe 2
A short walk to City Organiser - who are opening just for our party

Andy Morse from City Organiser will also be joining us for lunch, he has over 25 years of experience in retailing Filofax products.

Now before you all get excited about booking tickets etc.... Places for this meet up will have to be confirmed. But I will not be accepting requests to join the meet up until March 16th, this is to avoid the situation where people reserve a place and then pull out at the last minute which then doesn't allow someone else the chance of a place at the meet up.

Hopefully by introducing this delay, you will be able to get the date cleared in your diary/planner and then when you request your place on or after the 16th March, you will know that you have a confirmed place and hopefully you will definitely be attending. Of course there might still be some form of family emergency or other on the day that might prevent your attendance I know.

I will send out a reminder closer to the 16th March for people to get their requests in after that date and which email address to send your requests to.

Once places have been assigned then I will send out full details about the arrangements for the day.

Looking forward to yet another great meet up in May.

Philofaxy Charity Donation - Thank You

2012-01-31T10:16:00.001-05:00

Hi Everyone

It is always nice to receive a thank you letter, especially in relation to Philofaxy.

In today's post was a nice letter from MacMillan the cancer charity thanking us for the £175 donation which was made using the commission earned in the last 6 months from all your purchases made through the links on Philofaxy to Filofax UK, WH Smiths and a few other UK retailers.

Thank you for your support with this donation. Look out for further fund raising activities later in the year.

Free For All Tuesday No. 52

2012-01-31T00:00:00.004-05:00

So here is our usual Tuesday point when you can ask any questions you need answering about your Filofax. Step forward and pop your questions in the comments and we will do our best collectively to answer your questions.

How I use: Week on Two Page

2012-01-30T00:00:00.000-05:00

With thanks to one of our readers for sending me this idea.

As we all know, we all benefit from picking up ideas from seeing and hearing how other people use their Filofax organisers in their daily lives.

You only need to look at our webstats to see the most popular posts tend to be ones describing in great detail the inner workings of their own individual Filofax, which might not contain fancy inserts or specially printed diaries, it's just their own way of using the standard off the shelf inserts.

So this week let's focus on people that use a 'Week on Two Page' diary insert or WO2P to all Philofaxers! We will cover other formats in later posts, so please be patient if you are a Day Per Page person or any of the other formats available.

So the Week on Two Page, a fairly standard diary insert... they are standard in most sizes, come with most new organisers, there are a few variations, some have appointment times, there are some slight variations, Sunday or Monday start. Some have reduced space for Saturdays and Sundays. Some available in cotton cream. Single language, multi language, non-English. So quite a variety in just this one format.

So if you are a WO2P person.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the WO2P do you use... etc etc.

Starting over

2012-01-29T19:33:00.000-05:00

Do you ever start completely over with a new Filofax?

Normally when I move over into a new binder, I transfer long-term inserts, information, addresses, and accessories so that I don't have to re-write things that are still current.

But this time when I start my new Aston Filofax, it will be entirely new inside. My plan is to start using it when we move away from Indonesia (which will hopefully be this summer sometime). It will be my all-new Filofax, a fresh start in planning and in life.

I want to make a clean break from this chapter in my life and move forward fresh and new. So I'll have a new diary insert, rewrite my info and address pages, get new maps and even a new sticky notes accessory rather than just transfer over my old ones.

Especially long-time Filofax users, do you always transfer still-current things over from your old Filofax to your new one? Or do you sometimes make a clean break and start completely over with your new Filofax?

Date for your Filofax - Sunday 5 Febuary 2012

2012-01-29T00:00:00.003-05:00


New York	London	Paris	Jakarta

We are going to run another conference round-table voice chat using Skype.

I'm sure we are gradually getting to know each other's voices, but I will make a point of going 'around the table' to get everyone to introduce themselves this time.

So...When, Where, What, Who and How?

When? - Sunday 5th February from 10am (US East Coast time), 3pm London time, 4 pm Paris time 9pm Jakarta etc. See the clocks at the top of this post to see roughly what time you should be on line.

Where? - an on-line chat using Skype.

What do I need? - just a micro-phone and some head phones(in ear phones work fine) and a free Skype account. Using headphones reduces 'echo' on the call.

Who - All of you... connect up with Philofaxy and we will attempt to get as many of us linked in to the audio conference as possible.

How -

Connect to Philofaxy by firstly searching for Philofaxy in Skype, I will then add you as a contact.
Then 'Start Chat', I will then add you in to the chat room.
Then if you request it, I can add you to the audio conference as well. But if you just want to chat via keyboard that's fine. That way it's slightly less hectic for me!

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part Two

2012-01-28T14:52:00.004-05:00

Following on from part one. Here are the rest of the significant new additions to the range.

The next new addition is the Pennybridge, now this has been available in other markets before (Germany, Denmark etc) It comes in Pocket, Compact and A5 all are zipped in 'leather look' in black and purple. They range in prices of £29, £35 and £49. The A5 comes with an iPad pocket...

The Breast Cancer Campaign organiser, still in pink is now also available in Personal size as well as pocket.

Moving on to the Finsbury, as usual they have phased out colours and added new ones. This year we gain Blue and Yellow. The Finsbury will also be available in Compact size as well as Mini, Pocket, Personal, A5, A4 although the colour availability varies a little depending on the size of the Finsbury.

The Holborn will no longer be available in Zip format, but will be available in Compact format...and in Wine colour.

The Filofax Classic will be available in two new colours Sage and Lilac in Pocket and Compact sizes

The Osterley becomes available in Orange, bright and different!

And finally... the Purple Malden...

That's it for today... I will try and pick up on some of the other changes later. Once again thanks to Nina for her detailed report from Paperworld 2012

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part One

2012-01-28T14:13:00.002-05:00

Special agent Nina has been at Frankfurt today going around Paperworld 2012. You can read her full report on her blog... but I thought I would share with you some pictures from her 'concealed camera'

So first up is the 'Petal' it will be in Pocket size only and will retail for about £15.

And those of you who will recall the discussions and posts we had about a Union Jack Filofax a few months ago, will be forgiven when you suggest that the idea has been taken and used by Filofax when you see this one... the 'Jack Vintage'.

It will be available in Pocket and Personal size for £17-20.

This next one is the Domino Mix again in Pocket and Personal sizes only it has textured exterior surface. It will sell for between £21 and 24.

The Swift is the replacement for the Songbird, and it is fabric covered and comes in Pocket and Personal sizes with a price of between £28 and £34

That's the news for today... more coming up tomorrow hopefully....

Web Finds - 28 January 2012

2012-01-28T00:00:00.009-05:00

Another busy week for me, but I still had time to dig out these posts for your enjoyment.

After Kodak, Can Old Brands Survive by Re-inventing Themselves? - More than just a logo << Philofaxy gets a link!
The Malden Sage continues - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
New Filos and plans for them - Bluebonnet reads
Filofax Friday - Siena Setup - Cupcakes and Cadenzas
A Clean Slate - The Zeitgeist of Zoe
Download a perpetual calendar page maker for your Filofax- My Life All in One Place
My funked up Domino - Rapunzel's World
Filofax for the Future - Penfountain Blog
Oh Cavendish - Bluebonnet Reads
Contemplating a new Filofax set up - Bluebonnet Reads
How to make dreams come true - Susannah Conway
Filofax partners with Alice Temperley to launch new collection during LFW - Diary Daily
Organise your projects - Day Timer Blog
The Postman didn't have to ring twice - Filofax Fixation
Filofax Monthly Planner - My Life All in One Place
Paper World 2012 - Chaotic Perfectionist
Filofax Do-over - Strickmuse
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy

Filofax UK - Free Delivery

2012-01-27T07:34:00.000-05:00

Filofax UK have announced Free Postage and Packing until the end of January. Click on the graphic below.

It's also the last week of their 50% off Sale. Grab them while you can....Pockets in Malden, Finchley and Deco's all at half price.

Free For All Friday - No. 167

2012-01-27T00:00:00.001-05:00

So what changes have you made to your set up that you are finding that are working well for you? One of my success stories is moving my Blog Calendar to A5 size, it's a Google Calendar Month to a Page format printed on to A5 paper and punched.

It works great, it's tucked in to the end of my planner section and I flip to it when I'm planing and dating future posts. It originally started life on A4 size sheets but I downsized it to A5 and it's still working well.

But as it's Friday feel free to discuss anything Filofax related.

Tickler Filofax

2012-01-26T03:26:00.000-05:00

Many of you are probably familiar with the idea of a Tickler File. This is a set of file folders, each labeled with a number 1-31, corresponding to the days of the month. Each day you look in that day's file to see if there are any papers you need that day. So if you have a concert to attend on the 15th, you put the tickets into the file labeled "15" so you know where to find them when you need them.

I, and other people I know, use a similar system in our Filofax diary pages. For example, last February we went to our friends' wedding. I wrote our hotel information, reservation numbers, address and phone number of the hotel, and directions to the hotel on a notes page. I put this notes page on my Filofax rings between the diary pages of the date we would be there to make it easier to find when I needed it, instead of buried behind a tab somewhere.

I have an expat friend who keeps her list of things to buy the next time she's home in the UK on her Filofax rings in the pages of her diary at the date she will be home. That way when she is in that time and place, literally, her list will be there.

Does anyone else use this method of putting reminders and information on the rings in your Filofax diary pages at the date you need it?

Musing for a Wednesday....

2012-01-25T00:00:00.041-05:00

To say I'm short of ideas today would be a little bit of an understatement... ok let me get the excuses out of the way. I've been busy with a few non-Philofaxy projects, some of them payment type projects some pro-bono ones, as usual, more of the later than the former... but that's life!

In terms of Filofax news we are in a little bit of a lull awaiting announcements which will start to appear in the public domain from about the end of the month and then hopefully through February. Filofax are at a trade show in Frankfurt next week, so most of their 2012 range will be on display there I would think.

You will have seen the 'Temperley Teaser' which I've seen reported else where as being priced £379 and £399, there are two sizes and two designs we do know that... and the 'inflated' price is mainly because it's a 'limited edition'

But it got me chuckling when I saw our popular posts list in the side bar. There was my post from last week on Filofax News, sat next to the other post about dividers... You won't be seeing old chocolate box dividers in your Temperley Special Filofax now will you!!! How much am I bid for these colourful chocolate boxes...

I don't wish to comment until I have seen an actual example of these organisers before I make a firm comment on 'are they worth it' However, I've received some 'material samples' for both of the models, and I think they will be quite stylish, but I'm not sure how robust in everyday use they will be. Time will tell.

I would also like to publicly thank you for being such good sports about the part 1 to last weeks News story, I was in stitches of laughter when I saw some of the comments and the barbs throw at me at the time for leaving you all hanging at the end of 'story'. I had given my brief outline to my dear wife Alison to enhance it a bit and suddenly the idea came in to my head of not saying anything about the news! Yes it was cruel... but funny when you think back... and yes I know I won't be able to pull that stunt for a while!

The other thing I'm trying to sort out at the moment is a date for the next meet up in London, this is just a case of finding time in my schedule sometime in the Spring. So look out for announcements soon I hope.

As usual any Guest Posts are welcome... please send them in to philofaxy at gmail dot com Our popular series of posts of Readers Under The Spotlight is also open for new interviewees, email us if you would like to go under the spotlight.

Free For All Tuesday No 51

2012-01-24T00:00:00.001-05:00

It is Tuesday, so fire away with any Filofax related questions you have... and hopefully there will be more answers than questions!

Poll: Business or Social?

2012-01-22T17:36:00.001-05:00

A simple question really... What is the primary use of your Filofax organiser Business or Social?

Please vote in the poll in the side bar.

New to Philofaxy?

2012-01-22T00:00:00.035-05:00

Welcome to Philofaxy.

If you are new to the site or you have been here for a while, this post is a way to show you around so you get the most from the site.

As you might have seen there is a lot of information on here and you might have problems remembering where everything is, so we hope to be able to help you out with how to find things to get the most out of the site.

So looking at the Home page you are on now, below the banner you will see: Home, About, FAQ etc

Home: Takes you back to the start page from where ever you are on the site, clicking on the banner does the same.

About: How to contact us at Philofaxy and some background on the contributors.

FAQ: This is a good place to look for the simple often asked questions. We try to up date it from time to time to reflect the current topical questions.

Files: This the home for all our downloadable template files which you are welcome to customise to your own needs or just print them off as they are.

Links: Links to lots of blogs and other Filofax related sites.

Suppliers: Looking for a Filofax or inserts or accessories, then this page is a good place to start.

Ad Spot: This is our readers advert page, you can place a wanted or for sale advert for your Filofax goods here free of charge. However, we do recommend donating to one of our favourite charities, but it's based on an honesty system, we don't check up on who has made donations and who hasn't. This page is great because you are buying from people that do understand the Filofax range unlike some Ebay sellers...

All Stars: The Philofaxy All Stars... a group of readers who have done guest posts on each others blogs not all Filofax related, but a great read anyway.

Flickr: An overview to the Philofaxy Flickr group where you can share pictures of your Filofax and there is a small discussion group there too.

Searching Philofaxy - With in excess of 1000 posts on Philofaxy spread over six years, finding exactly the information you want could be quite a task... however we do have some tools to help you:

Search - Pop a key word in to the search box in the sidebar and the search tool will find all of the posts with that keyword in it.
Labels - Further down the sidebar you will find the label cloud again this will find all the posts with those labels on the posts. We try to label all posts, although some of the earlier ones are unlabelled... another job still to be done!

Subscribing to Philofaxy

RSS - You can add Philofaxy to your favourite RSS reader such as Google Reader.
Email - If you want to receive each post by email, pop your email in to the subscribe by email box and follow the instructions. This service is provided by Feedburner. They will send you a verification email which you have to click a link in to confirm your email address in the usual way.

Philofaxy on the Web

Facebook - You will find our Facebook page here
Twitter - We are very active on Twitter as @philofaxy and our experimental newsfeed @philofaxynews
Flickr - As mentioned above there is a Flickr group for sharing your Filofax photos and ideas
Linking back to Philofaxy - If you would like to link back to Philofaxy from your website or blog we have a 'badge' with the exact code which you will find at the bottom of the side bar.

Regular Posts on Philofaxy

Free For All Tuesday - Questions and Answers on any Filofax related topic
Free For All Friday - General discussion, open house for anything Filofax related
Webfinds - Each weeks round up of other Filofax related posts on the web

Other Philofaxy Events

Skype Roundtable Voice and Text Chats - once a month we have a Skype voice conference, this is open to anybody to join in. It is an open agenda and we don't only get to talk about Filofax things. People taking part can be spread around the world, so it can be quite educational as well as good fun. Look out for announcements on the blog about when the next one will be. Generally they are the first Sunday of the month, but they can move slightly if this conflicts with public holidays or Steve's travel arrangements!
Meet Ups - We have held several very successful meet ups, they vary in size from as little as two or three people up to twelve people, these have been held in London, New York, France, Holland, with other ones planned for other countries around the world.
Although meeting 'people off the internet' can sometimes seem a little odd, we all have at least one interest in common and everyone I've met at all the different meet ups have been great people to sit and chat with.

That was a bit of a lightening tour around the site and some of our activities. Please do add a comment on to posts, we love to get feedback and we do read all the comments.

If there's something you haven't understood or there's a topic we haven't covered that is Filofax related please get in touch with us and we will do our best to respond to your email within a day or so.

Web Finds 21 January 2012

2012-01-21T00:00:00.011-05:00

So another week passes by, but still a great number of excellent posts for you to read and enjoy. I can't think of a suitable excuse today... so just grab a tea, a coffee, a wine or a beer, put your feet up and enjoy!

A Filofax that isn't an organiser! - Bagsey - Bags, can you ever have enough?
Compact Calendar - David Seah
2011 Archived - Well Planned Life
A Filofax Swing Pad you can make at home - My Life All in One Place
What's in your planner - The Crazy Suburban Mom
A Stationery Love Affair. Moleskine. Filofax - Oh Panda
Filofax Friday - Cupcakes and Cadenzas
On being a notebook polygamist - From down the well
Cheap hole reinforcements - This is My life
insert witty blog post title here - Filofax Fixation
Download a monthly planner for your Filofax - My Life All in One Place
Using my Filofax Flex - Planet Millie
What's in a name - Filomaniac
Pocket Filofax - We're gonna need a bigger boat
A diary system - colourliving
Random Filofax Musings - Filofax Fixation
Tickle Me, Filofax - The Crazy Suburban Mom
How is your 2012 organisation going? - Heather Holistics
Tweaks to the Filofax set up - Paper Pens Ink
Filofacsmile - Filofax Fixation
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy

Please note: Google have recently made a change to Blogger/Blogspot blogs. They have introduced a new type of comment set up.

You will recognise the new set up if you see 'Reply' below each comment. It's a nice idea... except if someone links to your post, like we do above, for some reason the link takes you straight to the comments and not the top of the post.

If your Blogger/Blogspot blog is behaving like this, go in to the Dashboard, then 'Settings', then click on comments 'Comments' and change 'Comment Form Placement' to 'Full Page' rather than 'Embedded below post' and then scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Save Settings.

That should cure the problem until Google fix the issue.

Free for All Friday No. 166

2012-01-20T00:01:00.003-05:00

Only connect...what does that mean? The prose and the passion...the future and the past...the sacred and profane?

I've always used my Filofax to schedule and prepare for the future, but I believe that most of a Filofax's value may lie in preserving and honoring the past.

Do you usually write things down before the fact or after?

What's on your mind (or Filofax) this Friday?

Dividers with a difference

2012-01-19T00:00:00.000-05:00

We have seen some very creative and beautiful section dividers from different blogs and websites in the past. I have to be honest I'm not that sort of creative person really, crafty but not in a craft sense!

So I've been looking around for some alternative things to make dividers out of, that would be different to the plain cream ones, that would make use of items that are no longer used.

One idea I saw on someone else's site was to use old road atlas pages cut to size then laminated to give them a bit more 'stiffness' I might try this with my French road atlas when I replace it soon. I would most probably pick the pages from our surrounding area which will mean the divider serves two purposes, and I like things like that.

So that was one idea. But at Christmas sitting around with the family I started to think there has to be other ideas that we can try... and there it was stirring at me....

A big stack of chocolate, 7 bars in fact, all neatly packed in their own individual boxes. So what do you do after you have eaten all that chocolate? Well you recycle the boxes.... but I had other ideas... Pull the box apart... trim it to size and punch it and you get this:

A perfect, functioning divider. and the folding bit on the right acts as a tab that can fold out of the way, it can be labelled, trimmed to a tab shape or left as it is. Oh and the chocolate was very nice apart from the milk chocolate with lime... I swapped it for some plain instead!

This week I also received in the post a lovely Vogue desk calendar from our friends at City Organiser. Each week is a different picture taken from the magazine. The picture and the calendar part are perforated, so as each week passes you tear off the picture and the calendar bit to reveal a new week.

Here are the first two weeks pictures, which you can send as postcards.

But instead of using them as postcards. I've punched them and they make great personal size dividers.

These are just some of my simple ideas, but once you start looking around your own home it is surprising what there is that you can reuse like this.

Philofaxy by Email...

2012-01-18T12:00:00.005-05:00

If you subscribe by email to Philofaxy, there were problems with the RSS feed early this morning. I ended up having to delete the feed and recreate it. Unfortnately this meant that all the subscriber details were deleted as well.

So please resubscribe to the feed using the box in the side bar. I've tested it out and it appears to be working again.

Filofax 2012 News... Chapter 2

2012-01-18T05:00:00.001-05:00

I laid the pages on my desk in front of me......

Is it safe to come out yet? Yes that was a cruel thing to do this morning wasn't it.....

OK let's get down to business... what will you see this year... not every single detail, but some of the 'headlines' that I'm sure you will be interested in...

So new to the range.... first off... Purple Malden in Mini, Pocket, Personal, A5... no need to read any further is there.... oh you want to know what else was in the envelope...

How about a Raspberry Finsbury in A4 size, should brighten up that end of the range. Some other new Finsbury colours such as yellow and blue in all the popular sizes.

Some brighter sounding colours for the Classic in Sage and Lilac. Osterley brown is replaced by orange.

This year is the year the Compact size expands in to more styles and colours, with compacts being made available at all price points in the range. Overall the new colours sound as if things are brighter and more colourful compared to the 2011 range.

Now we have heard about some of the outgoing colours and models, some quite short lived styles, the Chameleon will be made extinct this year. Also surprisingly the Slimline in Finsbury and Cuban will be going.. replaced by the new Compacts I suppose...

Also good bye Kendal, it has I suppose had a long run... Likewise a lot of the Zipped organisers are set to disappear from the range.

Maldens in Vintage Pink, Black and Grey are also due to bow out this year. Ochre lives on.

Short lived life for the Regency and Enigma.

As usual some Finsbury colours disappear to be replaced by others, like wise the Domino, and Apex...

There are some new models... but my 'insider' wasn't able to grab any digital pictures... so we will have to wait for details of that they look like... he muttered something about sending off his film to Kodak to get it processed.. so 1950's....

As usual as we get any Filofax news we will of course share it with you.....

Finally, I would like to thank my dear wife Alison for polishing up my basic story line and developing it in to that cliff hanging suspense thriller you had to enjoy/endure this morning... but I will take the credit/blame for the way it finished... by not telling you anything!

Thank you for being such great sports...

Oh just one more thing.....

Filofax 2012 News

2012-01-18T00:00:00.035-05:00

A side-street cafe, dusk falling rapidly. A man approached my table. His wide-brimmed felt hat was pulled down hiding his face, his dark trench-coat cinched into his waist. He turned his head left and quickly right, as if fearing somebody, or something, was following him. He hesitated, but with one more glance backwards, slid into the seat opposite me.

'Mr Philofaxy?'

'Yes.'

'I have something for you,' he whispered.

He reached inside his coat and produced a large plain brown envelope. He glanced down at it. His hand was suspended in the air, as if reluctant to take the next step. He placed it on the table, his hand still on the envelope. The tendons on the back of his arched hand cast little shadow valleys in the subdued light. With a jerky movement, he thrust the envelope across the table.

'This envelope contains information vital to the well-being of your community. I cannot over-emphasise how important it is. But you must be careful.'

I pulled the flap open and inserted my fingers into the envelope.

'No!' he hissed at me. 'You can't read it here. You never know who's watching this cafe.' His eyes darted around and settled back to me. 'Take it home to read. But shut the curtains and bolt your door.'

I looked at him, trying to guess at what was behind his dramatic manner. What could be such a secret that it made him so frightened?

Almost to reassure him, I smiled and replied with a simple 'I understand.'

He touched the brim of his hat, looked around once more, stood up and made for the door. I followed him to the entrance, but when I looked up and down the street lit by dull orange lights, I could see nothing.

I looked at the envelope. It could only contain a few sheets of paper. I folded it and thrust it into my pocket. I finished the last of my coffee, dropped some coins in the saucer and got to my feet. I tried to act unconcerned, even throwing a quick smile at the waitress, but my hand trembled. Once out of the door, I hurried around the corner where I'd parked my car in the shadow of a warehouse. As I stood in front of the corrugated steel door, I wanted to rip the envelope open. I looked up and down. The street was deserted. But I remembered what my contact had said. After the risk he'd taken, I had to tamp down my curiosity. If I gave in now, somebody could so easily come along and snatch it out of my hand.

I only drove through one red light. My mind was so full of thoughts chasing each other that I didn't see it. The tyres screeched in protest as I braked hard on my driveway. I ran across the gravel, fumbling with my front door key, dropped it, but managed to open the lock at the second attempt. I slid my coat off and left it lying in a heap in the hallway. In my office, I locked the door, threw myself into the chair and opened the envelope.

I read the pages inside wide eyed..... the details of the new 2012 Filofax range......

Free For All Tuesday No. 50

2012-01-17T00:00:00.003-05:00

So what questions do you have for us this week?

And for our new readers... Firstly Welcome.. and feel at home and feel free to ask any Filofax questions, this is a regular feature every Tuesday.

Fire away.

Poll results: How many weeks of diary pages do you keep in your Filofax?

2012-01-16T20:12:00.000-05:00

Thanks to everyone who participated in this poll! Here are the results:

How many weeks of diary pages do you keep in your Filofax? (252 total votes):

Less than 1 month 11 (4%)

1-3 months 45 (17%)

4-6 months 41 (16%)

7-12 months 130 (51%)

More than 12 months 25 (9%)

I was really surprised that so many people keep 7-12 months' worth of diary pages in their Filofax at one time!

Phone Directory

2012-01-16T00:00:00.000-05:00

So what do you do when the new telephone directory turns up on your door step or in your mail box?

Most people I expect grab the old one and put it in the recycling..... you do recycle don't you??

Anyway, during my meet up with Nikki last month here in France, she showed me some things she had in her A5 Filofax that had come straight out of the old phone directory.

When I looked at our recently replaced phone directory there was a great map in the back cover of the area which I will salvage. Some of the introduction pages include information from local government agencies, lists of useful phone numbers etc.

Now some of this information was printed on the very thin paper used for phone directories, but I will copy Nikki's idea of laminating those pages with a laminating machine and then punching them to fit my Filofax, this will make sure the pages don't tear when the pages are turned.

UK vs French paper catalogues

2012-01-15T00:00:00.000-05:00

I realise that the paper catalogues have been out for several months now. But it was only last month during the meet up in Poitiers that I managed to pick up a French edition of the 2011/12 catalogue.

At first I thought they would be the same, just in French, but no they have some slightly different products, which we more or less know from looking on the website. However, in the catalogue although they have used the same photos etc they have ordered them differently. In some cases different colours are available compared to UK, but again this is obvious from the website. The other oddity was that the French catalogue doesn't include prices on the pages, were as the UK one does.

I think the few extra pages in the UK catalogue (78 pages vs 72 pages) can be accounted for by differences in stock that is available in both countries.

In terms of organisers. The UK has the 2012 Olympic range, France still have the Sketch, which I think was discontinued in UK recently. France also has the Luxe and the Dakota. Overall UK carries 5 more designs than France. Although in website terms I suspect there is more of a difference, the Deco doesn't appear in either catalogue! So it must be on it's last year I would think.

Reading both catalogues side by side can be a bit mind boggling! It makes you wonder what we are likely to see next year.

Although the Flex isn't mentioned in the paper catalogue. Looking on the Filofax French website, for 2012 they have introduced a slightly different format Week on Two Page diary insert for the Flex, with appointment times and horizontal lining.! So we are also going to be faced with differences in those product ranges as well as normal Filofax products...

I think I need a rest!

Web Finds 14 January 2012

2012-01-14T00:00:00.026-05:00

Well another week has zipped by. I've been submerged with my head deep in another unpaid project for another organisation all day, so it's been great to finally finish that one and emerge to do some things on Philofaxy that I love and enjoy doing.

So what have we discovered this week. Lots of 2012 set up posts still coming through naturally.

My home binder a5 pink finsbury filofax (think flylady) tabs 1-2 - Loving My Filofax
Bargain Filofax Post-It tabs and a hack to go with them - My Life All in One Place
Another Filofax cover! - Hooked
Filofaxes, clutter and no wonder my cortisol level was through the roof - The Crazy Suburban Mom
Double Memories - Write a novel? I must be mad!!!
Finchley Filofax - The Young Grasshopper
Paper Pens and Ink is one today - Paper Pens and Ink (Happy Birthday!)
Pretty Filofax Dividers - Fantail Designs
My 2012 Filo system finalized! (For sure this time) - The Crazy Life of J
Filo pages anomalies - Filofax Fixation
Filofax Template - Lancashire Cat
My 2012 Set up - Whimsicality
Make your own notebook paper and inserts - This is My Life!
Getting Philofaxy about the Filofax from France - This French Life
2012 Set Up - Well Planned Life
London 2012 Sporting Icons - Filomaniac
My Filofax Family Portrait - Rapunzel's World
The colour purple.... and Mulberry - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
Organise Daily Repeat Tasks - Daytimer Blog
Filofax Love/Getting Organised Part 1 - Love Me and My Ego
Filofax 2011 Set Up - Within Dreams We Live
A new resolution in organisation - Never Plain Jane
Introducing Dinky the personal Deco - Rapunzel's World
Printing fold out page for Filofax Personal - My Life All in One Place
The Vintage Pink Malden Debate - Rapunzel's World
Filofax Dividers - Time2Craft
My Filofax - Sunshine Stamping
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy

Free For All Friday No. 165

2012-01-13T00:07:00.013-05:00

Happy Friday the 13th! I was born on a Friday the 13th so I don't think of them as unlucky, but if you are superstitious, watch out today!

Now that we are a couple of weeks into the year, and you're back to your usual schedule, how is your Filofax setup working for you? Swimmingly? In need of a few tweaks? Total overhaul? Going back to what you used before?

And as always on Fridays, please feel free to discuss anything Filofax-related.

Have a great weekend everyone!

A Journey Back In Time - Part 2

2012-01-12T00:00:00.004-05:00

So after yesterday's first half of our journey back in time, we continue today with the second half of our journey.

Thank you for all your feed back on yesterday's post, I'm not sure if we have come to a definitive conclusion yet on the date of the catalogue, but for the point of discussion I will use '1937'.

So consider this for a moment, irrespective of the date of the catalogue. Compare the price of an organiser with the price of a punch. The punch is just about the most expensive thing in the catalogue at £2, yet a leather organiser is £1/7/6 or £1.375 for 1 inch rings. Now in today's money the punch from Filofax will cost you £27.75 which would make the organiser in today's money about £19.08

Even my Winchester back in 1985 cost more than £19.00, remember the organisers where sold empty during the period of the catalogue and during the 1980's.

So what has changed... The cost of making a punch back in '1937' must have been considerably higher than today, I suspect the parts although made on a machine where made by a skilled metal worker and assembled by hand. These days and looking at the way the Filofax punch is now made the parts are most probably made using automated machinery. So that might account for some of the changes in price.... there is of course that horrible word 'profit' I suspect the profit margins on today's organisers are higher than they were back in say '1937'

The catalogues in the 1980's were not that different to this one, higher prices of course! But they also listed all the forms and inserts, quite baffling some of them. I will cross check the list against the ones shown in 'Filofax Facts' although that book was published in 1988, it will be interesting to see the differences. But there has definitely been quite a decline in the number of different inserts available.

If more information comes to light about the history and date of the catalogue I will be sure to let you know.

Filofax France and Italy 50% off sale

2012-01-11T14:45:00.004-05:00

I hate to start an enabling frenzy, but Filofax France is having a 50% off sale. Don't say I didn't warn ya:

Click here to go to the sale items

And Filofax Italy as well
Click here to go to the sale items

A Journey Back In Time - Part 1

2012-01-11T00:00:00.010-05:00

So today I would like you to join me in a journey back in time, to a time a long, long time ago, before I was born and maybe before some of your parents were born even. Gosh, that is a long time ago!

But before we can go on this journey together back through time, we need to understand how money worked in UK before 1971. After 1971, UK money was decimalised so now we have 100 pence make one £1. Before 1971 UK used pounds shillings and pence. There was 240 pennies in each pound but more commonly it was thought of as twelve pennies equals one shilling, twenty shillings equals one pound. So when we go back in time together and you see £.s.d., it stands for pounds shillings and pence

How amounts were written in the past is also different. So if you see 20/- that means 20 shillings, which equals £1 (one pound) 1/6 is one shilling and six pence or 7.5 new pence (£0.075).

As a young 12 year-old the changeover to decimal coinage was quite a change. You can read more about it here. But in actual fact, as you will all know, the decimal system is a lot easier to use as long as you forget about the pre-decimal system and stop converting back in to it.

So how are we going to travel in to the past, Steve? And what has all this got to do with Filofax... Have you been drinking too much of that French wine again.... ???..... Just stand by, I'm getting there. OK? But I needed to prepare you all for this shock... I could have just taken you back in time and said, 'Right here we are' and you wouldn't have known when we were!

Now, to get back in time we aren't going to need a time machine made from a modified DeLorean DMC-12, the vehicle's time displacement being powered by plutonium, which supplies 1.21 gigawatts of energy to a device they call the "flux capacitor". No, we can do it with a simple desk top document scanner!

So now I need to introduce you to my able assistant... Mrs M or 'The Hand of Philofaxy' to some people, without whose help we wouldn't be on this journey back in time. You see, Mrs M was sorting through an archive box of hers the other day and in it she discovered something that I last saw in the late 1980's - a catalogue for Filofax dating back some considerable time. I thought this had been lost completely so I was very pleased to see it again. How old the catalogue is we aren't quite sure.

So what you are about to see are scanned in images for the pages from the catalogue. Just click on the pictures to see a larger version of each one.

Be sure to come back tomorrow to see Part 2 of this journey back in time!

Free For All Tuesday No. 49

2012-01-10T00:01:00.000-05:00

With the posts about punches and hole spacings in the last week or so I suspect you are either more puzzled or now up to date on that topic for a while! But what ever your Filofax question is, this is the best place to ask it...

Fire away.

New poll: how many weeks of diary pages do you keep in your Filofax?

2012-01-09T07:53:00.000-05:00

Please vote in the new poll at the left!

Seems to me that most people keep only a few weeks or months of diary pages in their Filofax, and rotate out used pages regularly. Especially people who use daily pages need to keep their binder at a reasonable thickness and can't keep too many weeks in there, especially if they have a lot of other pages and tabs.

Whenever I use a Filofax as my diary/ planner, I like to have as many months in as possible, usually 4-6 months past and at least 6 months future. One of the things I've always liked about using a Filofax as a planner is this ability to constantly see back and forward no matter what time of the year it is.

So what about you? Do you keep only the immediate future diary pages in your Filofax? Or like me do you like to have many months' worth of planning pages in at once?

Please vote to tell us how many weeks of your main diary pages (weekly or daily) you like to have in your Filofax at a time!

The Great Organiser Hole Spacing Conspiracy

2012-01-09T00:00:00.106-05:00

A dramatic title to this post I know... but when you read on you will begin to wonder!

The focus of this post will of course be Filofax organisers and what hole spacing they use. As well as hole spacing I will include notes on paper size, so you will at least have the information for Filofax if you come across another brand of insert and you can ask them the right questions with regards to size and hole spacing.

Before we get in to this too deeply, here is an explanation of what I mean by 'hole spacing' and a picture might save a few words!

This is the dimensions for a European 'Two Ring' binder, in this case the hole spacing is 80mm the drawing also shows the tolerance of ±0.5 mm on that dimension allowed for in the ISO standard for hole punches.... yes such a thing exists!

Filofax Mini

The Mini size uses 5 rings each spaced by 19mm or ¾ inch. The paper size is 67 mm x 105 mm.

Filofax Pocket

The Pocket size uses 6 rings each each spaced by 19mm or ¾ inch. The paper size is 81mm x 120 mm. A number of other brands use this size and spacing.

Filofax Personal

Filofax Personal size is a very common size, it uses 6 rings split in to two groups of 3 rings. The two groups are spaced by 50 mm or 2 inches with the three rings having the common 19 mm or ¾ inch spacing between them. The paper size is 95mm by 171 mm.

Whilst the hole spacing is a common feature of other brands, be aware that some brands use paper wider than 95mm, this can cause problems especially in the compact and slimline Filofax organisers, which with their smaller ring sizes have narrower covers. Try before you buy... is the best advice... or if you are buying on line, establish the exact size of the paper or the tabs and make a mock up of your chosen size.

Filofax A5
Filofax A5 uses paper that is 148 mm by 210 mm, exactly the size of European ISO standard A5 paper. However the company chose for what ever reason to use 6 rings, again like the personal size split in to two groups of three rings. The two groups are spaced by 70 mm or 2¾ inch with the three rings having the common 19 mm or ¾ inch spacing between them.

Now looking at other brands, it all gets very different to Filofax, so much so that re-punching some of these other sizes can turn your diary insert in to something resembling a Swiss cheese.

Quo Vadis Timer 21 is A5 paper size with six holes, but they use the same hole spacing as Filofax Personal size! Yes it took me a while to realise that! So QV Timer 21 pages need to be re-punched but the Filofax holes fall neatly between the original QV holes.

Time Manager International TMI like Quo Vadis use Filofax Personal hole spacing in their A5 products, but only 4 rings not six, they miss out the middle ring of each 3 ring group. So they have 38mm and 50mm spacing Again re-punching their inserts results in having 12 evenly spaced holes.

Franklin Covey and Day Timer in the USA use a page size of 140mm x 216 mm (5.5 x 8.5 inches) which is close to A5 in size (slightly narrower, but slightly taller), but the hole spacing is very different to Filofax. Firstly they use a 7 ring binder, but ignore the middle ring! If you then think of their insert as being 6 holes split into two groups of three. The two groups are spaced by 38mm or 1.5 inches with the three rings being space by 1 inch (25mm)

Punching one of these to fit a Filofax A5 will result in pages that look something like this:

As you might be able to see, the top and bottom holes of the row of 7 holes are very close to the top and bottom holes of A5 Filofax, in fact when punched those holes become oval in shape.

Mulberry for reasons best known to them, use A5 paper, but their 6 rings are spaced in to two groups of 3 rings. The two groups are spaced by 45 mm or 1¾ inch with the three rings having the common 12 mm or ½ inch spacing between them. As we have previously mentioned Mulberry sizes on all of their binders are different to Filofax, a previous Philofaxy post gives all of the details for this brand.

Filofax A4
As previously discussed the A4 size is 297 mm by 210 mm a standard European ISO paper size, the four holes are each spaced by 80 mm, again which is an extension to the ISO standard spacing (ISO 838) Nearly all binders in Europe that use A4 paper use this four hole spacing so finding alternatives shouldn't be an issue.

In the USA, Day Timer sell a 'Folio' size which is 216mm x 280mm (11 inches by 8.5 inches) which is a fraction wider than A4 but shorter. This also uses 7 rings, again if you ignore the middle hole. You then get two groups of three rings. The two groups are spaced by 5.5 inches with each ring spaced by 1 inch. None of these 7 holes aligns with the Filofax 4 holes.

Putting all of the hole spacings together in to one detailed picture I came across this graphic below. US 7 rings is the Day Timer/Franklin Covey 'standard'

I hope things are a little clearer now... if not... please ask questions in the comments and I will try and respond.

Filofax Future Products

2012-01-08T00:00:00.018-05:00

We have often shared our thoughts on what we would like to see in the the Filofax product range in the past. Filofax will soon be announcing their 2012 range, although I have no idea yet what will be in that range, we have had a few clues as to what won't be in the range.

But what would you like to see in 2013 and beyond?

Personally I wouldn't concentrate my suggestions on organisers too much, apart from may be some colour suggestions, and may be some additional ring size requests (A true A5 slimline.... and may be a 30mm Personal Malden).

My requests would mainly be on inserts, better quality paper, better availability of diary inserts from abroad, or some new designs of diary inserts, may be a some more specialist inserts that are aimed at GTD.

So what are your suggestions?

Drop them in to the comments in to this post, or if you want email them to philofaxy[at]gmail[dot]com or if you are on the Skype chat today, I will take your suggestions verbally and I will compile our 'wish list' and make sure it gets to Filofax UK, I can't say how much notice they will take of our suggestions... but if we don't try then we will never find out.

Web Finds 7 January 2012

2012-01-07T00:00:00.046-05:00

So here are some I found this week in between finishing off the mince pies and Christmas Cake and taking down the Christmas Tree.

My 2012 set-up - Paper Pens Ink
2012 Filofax Set up - Shazza's Blog
Filofax perfect pens! - This is My life
2012 Overkill - Filofax Fixation
2012 looking forward to - Paper Lovestory
Introducing the Filofax - Lancashire Cat
Reflect and look back - A Daisy Chain Dream
My December Malden set up with Day-timer diary - Rapunzel's World
The Filofax personal Domino review - Rapunzel's World
Filo Dashboard...and ink and stickies - Filofax fixation
Happy New Year and Share your Filofax memories- Daximillian - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
My Filofax keeping me organised - Vintage Giraffe
Return of the Filofax shopping list - My Life All in One Place Philofaxy version here
Rolled over to 2012 - Filofax Fixation
Download your free page-per-day 2012 A4 or A5 Filofax diary - My Life All in One Place
Filofaxes and Pens, you can point and laugh if you want... The Crazy Suburban Mom
The Filofax Personal Deco in Ebony - Rapunzel's World
2012 Set up and new dividers - Blue Bonnet Reads
Filofax pt 2 - Lancashire Cat
Domino Love - LJ's Blog of Stuff
Filofax for 2012 - Re-Psych
My Planning System - Paper Pens Ink
Share your Filofax memories - Han - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
End of Year Stock Check 2011 done... - LJ's Blog of Stuff
Little sisters Filofax hello kitty dividers - Loving My Filofax
Filofax Friday: New Year New Start - Typecast
Filofax Friday - The Start of a New Year - Cupcakes and Cadenzas
2012 Filofax Setup - Life...considered, planned, organised
Your blog post could appear here next week... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Also:

Yearbooks
Philofaxy posts in electronic book format for you to download, print out, put on your portable device and carry around or on your eReader for late night reading. Just send the pdf files to your Kindle email address and you will always have something to read!

2011 PDF Format

2011 Q1 7.2 MB
2011 Q2 6.6 MB
2011 Q3 8.6 MB
2011 Q4 7.7 MB

ePub Format

2011 Q1 4.9 MB
2011 Q2 4.5 MB
2011 Q3 6.6 MB
2011 Q4 5.8 MB

As you can see some of the files are still quite big, so please be patient downloading them. All previous years are also available in the Files area.

Enjoy

Free For All Friday No 164

2012-01-06T00:00:00.011-05:00

So the end of the first week of 2012, I hope you have recovered from the holidays and festivities.. Taking down the decorations and the tree tonight this being '12th night' So that is Christmas done for another year..... But it's the start of another exciting Philofaxy year.

Have you made any changes to your Filofax set up this year? Tell us about it or volunteer to write a guest post for us....

But as this is Friday please feel free to discuss anything Filofax related.

A5 Flex Diary > A5 Filofax

2012-01-05T00:00:00.012-05:00

Could a Flex A5 Diary be adapted to fit an A5 Filofax?

I have seen this idea mentioned a couple of times in the comments on previous diary posts. So I thought I would give it a try.

I have a Flex A5 July 2011-July 2012 diary from when I did the review earlier this year. The nice thing about the Flex diaries is that they use cotton cream paper, which of course isn't available in Filofax A5 size.

A Flex of course is a bound book so getting this in to a Filofax was I going to be brutal/destructive with no way back....if you are in any way squeamish you had better look away now....

So first of all I had to take the Flex Diary taken apart.

First of all I removed the cover, by using a craft knife at the join between the cover and the contents.

As you can see the book nature of the Flex is retained even though the cover has partially been removed.

It then splits down in to five 'booklets' which are stitched, but the threads are easy to pull out and then the pages are then in loose leaf form.

Measuring the pages they are exactly A5 size (210 x 148 mm) so there's not additional margin in the middle. I then used my trimmer to cut the A4 pages in to two to form the A5 pages.

Punching the pages with an A5 punch you can see in the above scan that the punched holes do go through some of the content on some of the pages such as this year planner. Although this isn't too bad I suppose.

On diary pages the punched holes don't cause any problems, so if you only wanted the diary pages from the Flex in the A5 Filofax then this would work fine.

If you are going to carry out similar surgery on a Flex diary can I please ask that you do it carefully, sharp craft knives are dangerous things in in-experienced hands, and don't leave them around where children can get to them.

Cuban Zip Review

2012-01-04T00:00:00.010-05:00

Firstly, thank you to Filofax UK for supplying me with the Cuban Zip for review.

The zipped range of organisers from Filofax are not high in numbers. In a recent post I asked for peoples thoughts on zip or clasp closures. As you will see from the comments some people like the extra security that a zip organiser gives them whilst others prefer the 'speed' of being able to open and access their information.

The point of this review is to look at the Cuban Zip in detail and pick out the differences and the features contained in this particular model/design.

The Cuban Zip is of all leather construction, although the many pockets are lined with a textile material. The leather is smooth Italian leather and the one in the pictures is the saddle brown model with cream stitching. It is also available in chilli red.

The personal size Cuban Zip is slightly bigger in overall size compared to say a Malden Personal. It's also thicker, but it does have 30mm (internal diameter) rings rather than the 23mm rings in the Malden.

On the outside front there is a vertical pocket, this has a small flush magnetic closure on it. This pocket would be useful for tickets and papers you need speedy access to whilst travelling. It would save you those vital seconds to unzip the organiser. I'm surprised other organisers don't have this feature.

Opening the organiser after unzipping it on all three sides. My first thoughts where how small the pages looked inside the organiser! A combination of the slightly larger size and of course the large rings I suppose.

One of the first things you will want to know is 'Does it lay flat?' No not out of the box is doesn't. But I know with time and a little 'training' and some leather treatment it will improve, although I might need to borrow some dumb bells if I am going to follow Terri's example!

The inside left hand cover has seven credit card slots, although using the very top slot is a little fiddly next to the zip... not that I have that many anyway. There is also a business card slot at the bottom of the inside front. There are two individual lined vertical slot pockets and also a deep vertical zipped pocket.

On the inside right hand cover there is another vertical pocket, this will hold a personal size notepad if you require it.

There are two pen loops, one each side on the inside of the zip, so you shouldn't lose your pens. Both pen loops are leather with a short elasticated section included in them. These hold most pens I've tried nice and snugly.

The larger size rings certainly gives you more capacity. As a comparison I removed the standard page fill supplied with the Cuban and then replaced it with the pages I currently have in my Malden. The Malden I would say is about at capacity in terms of being comfortable to be able to turn the pages and to be able to close it easily. Although I have seen pictures of people with a lot more pages than I have in similar personal size Maldens!! But the Cuban just swallowed the contents of my Malden as if it was just a snack and it laughed back at me 'So where is the rest then? Plenty of room in here!'

I have tried my two diary insert set up in the Cuban and it fits easily. In the Malden this same set up is a bit of a squeeze and I have to be selective as to what pages I include. Oh for a Malden Personal with 30mm rings!

Another advantage possibly to using the Cuban I discovered is because the organiser is wider than the clasp closing type it has the extra space required to be able to use Franklin Covey Tabbed pages without them sticking out the edge of the organiser.

To be honest I'm still undecided on my preference if I had to decide between the Malden or the Cuban Zip, both have their advantages and disadvantages for me. I will alternate between both to try them for more than just a few days, to see if there is one that I like more than the other.

Other zipped organiser posts:

Migrating to the Cuban Zip - Filofax Fixation
Never ask a lady her weight - Filofax Fixation
Filofax Cuban Zip Personal - The Life of the Perpetual Student
My Filofax My Love - Rori Rants

Once again thank you to the people at Filofax for supplying me with this review sample.

Free For All Tuesday No 48

2012-01-03T00:00:00.009-05:00

So today or yesterday was the first day back at work for most people. But let us help you answer any Filofax questions you might have.

Fire away with your Filofax questions.

Reader Question - Which Punch?

2012-01-02T00:00:00.035-05:00

Over Christmas I had a couple of emails from folks asking me about paper punches 'Which is the best punch to buy?'

Now if you own more than one size of Filofax... and frankly who doesn't...<cough> ! Then buying individual punches for each size from Filofax works out quite expensive. Filofax Germany do sell a 'Multi-fit' punch, but it is also quite expensive at just under €70 plus shipping. The multi fit does Mini, Pocket, Personal and A5

As I've said before I do not recommend the Filofax plastic portable 6 hole punch sold by Filofax, they only punch a single sheet at a time and after using one for a few months the holes in the paper aren't that clean a cut. You would be better off putting the money towards a proper metal paper punch.

So here are a selection of alternatives with links and references to reviews for different sizes.

So if you have a Mini, Pocket or Personal size Filofax I recommend the Rapseco Diary Punch 66P which I reviewed back August 2009. It is still available from Amazon and I know lots of people have bought this punch. It has moving punch blocks that allows you to set it for Personal and Pocket size and it also works for Mini size too. I have one I bought myself and I use it quite frequently for punching pages I've printed off myself.

For A5 punches there is the Filofax A5 punch. This only punches A5 size. This one is available through Amazon slightly cheaper than Filofax, although shipping might alter the total price.

There is also an A5 adjustable punch available from Amazon made by Rexel. This comes with 4 punch dies but it can be fitted with 6, and then it would punch A4, A5, Personal, Pocket and Mini sizes, but you would have to adjust the hole spacing on the punch to match the size you were punching for. One other advantage of this particular punch is if you are using a Quo Vadis, Franklin Covey, Day Timer, Mulberry organiser you would be able to set the hole spacing to match those of the organiser as these are all different to Filofax A5 size.

KW Trio-9170 6 hole adjustable punch this punch will do A5, Personal and Pocket sizes Also available here, this punch is very reasonably priced for it's specification. However, the cost of shipping it outside of Holland can increase the price considerably. Try to source it locally if you can.

If you have an A4 Filofax, then any standard 4 hole punch will suit, I picked one up at my local supermarket for under €15, they come in quite a range of prices according to how many sheets you want to punch at the same time. I just bought a standard desk top one that punch up to 15 sheets at a time. More than adequate for most peoples needs.

If you have any other 'punch' questions, please pop them in to the comments and I will do my best to answer them.

And if you have a 'reader question' then please email us at philofaxy at gmail dot com we are always happy to answer them directly or via a post like this.

Date for your Filofax - 8 January 2012

2012-01-01T09:30:00.000-05:00


New York	London	Paris	Jakarta

We are going to run another conference round-table voice chat using Skype.

I'm sure we are gradually getting to know each other's voices, but I will make a point of going 'around the table' to get everyone to introduce themselves this time.

So...When, Where, What, Who and How?

When? - Sunday 8th January from 10am (US East Coast time), 3pm London time, 4 pm Paris time 9pm Jakarta etc. See the clocks at the top of this post to see roughly what time you should be on line.

Where? - an on-line chat using Skype.

What do I need? - just a micro-phone and some head phones(in ear phones work fine) and a free Skype account. Using headphones reduces 'echo' on the call.

Who - All of you... connect up with Philofaxy and we will attempt to get as many of us linked in to the audio conference as possible.

How -

Connect to Philofaxy by firstly searching for Philofaxy in Skype, I will then add you as a contact.
Then 'Start Chat', I will then add you in to the chat room.
Then if you request it, I can add you to the audio conference as well. But if you just want to chat via keyboard that's fine. That way it's slightly less hectic for me!

2011 Some Numbers and Popular Posts

2012-01-01T00:00:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year to all our readers.

Philofaxy is brought to you by.....

Nan

Laurie

Steve

2011 was a very successful year on a number of fronts for Philofaxy

7 years... Philofaxy is in to it's seventh year, which I suppose is a long time in the life of a blog
10 Philofaxy meet ups in different parts of the world in 2011, after the first one in 2010, 2011 became the year of the Meet-up, let's look forward to more in 2012
£500 the total of our charity donations, raised through your donations and earned through the commission earned from sales through the site
530 the number of posts in 2011 on Philofaxy, err yes we got a little carried away!
1450 the number of pages in the Philofaxy year books of 2011, the latest quarter is now available for download
273,500 visits to Philofaxy in 2011, it was 112,000 in 2010
793,500 page views on Philofaxy in 2011, it was 280,000 in 2010

The Top 10 Posts of 2011 (based on page views in 2011)

Filofax Templates - This post dates back to 2009, but it gets the most visits each month! I occasionally up date it with the full list of or growing list of templates we now have available. Most visitors to the post come direct from Google searching for 'Filofax Templates' 100% match I guess.
Guest Post Task and Time Management with Filofax - Jotje - This has also proved to be a long standing favourite, this is the set up of Jotje's personal Malden, great post, I learnt a lot from this post, not only the content, but also how popular posts like this are.
Filofax Buyers Guide - I created this over the Christmas/New Year holiday in 2010.
Alternative refills for your Filofax - My discovery of QV Timer inserts lead to a lot of other similar posts this year including the almost never ending series of posts on diaries for 2012
Diary Inserts for 2012 Part 1 - I thought I was never going to get to the end of this series of posts, the more I looked on the web, the more I found! But I hope you have a better idea now of what is available out there.
A Pocket Full of Life - Jotje The follow up to Jotje's earlier post this time she tackled the Pocket size and again it proved to be very popular.
Time Management with Filofax Diary - A popular topic on Philofaxy, I predict that David's recent guest post on this topic will be up here next year, it's just outside of the Top 10 at the moment...already!
Printing your own Filofax Personal Pages With thanks to 'Nellie' for this one, I've since been expanding the number of Personal size pages available and printing them off successfully.
Filofax Flex Review - Quite a memorable series of posts for me as most of them were written whilst I was in a hotel in UK, the package arrived the morning I was departing for UK.
Filofax Germany The list wouldn't be complete without this post... when the €9 sale was announced, the whole Twitterverse went crazy! OK Filofax UK where is our £9 sale... hint! Thank you to Iris of Filomaniac for the tip off!

Wishing you all a happy and healthy 2012

January Sales

2011-12-31T17:37:00.000-05:00

The sales have started at City Organiser:

Terms & Conditions:
This SALE ends on Monday January 16th, 2012 both online and in our shop.

The online code is newyear (all one word and all in lowercase)..

All our SALE prices are matched in our shop at 40 Bow Lane, London, EC4M 9DT - if you'd like to use the extra discount code in the shop then please tell us at the counter before you make your purchase.

If you'd like to speak to us then please call 0207 236 4166 - Monday to Friday, 0900 to 1800

City Organiser, 40 Bow Lane, London, EC4M 9DT, UK | sales@cityorg.co.uk

Web Finds 31 December 2011

2011-12-31T00:00:00.014-05:00

The final web finds of 2011. What a year it's been. Thank you for all the blog posts you have posted and we have found... I hope we have brought you more readers to your blogs and you are building your readership and following. Let us look forward to some more great posts in 2012.

So here are some I found this week in between eating mince pies, Christmas cake and far too much chocolate....

2011 'can't live withouts' - Paper Love Story
Share your Filofax memories - Sandra - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
It's a dream, but a lovely one! My hypothetical stationary shop! - The Life of The Perpetual Student
Print your own media wish list - My Life All in One Place
Renovating the Cavendish - Paper Pens Ink
Top 10 Pen Reviews - The Pen Addict
Filo friendly pen? - Filofax Fixation
Little Blue Beauty: Filofax Adoration & Organization Post! - Mermaid Eyes
How do you structure your diary? Featuring my favourite A4 Filofax - Rockalily Lipsticks
Stylish Organisation - A Little Bird Fashion
On Filofax - Life...Considered, Planned..Organised
Year End Stock Check - A Work in Progress - LJ's Blog of Stuff
One Life, One Filofax...Really? - LJ's Blog of Stuff
Share your Filofax memories - Nellie - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
Reggie on Location: Christmas Day 2011 - Well Planned Life
Gadgets got your schedule scattered? Maybe it’s time to go back to paper - The Washington Post
Ms. Finch and I take umbrage to the word chunky - The Crazy Suburban Mom
Share your Filofax memories - Unchecked Other - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
Filofax Holburn Zip Review - simple notes to me
Your blog post could appear here... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy

Filofax 2012 - Changes to the range

2011-12-30T06:00:00.001-05:00

Some interesting news this morning about the changes in the range...

"There's a few shocks in the list of Filofax 2012 organiser retirements; Osterley Brown & Songbird stand out to me but it's also going to be goodbye from the Chameleon, Regency, Enigma (nobody got that one in any sense of the word) and some colour retirements in Malden, Domino & Apex.
Some exciting new lines arriving in March and, as the legendary singer James Taylor says, every time you make a new friend you need to say goodbye to an old one - or else you get friend build-up..."
Source: City Organiser

This is all as yet unconfirmed from Filofax UK... but it looks accurate if you take in to account what has been on sale at low prices...

Free for All Friday No. 163

2011-12-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

Since it's our last FFAF of the year, it's a good time to talk about our New Year celebrations. In my case, a walking tour of my town's concerts and other festivities, dinner at a favorite restaurant, and then some champagne at home.

And since it is Friday, all other topics are also welcome!

I have loved and valued my Filofax this year, and will continue to do in the next year.

Malden Mini - Wallet/Filofax

2011-12-29T00:00:00.047-05:00

Yes it was inevitable that I would buy a Malden Mini to go with the rest of my Malden Family! A mini came up for sale and I made a rapid decision to buy it, like you do...

So the Mini is a grey one, so it nicely matches my A5 Malden's. In the picture above it is shown next to my black pocket Malden to give you some idea of the size.

Comparing the two, you will see that the Pocket has a notepad slot in the right hand inside cover, were as the Mini has two more card slots.

In the left hand side of the Pocket there is a zip pocket, with a slot behind it, a further slot pocket and another behind that. The last one being quite deep. In the Mini there is again a zip pocket with a pocket behind that and an additional slot pocket.

If you are going to use either of these sizes as a wallet/Filofax/notebook/shopping list type organiser then in some ways the Mini I think might work slightly better because of those slots in the right hand inside cover.

Both have full width outside cover pockets, ideal for bank notes and receipts.

In the pictures above is a Finchley Mini and the Malden Mini. The Finchley has two slots in the left hand side and a large zip pocket in the right hand side. I use the zip pockets on any of these for a small amount of coins, but they can make the organiser quite heavy if you carry too many coins.

I have been trying out the Malden Mini as a wallet for the last couple of weeks, it works quite well. The only thing I've had to do compared to using the pocket size is to relocate my passport to my car documents wallet, which wasn't a big deal really. I also trimmed a health document I carry which stuck out the top a little, once trimmed down it slips in to the back pocket of the Mini just fine.

I don't have that many pages in it, just a WO2P diary insert with some 2011 pages added, some lined paper and some to-do lists. I have bank cards in the front and medical ones in the back.

So I think the Mini is a great addition. It also fits in to my pockets easily if I don't have my 'Man Bag' with me!

Our dear friend Thomas has a Malden Mini which he has been successfully using as a wallet since the London Meet Up in March, he's made some top tab dividers for it too.

My GTD Set Up - David Popely - Guest Post

2011-12-28T00:00:00.000-05:00

Well, the passing comments on Philofaxy about GTD setups seem to have generated a great deal of interest, so I asked Steve if he would like me to come forward with some detail of my own....so here it is.

Please be aware, though, that this is only ‘my’ setup – and, in fact, is only my setup at the moment – I can and do change setups quite regularly, as those who know me and/or follow my comments on the site will know!

If anyone is interested in starting with the ‘received version’ of how to set up a paper planner for GTD, there is a very good white paper available from David Allen himself via his website. It’s a free download, although you have to register to get it, but that’s not likely to be a problem to anyone who has more than a passing interest in implementing GTD.

And so, to my own set-up, which is really a modified form of GTD, both in setup and in underlying principle. I’ve made these changes because they suit me temperamentally, and I think we tend to underestimate the role of temperament in what will work best for us. You, dear reader, may like a lot of structure (as I do), or you may prefer a freewheeling system which just captures everything you need to do and then leaves it to you to regularly review those tasks and make choices out of the whole range of available to-dos. That doesn’t work for me – I’m an accountant (CPA if you’re in the US) and time management consultant and have anything up to 120 ‘live’ deadlines for filing stuff with various Government agencies (or just delivering to the client) at any given moment, and each of those deadlines has sanctions, usually fines and penalties, attached, so it’s important that I keep on top of all of them, all the time.

Firstly, my go-to binder. As regular readers will know, my first choice is a Personal Malden in Ochre. I love this binder, for the combination of weight, style and accessibility. I’ve tried using my A5 Finsbury, but it weighs enough to make it undesirable as a travelling companion, most especially when I’m in London on business, as I am quite often. I have enough papers, files and overnight stuff to carry without 6-8 pounds’ weight of organiser to add to the load. One of my underlying principles is, ‘One life, one organiser’, so I don’t split my stuff between binders, or use different binders for different aspects of my life. I want it ALL together in ONE place – which also happens to be one of the underlying principles of GTD. I know that when I pick up that binder I’m going to have everything I need, all together, in one place.

Firstly, inside the front cover I have my most used plastic cards (the rest live in card-holder inserts at the back of the binder, plus my own business cards, plus postage stamps, train tickets if I’m travelling to/from London, etc. What I really like about the Malden (apart from everything else about it!) is the way the pockets are arranged here. This setup means that I can flip the binder open in the supermarket, at the cash machine, etc, and have all the plastic cards I need, right there. There is a larger pocket behind the card slots, and I use that to capture the receipts I’m picking up through the day as I move around. Because I’m self employed, I just capture everything, and then decide later, on a daily basis, what needs to be kept and what can be thrown. The ones I’m keeping them get entered into my accounting software and ‘cold filed’ away, again on a daily basis. If anyone who is self employed wants to know more about this they can get in touch and I’ll elaborate.

Now into the main Filofax areas. As you will see from the accompanying photos, at the moment I’m using a basic 1-6 divider set, but I’ve added the diary tab from a standard set of dividers at the front. I’ve cribbed this idea from Gerard (many thanks), and it works really well for me. This is my first real departure from the ‘received wisdom’ of GTD, which has the notes/capture section in first place – however, as I say, this work for me.

Diary-wise, my current plan for 2012 is to use a Day on 2 Pages diary/to do list setup, which I’ve bought from the French Filofax website, backed with a standard 2012 year planner. I can only get 3 months’ worth of daily sheets in the binder, but it’s a compromise I’m prepared to make. The year planner will give me perspective on the rest of the year (as well as on the 3 months I’ve got in as daily inserts), and pretty soon I plan to have a 2013 year planner as well, behind that, for anything truly long-term which needs noting. Generally the year planner only tells me geographically where I’m going to be at any given point – there isn’t much room for detail, but the place reminder is usually enough to prompt me.

After the diary section, I’ve currently got a makeshift index page to the other six sections. I plan to replace this with a printed sheet pretty soon, once the whole thing has bedded in for 2012.

Section 1 is my notes/capture section. This is my one concession to colour (once the index sheet has been replaced)....I’m currently using yellow lined here, it gives me the ‘feel’ of a yellow legal pad, which is what I used before I decided to unify everything into the Filofax. These notes are sorted daily, and the resulting next actions, projects, etc are transferred to the relevant sections. This is really the most important section I use daily.....the GTD ‘system’ of capturing everything in one place and sorting it later enables me to keep a clear head and to stay focused in a way which would be impossible otherwise.

Section 2 is my Next Actions, divided into home, work, personal. If the ‘work’ list in particular starts to get out of hand I create separate lists for London (when I’m there, so this is in part an ‘errands’ list), phone, email, etc. I also have my ‘waiting for’ list in here, so that i can always be ahead of the game when it comes to keeping tabs on slow-responding clients.

Section 3 is my Agendas section. I don’t use this a great deal (I no longer have that many face to face meetings, and I don’t have staff), but what do use it for is notes for my client meetings with those whom I see on a regular basis when I’m in London. That way I don’t forget anything I mean to raise when I’m in the meeting.

Section 4 is my Project Lists. These are divided into work, home and personal. These, together with the Next Actions lists, form the core of my weekly review, which I try to carry out on a Friday afternoon, last thing, so that I can start the weekend knowing I have everything ‘nailed down’ for the coming week. I don’t like using my weekend time for this, even though some of it is personal stuff. As an adjunct to this, I also confirm any appointments for the following week, by email.

Section 5 is my Project Plans section. I try to have a plan for everything which is in the Project List. Also in here are my 2012 goals, and a summary list of my Areas of Focus – again, all concepts taken from Getting Things Done and Making It All Work (which deals more with perspective than with just getting control). These also get reviewed in with the weekly review.

I reckon I can do the weekly review adequately in around an hour....not much time invested, given the payoff.

Finally, section 6 is my information section. In here I have various bits and pieces of often-accessed information. If I find I’m not accessing something on at least a monthly basis, it gets thrown, provided I have the information electronically somewhere, or I know how to find it easily.

I don’t have a contacts section. All my contacts live on my mobile phone, and are far easier to access that way. Also, I have an Outlook-based address file as backup (which in turn gets backed up in my thrice-weekly overall data backup).

I used to keep notes of my expenses in the ‘Financial’ tab of the standard dividers when I was using them, but since I dropped them (and the note-taking with it) I find that capturing the receipts and processing them into my accounting system (where they would end up anyway) is good enough.

So that’s my system. You’ll see that I mostly use plain white ruled paper (or plain for printing) and I really don’t need a lot of different forms. Presently I’m using ‘To Do’ forms for Next Actions, but these could equally well be kept on plain white. I just happen to have them lying around so I’m using them. I think this entire system can be run using shop-bought plain white ruled paper, with some unlined for printing the odd sheet.

Good luck with your planning for 2012, and have fun!

David

Thank you David for an excellent article and insight on your GTD set up.
Steve

Budget Planner Template

2011-12-27T10:15:00.000-05:00

So you spent too much money on presents and booze for Christmas? Time to start planning your budget for 2012? OK here is a template that will help you..

Budget Planner - .docx .pdf

This template is designed for Personal size, but in a 'Z fold' configuration. To use this template you will need to cut a piece of paper to size (263 mm x 171 mm), then print one side, then the other on your printer. I used the manual feed on our laser printer and it worked just fine.

Once you have printed both sides it just needs punching and then folding, at 95mm and then back again to the outer edge.

Thank you to Gerard for sending me the original sample of this 'Vintage' Filofax page.

Free For All Tuesday No 47

2011-12-27T00:00:00.003-05:00

Well I hope you had a lovely Christmas and I guess you might have a few questions to ask... 'where can I buy... who stocks.... etc'

Well this is the place to ask all your Filofax related questions....

Reader Question: Filofax paper, which pen?

2011-12-26T00:00:00.006-05:00

We have frequently seen comments about the (poor) quality of Filofax white paper, particularly how it doesn't like fountain pen ink. The Filofax cotton cream paper seems a lot better and higher quality.

So a reader asked me this week. 'Which gel pens or rollerball pens work with ordinary Filofax paper? I can't use cotton cream paper as they don't sell A5 diary inserts in A5 size'

The later point is true, they don't do cotton cream in A5, shame really. So which gel pens and roller ball pens work with ordinary Filofax paper? And I suppose which ones fit the pen loop should also be taken in to consideration.

As a supplementary question I was wondering what paper people use if they print their own inserts?

Merry Christmas

2011-12-25T00:00:00.015-05:00

The Nan, Laurie and Steve would like to wish all our readers a very Happy Christmas.

Thank you for all your kind support and participation in 2011, it has been quite a year for us all.

And we now look forward to 2012....

Web Finds - 24 December 2011

2011-12-24T00:00:00.020-05:00

Christmas Eve has arrived, the children are getting excited, so may be you need to hide away and have a quiet hour with a coffee and some web finds to read!! Leave a comment and mention you found the link to the post on Philofaxy... just in case they don't know about Philofaxy!

New Clients bringing Christmas cheer to Leapfrogg - Frogblogg Let's cause a nice spike in their website stats... Let's show them who knows lots about On-line buying from Filofax....
aw man, what a week! - Filofax Fixation
Filofax.. the first - Yearbook 2011
Bristol mini Philofaxy Meet-up - The Life of The Perpetual Student
Filofax Meet Up Brizzle - Imysworld
Expenses Envelopes for Filofax Personal - My Life All in One Place
Dragging out my Filofax - The Crazy Suburban Mom
The End is Near... - Filomaniac
Get Organized in style with Letts of London and Filofax - The Knack
My Filofax Life - beyondblueeyes
My Filofax Love Story - Whimsicality
The Trick of Syncing Your Paper Planner and Smartphone - Day Timer Blog
Filofax Compact Osterley - SNARLing Post
Out with the old in with the new - Filofax Fixation
Finally the one that replaced the Malden - Musings of a Caribbean Princess
Making Filofax Expenses Envelopes - A5 version - All My Life in One Place
Filofax Storage vs Sleeping Beauties - Vanjilla
The search for the perfect zipped Filofax - Rapunzel's World
Introducing the new member of my Filofax Family. The Balmoral M2 - Rapunzel's World
Personalised Photo Diary - Filomaniac
Vintage Winchester Filofax - The Life of The Perpetual Student
Last Few Days Update !!!! - The Life of The Perpetual Student
The Great Mini - Vanjilla
Filofax clasps (size DOES matter) - Paper Pens Ink
What is it with Wednesdays - Filofax Fixation
Stuck on my Filofax - The Crazy Suburban Mom
Filofax Yay! - Smiles and Miles
Setting up my Filofax for 2012 - Stickymuse
Filofax Personal vs Pocket Setups Pics & Final Decision - Loving My Filofax
Your blog post could appear here... Please email us if we missed you this week.

Enjoy... and I'm off to help Santa and his helpers... ho ho ho... Merry Christmas

Free For All Friday No. 162

2011-12-23T00:32:00.003-05:00

It's nearly Christmas! Is Santa bringing you any Filofax goodies? Or is it coal in your stocking for you? ;D

As always on Fridays, feel free to discuss anything Filofax-related.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Blog-o-Fax

2011-12-22T00:00:00.007-05:00

This is nothing new, people have set up Filofaxes for keeping notes about their blog before... but I thought I would tell you about mine...

So in the run up to Christmas I have been writing lots of posts to try and get over the Christmas period, so you still had stuff to read and, I could sit back and relax and enjoy Christmas with the family... I'm a bit selfish like that you know! Well I don't see my son that often other than on the other end of a Skype call, so to see him face to face is a bit rare these days, ok enough of the excuses Steve...

All the routine posts on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays are easy to do in advance, it's thinking through the ones on the other days of the week that needed thinking through a bit.

So I was going a bit stir crazy with dates and posts and trying to slot them all in. During a break to wander around the supermarket to get bread and the usual stuff I thought... Blog-o-Fax, yes need one.

Now I could have just done this with a wall calendar and some marker pens... but where is the fun in that? I 'needed' something that would show me several weeks in advance but would still give me plenty of space to write in the boxes. So a month on one page may be...

Naturally I wanted to avoid buying anything new.. so I thought yes... my A4 Classic, it is sat in the cupboard just waiting to be used. A4 would be easy to print a calendar off for and also it would give me plenty of space to write in the boxes, nice and clear and I will be able to see at a glance where I needed to write posts for. Yes I know the Classic is a bit of an overkill at £150... but I didn't pay that much for it when I bought it last year, and I have it sat in the cupboard.

So I popped on to the computer and put in the dates of FFAT, FFAF (Tuesdays and Fridays) and then worked out a suitable layout and size etc. Printed off the calendar in colour as well!

I took out some of the other pages in the A4 that I would no longer need, put them to one side and then concentrated on what I would need apart from a calendar. Some notepaper, and a couple of To Do list pages, can't do anything without a To Do list!

I've been using this for the last two or three weeks and it really has made a difference with my blog post planing. I can now easily see where the gaps are in the schedule, what is coming up, what I can shuffle when more time important posts come along. So the schedule does change and get updated quite often in a week.

Once this next few weeks is out of the way, I might try transferring the idea in to my A5 desk Filofax, but it's been a useful exercise to try it out in a separate one first to see what I actually need over a few weeks before I make any changes to my main set up.

Philofaxy

Free For All Friday No 172

THE NEW LIMITED EDITION ‘TEMPERLEY LONDON FOR FILOFAX’ COLLECTION

Filofax 2012 release dates

Reader Under The Spot Light - Ray

Free Monthly 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

Free For All Tuesday No. 56

How do you use: Year Planners?

Philofaxy Meet Up - US Mid West - 2012

Date for your diary - Saturday 3 March 2012

New York

London

Paris

Jakarta

Download source files for the new Personal-size diary layouts

Web Finds - 25 February 2012

Free For All Friday No. 171

Guest Post - Alice - Erin

Free Personal size 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

Discount Code for City Organiser....

Free For All Tuesday No 55

Wanted - Reader Reviews

How do you use: Monthly Pages

Guest Post - Do it yourself – Tabbed Month on 2 Pages for your A5 Filofax

A5 Undated Diary Layouts

Web Finds - 18 February 2012

Download source files for the new A5 diary layouts

Free For All Friday No 170

Free A5 2012 diary sets to download and print for your Filofax

Journalling in Your Filofax

Free For All Tuesday No 54

How Do You Use: Week Per Page

New A5 Filofax diary layouts

Reader Under The Spotlight - Claire

Web Finds - 11 February 2012

Fashion Targets Breast Cancer

Free for All Friday No. 169

Guest Post - Writing Filofax - Amanda

Restoring my Buckingham?

Free For All Tuesday No 53

How do you use - Day per Page

Guest Post - Retired Filofax - Michael

A5 Compacts....

Web Finds - 4 February 2012

Free For All Friday No. 168

The New Range... my own point of view..

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part Three

Philofaxy London Meet Up - May 2012

Philofaxy Charity Donation - Thank You

Free For All Tuesday No. 52

How I use: Week on Two Page

Starting over

Date for your Filofax - Sunday 5 Febuary 2012

New York

London

Paris

Jakarta

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part Two

Filofax 2012 New Range - Part One

Web Finds - 28 January 2012

Filofax UK - Free Delivery

Free For All Friday - No. 167

Tickler Filofax

Musing for a Wednesday....

Free For All Tuesday No 51

Poll: Business or Social?

New to Philofaxy?

Web Finds 21 January 2012

Free for All Friday No. 166

Dividers with a difference

Philofaxy by Email...

Filofax 2012 News... Chapter 2

Filofax 2012 News

Free For All Tuesday No. 50

Poll results: How many weeks of diary pages do you keep in your Filofax?

Phone Directory

UK vs French paper catalogues

Web Finds 14 January 2012

Free For All Friday No. 165

A Journey Back In Time - Part 2