As a hardcore Type B personality, I’ve never been much of a journaling planner type – so needless to say, I’ve never been super into planners.  That is until I discovered the whole new world of Happy Planners that make my aesthetically oriented soul sing and suddenly I was all about it.  Well … as excited about planners as a non-planner can be anyways  😉  Check out my Peony florals Happy Planner {{swoon}}

I’d even tried using several other pretty planners over the last couple of years, realizing I had no choice but to use a planner to keep my blogging, work, and homeschool schedules straight (plus all our personal & family plans).  I kinda liked them, but didn’t love them and only ended up using them incredibly intermittently…. (not exactly how they were meant to be used).

I have always been a journal-er at heart, however.  I think keeping a journal is the epitome of stopping to smell the roses – it encourages you to look around and take in your surroundings and it provides a way to tuck them away into your heart for safekeeping. Later on, you may even choose to share many of these writings with loved ones to help build a rich family history over the years.

As much as I loved journaling my childhood adventures and teenage melodrama, (ha)!  Life got uber busy as an adult and journaling usually fell by the wayside over the years.  You know how it goes… good intentions + work + motherhood = chaos, more often than it yields time to stop and smell the roses in life.

But I think the equation should look more like this…. gratitude = joyful, meaningful living.

So I came up with a quick and easy way to journal that feels much more doable for busy girls on the go!  Think planner meets gratitude journal, meets traditional journal  😉  Sounds intriguing, right?  Take a look!!

I actually started journaling little bits and pieces of our day on the pages of this planner, not thinking of it like this combined way of doing it is actually the happy little hybrid that it is.  But that was an unexpected bonus!  I just didn’t want to waste this pretty pink journal from Target that I tried and liked at the beginning of this year, but just wasn’t working for me.  Though I initially liked the purse sized convenience of it, the bigger size and eye-catching aesthetics of my Happy Planner turned out to work much better for getting me to actually use it everyday!

So instead, I just decided to repurpose this one to record fun, unusual, important, charming, or otherwise memorable happenings here and there, throughout the year.  Perfect solution for any wannabe journaling Mom who finds herself too busy in this season of life to keep the full, extended version of a journal she was previously used to!

So what do you think?  Is this something that could work for you?  Have you ever tried a hybrid hack like this to better meet your needs?