I am slightly OCD about being organized… or at least having the facade of being organized.  I’ve always described my organization style as organized chaos.  Things may look cluttered and crazy but I know where everything is (and may your gods help you if you try to interfere  with my system!).  Along that same vein I love planners, and binders, and backpacks with tons of pockets and places to put things and pens and pencils and an overly organized home for them to live in.  I love it. I love making new systems and improving on old systems and color coding. My current planner that I keep track of basic chores, events, meetings, appointments, and blog posts is color coded by type of event, holidays, blog posts, and chores.  I also keep track of  moon phases amongst other things.  My favorite thing is to sit down on a Sunday night by my mister on the couch and plan out my week. Makes things easier, I don’t forget stuff, and it helps me to stay focused and on task.

But, I hate boring plain things so whenever I get a new planner, or journal… or anything really I always decorate it to make it mine.  Always.  I prefer a base color of black.  But I hate just plain black.  And I also hate logos and brands on items.  I usually cover up brands and paint on accent colors and designs here and there.  Stickers and patches are also a must.

This week, after what felt like waiting for forever, the holy grail of planners came in….Many moons.  I have been following her books and I absolutely adore them, but a planner? OMG. Swoon. When I opened it I was taken aback by the layout and the design of everything.  I really love it.  It’s perfect.  But the cover was so pretty I was worried about ruining it if I threw it in my bag… so of course, I had to find the perfect cover.  One that was the perfect size and one that also had little organizing things.  I really wanted it to be colorful, but the size became an issue  as well as not wanting binder rings since my planner was already a spiral bound book.  I found one for a decent price.  Those things can seriously get super expensive!  $15 wasn’t bad.

So I get it home and all these ideas came flooding to me about what I wanted to do to decorate it!  The book combined with the things I put in the cover prevented it from staying closed properly so I decided make a strap to close it.  And to add a pink accent.. and to sticker up the logo.

I’m bad at taking photos while I work on a project because usually there are no defined steps. I usually make things up as I go along and tweak as needed.  This one I measured my fabric and cut it.  I then cut a long triangle from a piece of card board for the part that goes around the open edge of the book to help make it sturdier than just the fabric. I hot glued the triangle to the the fabric strip, then glued the edges over to create a seam.  I put some fabric on the back of the triangle strap to give it a finished look. Then I sewed the accent threads around the edges.  I sewed on the button where the front of the book is after measuring where it should go first.  Then, I just hot glued the strap around the book.  I used the gorilla glue for the hot glue gun.  It tends to hold things together pretty good. I absolutely adore it! And it makes my new planner that much more special for me.