My Favorite Planning Accessories and How I Use Them To Keep Me Organized

I am a lover of pretty things. Colorful, sparkly, shiny things. This love crops up in all facets of my life. My colorful mask. My awesome Harry Potter backpack. The sparkly charging cord on my nightstand. It’s just how I roll. This love also  extends into my planning life. My favorite planning accessories are no different.  These are my all time favorite planning accessories and how I use them in my organization system. 

1. Dapper Desk Academic 
2. Pilot Frixion Erasable Pens
3. Extra large wall calendar
4. Zebra Pen Mildliner Double Ended Highlighters
5. Washi Tape
6. Planner Stickers

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Dapper Desk Academic

It feels like there are as many different brands of paper planners as there are people sometimes.  I know people who are huge fans of the Happy Planner and its customizability.  I also have another friend who is a die-hard Day Designer fan.  My planner brand of choice is the Simplified Planner by the extremely talented Emily Ley.  The Dapper Desk that I own is an offshoot of her original line.  It has a full page for each day with both a time tracking section and a full column where I can add in tasks.  And I have LOTS of tasks! As I mentioned in a previous post, I am color coding obsessed.  In my planner, my color coding begins in the monthly layouts, and I extend those same colors to my daily tasks and time planning for consistency.  I love that I can just glance at the pages and know right away that I have three business things to do, one for the PTA, two for Cub Scouts and four home tasks to handle.

Pilot Frixion Erasable Pens

These are my FAVORITE color coding pens! The ink is bright and smooth and because my planner is constantly changing, the fact that they are erasable is a godsend.  Not to mention that the pack came with 10 different colors.  The perfect amount for color coding obsession.

Extra Large Wall Calendar

Right next to our back door, I have an extra large wall calendar where I rewrite all of the activities and scheduled plans for the month so that all members of my family are on the same page.  With three kids, who will eventually all be in activities, I thought that I was important to get this element of my system started early.  I am also finding that my oldest will gravitate to it throughout the week to check it out.  Hopefully this will continue as he gets older so that it will be one less thing that I am constantly repeating myself about.  😉

Zebra Pen Mildliner Double Ended Highlighters

Did I mention that I like colorful things? I did? Okay great.  So yeah.  Pretty colors.  I use these a lot for my meal planning.  I will write out dinner in my planner for each day and then highlight the main dish one color, sides another color and any veggies another.  Not only does it look nice, it also makes sure that I am planning out a balanced meal.  

Washi Tape

Since the planner that I use is so simple, I like to use fun washi tapes to jazz it up periodically.  It’s great to use to highlight a particular section in your planner or to write on top of, if you do not use the erasable pens like I do.  Then if something changes, you just peel off the tape instead of having to white out whole sections.  

Planner Stickers

Stickers are to add a bit of creative pizzaz to my planner pages.  I love to get ones that are themed for specific times of the year or that revolve around a particular holiday.  It keeps the planning process fun and allows me to use it as a decompression moment, rather than it being so much of a chore.  

I obviously use lots of things for my planner.
What are some of your favorites that I haven’t mentioned? 
Do you have any specific brands that you love?