Welcome back to the blog today creatives! Leah here, bringing you part 4 of my Creative Planning blog series. In this series, it is my goal to show you creative ways to use and decorate your planners. In this post, I will be showing you how I plan out my week with a couple of Autumn-themed layouts in my brand new Beautiful Weekly Spiral Planner. Here is a picture of my Life Is Beautiful Spiral Planner! I flipped through this spiral planner and several of the other new products in a recent YouTube video; you can watch that here if you are interested in seeing more of the pages inside. I used the new Vintage Blessings collection from Simple Stories to decorate both layouts within my spiral planner. I chose to work with this collection because it felt seasonally appropriate for the coming weeks. I adore all of the lovely fall-themed designs and sentiments! The first day of fall is just around the corner and I could not be more excited for the arrival of my favorite season! I used the Bits and Pieces pack, the sticker packs and the washi tapes from Vintage Blessings line, as well as a few stickers from the September page in the new Seasons A5 sticker tablet. This first weekly layout was all about anticipating the arrival of fall, even if it isn’t quite here yet. You’ll notice how I like leaving little notes of encouragement, or “love notes” as I like to call them, throughout my planner pages. They are notes that help keep me in check. Sometimes they are happy and motivational, sometimes they are “tough love” notes that remind me to stay focused on my goals. Someone has to be responsible for holding me accountable, or in this case some THING (my planner).I also have to write in reminders to myself sometimes to slow the heck down and enjoy the season/the present. This week, I tried to keep an attitude of gratitude and remind myself to appreciate a few of the things I love most about fall – like pumpkin spice lattes, pumpkin beers, football and family time. The next weekly layout is for the current week, which brings us into the actual start of the Autumn season. Yay!! Again, the décor and “love notes” are all heavily fall-themed. I love the patchwork look of the birds in this collection, they are reminiscent of a vintage quilt. I tried to tie that into a few of my other decorations by adding doodled stitching around some of the stickers. Here is another example of one of my “tough love” notes – reminding myself to be better about taking care of myself, since I have not been making my health high enough of a priority lately. Lastly, I gave extra special attention to the first day of fall! I like to make important days more of a focal point on my planner spreads by adding embellishment clusters near them. On this day, I did that by using a few strips of cute washi tape, a happy sentiment, and a few banners. I did a little fancier lettering too and colored the letters in with one of my Tombow markers. Coloring in lettering is another fun way to emphasize something you want to draw attention to. Can you tell we like football in this house…?I have said before that I am always trying to be more present in the moment. For that reason, I try to take time to appreciate the things I love about every new season – there is something to love about them all. However, I can’t help but feel like there is something extra special in the air at this time of year. Autumn is truly a magical season to me. I know I’m not the only one who feels that way. How about you, what is your favorite season?
I hope you all have been inspired with a few ideas for decorating your planners, and/or for using some of the new Simple Stories products. If you’d like some more creative planning inspiration, I would love for you to come say hello over on my Instagram!
Until next time, happy crafting friends!

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