A new leaf and a new calendar
Sunday, August 23, 2009 at 7:15AM
The other day, my mother-in-law called to ask me if we would be available for dinner on September 19th. That just sort of blew my mind. That's like a MONTH away! How on earth could I be expected to know what we're up to a month from now? See, we're not exactly the world's great planners ahead. Like, when I signed up for summer camp at the kiddo's school, we knew that at the end of the summer they would be going on break, right? But then we sort of got sucked into life and work and stuff, and all the sudden it was the Thursday before a two week (!) break, and we hadn't made Plan B. Uh oh. While I would never SELL the kiddo to the gypsies, I did consider for a brief moment a mutually beneficial rental arrangement (I kid, I kid!). We made it through the two weeks without childcare thanks to the generous help of our friends and family and the occasional abbreviated work day. But still.
I have vowed to do better. Which starts with owning a calendar. That I actually write on. But all the calendars I see in the stores are either attractive but ridiculous overkill (I do not want to carry around a three-ring binder of my obligations) or totally antiseptic, blah, and insufficient. Can you see where this is going?
Obviously, I had to design my own calendar. I had certain requirements. It had to be pretty but not fussy. It had to have big enough blocks to jot down a couple of words about important events, it needed a spot to put random notes, and it needed a place to scribble reminders of stuff happening in upcoming months. So, you know, we wouldn't be caught off guard next time el pequeño gets two weeks at Club Med from his school.
For those of you who have your calendars filled in and accounted for into 2012, I salute you (albeit with slight suspicion of you and your kind). For the rest of you, feel free to download these calendar sheets for your own use. And check back later in the week--I'm testing a mini tutorial for a easy, nifty way to bind these all together.
Download September-November here.;)
Download December-February here.;)
Download March-May here.;)
Download June-August here.;)
Cameron Blazer
One observant commenter noted that this calendar is sort of unorthodox in the arrangement of the days of the week. Most calendars in the US use Sunday as the start of the week. Because this calendar was designed for use by our family, I decided to do it differently, to try to highlight the weekend time we have together in clear blocks. We go in so many different directions all week long, and we are constantly committing ourselves to parties and gatherings and obligations for the weekend, too. By putting the weekend days together, I'm hoping we can learn to be more discerning about what we sign on to on the weekends--if Saturday's jam-packed, we should try to decompress on Sunday, and vice-versa; I hope that by seeing the days side-by-side we can see that balance more clearly.
That's a lot of philosophizing about a relatively straightforward graphic design choice, eh?
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Reader Comments (28)
Saw your tweet and clicked over. Our family is the same way. I cannot stand planning -- so much could change in the next 4 weeks! I have finally gone back to using iCal religiously and printing out a refrigerator copy. I used to design our own calendar pages -- and they looked very similar to your’s. Right down to the patterned strip at the top! Great minds? ;-) Good luck!
Guess I'm "old school" (or just old) but I'm used to calendars laid out starting with Sunday.
My mind's eye can mentally scan and place a Wednesday, etc BUT it throws me when the week is shown starting on a Monday.
That seems to be the layout for MOST calendars I see for sale.
Just a thought.
Chuck
Chuck,
You are absolutely right. Most commercial calendars do start with Sunday. I meant to talk about this in the blog entry--I made the decision, since this is a calendar for our home (I am actually relatively adept with electronic calendaring in my professional life), to group the weekend days together. I guess I want to remind myself that these are our golden hours together, and seeing them together like that is intended to help me do that. Maybe I'll update the entry to talk about that...
Cheers!
i TOTALLY can't plan ahead like the plan aheaders...
more like the fly-by-seat-of-my-pants, PLEASE don't ask me what I want to do two weeks from now. :)
i guess once you have kids that kind of changes, but i'm totally feeling you on this one...
love the calendar - you are so very talented!
I love your calendar! I'm super picky too. I actually draw mine out in a little notebook, then use monthly printables for blog stuff. When I run out, I'm going to print out yours. I hope you get hooked on your calendar. I'm one of those weirdos who takes tons of satisfaction from scheduling, I hope you end up enjoying it too! Oh, and I'll be linking to these. They're SO pretty!
Love this idea! I just downloaded September-November and will use it as our "home" calendar for everyone to see! I have one that travels with me, but with three boys activities it will be nice to have a central one at home.
Thanks Cam!
Gregs
Great design Cameron - I have looked everywhere for a calendar that doesn't separate the weekend days! Thanks so much. One question, if it's not too presumptuous...would you consider creating a Southern Hemisphere version? Our seasons are reversed to yours (January is usually our hottest month!) and being over the International Date Line here in Australia, the dates are all a day out. (Here it is Tuesday the 25th.) I have altered the pages I have printed, but it does seem a shame. Your deigns are so clean and beautiful!
Anyway, just my two-cents-worth from down Under! Thanks for all the great freebies you offer, the great blog and all the inspiration.
July is peacocks! I know that's just for me!!
My mind's eye sees the weekly calendar like a stock ticker of Whack-a-Mole events and obligations traveling rapidly from right to left and curving slightly inward toward the unknowable. Time waits for no man, and in this case it also moves backwards—like a moonwalking hitchhiker. Fridays and Saturdays start out at the beginning of the week on the far left and get chased around to the other side by the end of the work week. Perhaps a better way of communicating this is that it's like how you could go off the screen on the left in Atari games and pop out again on the right side, but usually that meant crashing into an asteroid (read: forgotten appointment until the "advent" of this calendar). My daily appointment calendar starts with waking up at the bottom of the day and then moving upward through the hours, time filling up like water fills a glass or, more futilely, like Cream of Wheat caves in on itself and seems to fill the bowl no matter how many bites you eat. But if we stay with the glass filling up metaphor, then one day fills up and spills over into the next day, leftward . . . into a new glass (or bowl of Cream of Wheat). At any rate. My mind's eye's larger, yearly calendar moves in a counterclockwise orbit around an imaginary axis of resistance that spins in the opposite direction. New Year's Day is at the top of my annual calendar, which, when viewed objectively, is a circle—like a clock. Actually, when viewed in context, it's more like a sphere. Moving on. The vagueness of summer is down at 6 o'clock on my annual, circular date keeper. And Halloween is at, like, 10 o'clock. Thanksgiving, Christmas, and the cold holidays fill up the rest of final slice before the annual buzzer goes off and, like clockwork every year, the whole apparatus resets itself.
Can you make that happen?
Also, I'll need you to add more holidays in March, May, June, and September. And please block out August 28 through September 1 every year.
lovely post! beautiful calendar pages, and i also love how you've collected the weekend together. it makes it seem so short when sat/sun are split apart, like you barely have any time!
I'm used to Sunday being the first block of the week, too. However, that never made sense to me at all--I always thought of Sunday as being the 7th day. Anyway, thanks so much for designing this calendar and offering them to your readers. The calendar is beautiful and I will enjoy using it very much. Thank you.
Thank you for the lovely calendar design!
Just one question: here in Europe we celebrate valentine's day at the 14th, it seems to be at the 18th in your world?? :-)
These calendars are gorgeous. Maybe that will stop me from doing my usual -- you know, filling something in and then completely disregarding it. They are too pretty not to give it a shot.
i love your calendar pages!! definitely want to use them for 2010. however, isn't valentines day on feb 14th, not the 18th? the 18th is also a special day for me though, our first baby is due then. many happy grins.
-evalina
I love the calendars. Thanks so much for sharing with us. I appreciate the fun but yet simple look of the calendar. Perfect!
Gah! You guys got me--I had to do and re-do February originally because I put the dates in wrong (this calendar business really does push me to the far edges of my intellectual abilities), and Valentine's Day never got updated. I have updated the file now, so download to your heart's content!
I was just thinking this morning that I need to create a new calendar to be better organized. And then I find yours! It's way cuter than anything I'd ever do. Thank you so much for sharing!
you will not believe (well maybe YOU will since you seem to be right after my own heart), but I was looking for something exactly like this last week. And your renditions are even better than what I had in my head. Thanks for your creativity!
Hello there,
This is a beautiful creation! I wondered if you might be willing to use the same designs for Sept-Dec, but change the numbers so that they are for 2010? I would love to use this calendar next year, but would be short 4 months. Didn't know how much trouble it'd be - you're quite kind for making it available at all. Again, beautiful work. I love the cherry blossoms and peacock feathers especially.
Great, thank you!!!
Love the calendar! Just wondering if you are still planning on posting the mini-tutorial for how to bind them together? Thanks so much!
Wonderful calendars! As a landscape designer I use a wide-format ink jet printer, so I printed your monthly calendars on 17x22" paper to make a snazzy desk-top version. I use that size at home in an attempt to keep my whole family on the same page, so to speak. LOVE the Saturday + Sunday snuggling up together at the end of each row. Hope that you will keep this up for years to come!
What a great project! Thanks for your generosity and style. I love following your blog and have you on my blogroll. Cheers! Jenn
Thanks for the awesome/beautiful/simple/perfect calendar. I love having Saturday & Sunday at the end of the week, right where they belong. It has been a bit more of an adjustment than I thought it would be to remember this everytime I go to write in an appointment. :)
My Dear Cameron,
While I continue to be amazed at your incredible range of talent...from amazing multi-interests and an outstanding ability to create a human being who is both enchanting and engaging. But, we need to talk abut this dislike of "PURPLE". Blasphemy Oh Yes! But certainly excusable of one so young. Now to broaden your limited education at an unnamed state university, the color purple signifies royalty, religion, all things wonderful and most of all a certain university in the foothills of the real Carolina!!
I will accept your deficiencies, though certainly limited...and will even share my world famous recipe for cooking oatmeal , if...but only if...you reconsider the comforting and soothing and stimulating effects of the color purple and open that incredible mind to something that will give you joy for eternity!
Uncle Doug
I think this calendar is PERFECT! It's really handy, simple and such a neat design. (+ I love the colours!) AND the lay out is exatcly the way we're used to here in Finland. :-) Our week has always started on Monday.
Thank you for these! I've been using them since September for appointments and to track baby milestones. I love having these in my kitchen and they've really helped me track stuff I might have otherwise forgotten.
Hmmm can you start these over again? I really like them BUT just found them. It is Feb 2010. Just...you know...if you aren't busy doing anything else...haha!