DIY 2014 Organizer

Every year it so happens that we make resolutions and all of them are broken over the first few months if not weeks. Every year I maintain a diary and write down almost everything in it, it kind of also becomes my notepad etc but its always fun when years later you read it again. For me the diary I wrote in school is so nostalgic and I believe when ill be old with greyhair and with no work to do ill sit and go through all these diaries and refresh my memory again. This year however I have decided to make an Organizer!!! I believe that even thought I plan to do many things I am not able to achieve all of them, I loose focus or I get involved a lot in one thing and completely ignore the other and that’s where the Organizer comes in picture. I searched a lot online and found these awesome printables from various sites. I figured that as I am a student many of the printables were not applicable for me so I just printed out those parts which I believe will be applicable for me and just downloaded that. ( You can do the same, I am going to put all the links below so just print out whatever you feel is perfect for you. Also I don’t own these printables they are the sole property of whoever made them, I am just sharing them. )

So let me just show you how I have done my Organizer.

1.      Binder/File

So this is the Binder that I have used. You can use just about anything. I figured Filofax are also in great demand these days but I find them not that good for me. So I decided to just use a file or a Binder. You can use anything you feel fit for yourself. You can also just stick the papers on the wall if you find that convenient. It all depends on you really.

2.      ColourPens

I plan on making the organizer fun and colourful, so that it makes me want to come and write in it, so that it keeps me interested but I also don’t want it too messy with lots of colours in a way that the text gets lost in the colours and design. I wanted something where the text and my notes are instantly visible when I open my Organizer and that’s why I decided to use colourful pens to write in and use a simple template/background and so far it has worked great for me.

I just used a simple clear plastic pen pocket and punched it in the start of the file so all the things remain in one place and I don’t have to go search for it everytime I sit down to write. I also plan to put in some Sticky Notes and some Washi Tapes ( I am not able to find any in my locality in Mumbai, so if you know where I can find them please let me know in the comment box below. Thanks J )

3.      A transparent File

I have attached this transparent File/ Paper Holder or whatever it is called at the start of the Organizer, ill use this as a to-do list or something. I will put in any document that I have to read or something that need to do etc, I can also use it to post the post it notes so that I don’t ruin the inside pages. And the day it is empty like it is now means there is no pending work. YAY!

4.      At a Glance Yearly Calender

Needless to say why, it has to be there in an Organizer. This is useful when you just want to quickly checkoutsome dates or need to check out the days you are free or something. It just helps to have the entire calendar laid out in front of you.

5.      Goals of the Year

I have often noticed that every new year we plan somethings for the next year, some of those things are possible to achieve while some are plain unrealistic and sometimes it so happens that the plans you have made for the next year are not relevant due to some changes that your life undergoes. So I use this chart to plan goals month vise. So I know exactly what I have to achieve in this month or the next month. It helps me stay more grounded and more realistic. The thing I love about this particular layout is that it has a lot of columns so you can have goals right from basic to something very important. It helps track your personal as well professional goals.

6.      Weight loss Journal

For a long time now I am dying to loose some weight, and its just not happening. The problem is I absolutely loveee food and I am very lazy to actually workout and thus this is the result. So I am using this just to keep a track and maybe this will motivate me to focus on weight loss more.

7.      Month at a Glance

As I told you earlier I have made this according to my needs, I don’t really think I have so much on my mind that I need to have a daily and a weekly calendar I am able to manage my time with the monthly calendar. So I am just using that. I put in important things that I need to do on a particular day and then just manage my day using my cell phone calendar. But incase you want weekly and daily calendar as well ill put the link down below

8.      Blog Planner

I have this blog for like 5 years now and as you can see that I am not that active. Every year I plan to blog more, read more blogs etc but its not just happening. So this year I used this planner and I am actually that it is kind of helping me be on track. This is like what my 5^th blog in January itself? I am happy and I hope this continues. There is this small space below to write down any blog ideas that you may have and a small inspiration box where you can write in whatever that will inspire you to blog more.

9.      My daily details

This is something I made myself just to keep a track so there are different areas of my life that I want to work on and that’s what I have written in each tab which helps me keep a track on my daily activity.

-          Exercise - As I mentioned above, I have an exercise issue if I may say. So this is not a surprise. This is just to track how much I have worked out (if any)

I use an android app which helps me keep a track of my workouts MyFitness Pal. You can download and see if it works for you.

-          Water -  I also drink very less amount of water than what I actually should. Hence, this tab just to keep me hydrated.

I again use Water My Body android app for this. ( I just think it’s so easy use apps as your phone is always with you and it’s just convenient )

-          Walking -  This will again come under Exercise but I prefer having a separate tag for it.  Obviously I use an app for this as well - Run Keeper

-          Expense – I am not earning now, so I don’t have like a lot of money to manage but whatever little I do have I thought it would be a good idea to start tracking the money that I spend. Because somehow it so happens that I don’t realize when I am spending money on useless things. Maybe this will help me realize where I genuinely need to spend and where I am just wasting it. Android App – Expense Manage

-          Prayer – I am not very religious or a god fearing person, but I have noticed that when you pray your day is just more positive and confident and in this world where everything is so fast and you don’t have time for anything prayer obviously gets very little or no time (atleast for me) and thus this tag to keep some spirituality in me.

-          Read 15pages a day – You cant see that tag here but I have just penned it down later. I have taken the GoodReads.com challenge of reading 50books in a year twice now and have failed both the time. So this year I thought that everyday ill at least read 15pages of a book. So I get a check mark everyday if I read 15pages. I find this nice, as it pushes me to read more even though I am tired.

Well that is all there is as of now, its my first Organizer so maybe I have missed something or have put in some things that wont make much of a difference but let time tell me that. Ill be adding and removing things according to how I feel my needs are or according to what is working or working for me. Lets hope ill be doing a successful Organizer post at the end of this year.

Links –

1.      Binder, Pens and Paper File – Bought it at a local store, you can find it there or on flipkart or ebay.

2.      Year at a glance –  http://itsagingersnap.com/2013/11/2014-binder-printables/

3.      Online Passwords - http://itsagingersnap.com/2013/11/2014-binder-printables/(I haven’t added this above cause I had already written down the passwords so couldn’t upload it here, Sorry!)

4.      Weigh loss chart - http://www.pinterest.com/pin/327988785332785853/

5.      2014 Calender - https://app.box.com/s/2mgg2v4d62ib7w8lyvx0

6.      Blog Information sheet - http://www.blessingsoverflowing.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Blog-Information-Sheet.pdf

7.      Monthly Blog Plans - http://www.awellcraftedparty.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/monthlyblogplanner.pdf

The making of Secret Santa

A little background for those who don’t know what I am talking about, this is regarding a Secret Santa initiative that the Students of Kirti College, BMM Dept undertook as a pre event of their BMM Festival - Moksh. We along with some students of other colleges wore Santa caps and  gave out gifts to street kids on Christmas eve. The initiative got a wonderful response from other colleges as well as was covered in a leading Marathi newspaper and RJ Jeeturaaj appreciated it as well, you can hear us on air on 28^th December 2014 on Klub Mirchi on 98.3FM.

So now as that is done I would really like to talk about how all this came about and how we never thought that this would ever be what it is!

It was a random thought that came to my mind on 19^th December (5 days before the event) which I shared with Nikhil, to which he immediately said yes! I was still a bit skeptical about the whole thing and how we would plan this out. We met and discussed and decided that we would go ahead with it.  We immediately told our PR team to get in touch with all the colleges and inform them about the event. I wondered how many of them would actually take part in it. I had even told the PR team that they would have to go to each college and collect gift because calling them over to our college would not be something they might be keen on doing but it happened the other way round, all the colleges showed amazing support and came to drop of their gift all the way to our college. I remember going home and calling Nikhil up and telling that incase no one else supports us we would do it just with our college students anyway, but all my worries were washed out when the response from everyone around us was just marvelous. We received so many gifts that 2 cars were not enough to store them. There was a time when I came to college and was amazed by big big bags full of gifts brought in from different colleges and I took some time to get over the amazing response the initiative was getting.  Somewhere every person associated with this cause understood the need for such initiatives and that sometimes it gives you immense happiness in working for others. One of the PR head – Romit told me today that the way other people were responding to the initiative had given him a very positive feeling.

We went out on 24^th midnight to give out gifts and it got almost as late as 3am but there was not one person who complained about how late it was everyone was just happy that they could contribute somewhere to make a person smile.

I would really like to take this opportunity to thank each and everyone associated with this initiative it really would never have been possible to do something like this had it not been for you guys.

This Christmas would always mark as the bessstest one ever for me, and I am sure that it would be same for a lot of other people as well :) 2013 could not have ended on a better note. 

My Experiments with Cooking

This vacation I had decided to just relax and do absolutely nothing after all this is the last vacation of my life after this it would be all hunt for jobs and start earning and listen to mom say “Its time you get married!” so this last time I am going to do everything that I love. It started with me making a Harry Potter Wand!!! That was something I wanted to do for a long long longgg time but somehow it just didn’t happen but I am glad cause when I finally did it, it is just the best! Ill do a post on that soon. There are many other Potter related things that I am planning on doing but for now lets start with that I did today.

            I realized that its high time I start cooking, and cooking good! I don’t know I never got this feeling before that I should learn how to cook, but now suddenly I wanna know the receipe of everything that I eat. So what I ended up doing was subscribing to all the Food related channels on Youtube, Following Food Blogs etc etc. I guess this is something related to actually “Growing up”.

So today I decided to make Veg. Hakka Noodles. Quite a basic recipe really,

1.boil the noodles.

2. cut all the vegetables that you want to put in (onion, capsicum and cabbage for me)

3. drain the noodles and keep aside

4. heat up oil in another wok and put all the vegetables in and toss it up.

5. add the noodles and mix them up real nice.

6. add soya sauce, vinegar and salt.

7. add schezwan sauce if available.

8. toss up and serve J

For me, I did make a couple of mistakes like the salt was less and I sorta over cooked the noodles, but I guess I should be allowed these silly mistakes, I am still learning no? But other than that It was perfect. And in the adrenaline rush which went up inside me when my mom said, “its actually pretty good” I even cleaned all the vessels J

Movie Directed By Me

Hello People, here is a link to a movie made my me and my friends for a College Project. Do watch it and let me know your views :) 

Thank You!

The bestest shopping place in Mumbai

I am a big fan of the accessories you get to buy in Mumbai’s local train and in all those small shops which you are bound to miss out on. I have a few things picked up from all these small shops and local trains, and they are as cheap as 20bucks.  Some of the accessories we get to buy in those big big malls are so costly that you have to think twice before buying it and they are so small and delicate that I usually misplace them within a month, and if you fall in this league as well then these train accessories are just for you, you don’t have to bother about they getting misplaced and you can always have loads of accessories to match with your outfit J

These are some which I got in the local train for 10bucks each J

I love this one the most… love those little butterflies in there. I had one with little heart in it as well, misplaced it butL

Got this off Sobo Central, Ahemdabad. They are for `75/- but I really liked them. They are named as “Tribal range” something.

Something in Silver

Got this from Ahemdabad Kite flying festival  For `10/-

Got this just yesterday in a local train  for `20/-

These biggg earrings do look good sometimes, on traditional wear, or with a kurti.

Jhumkas from Law Garden, Ahemdabad. She initially told me  `500/-  for them, then after bargaining it bagged it for `100/- J

Got them yesterday along with the one I posted above… same price `20/-  I liked them for daily wear. It can be matched with almost everything.

Coming now to Bangles, Kadas… I am not much of a bracelet person always found it way too delicate for me to handle.

Starting from the right – Golden with little design on it for `50/-  from local train J

The second golden and brown from Bhuleshwar, Girgaun fro ` 250/-

The small silver one for `75/- from Bhuleshwar,Girgaun

Got all 3 from Rajkot, Gujrat for a total of  `275/-

These are just local buys, shouldn’t be much costly say `50/- for 4 of them.

These are my most FAVORITE, they look heavy but are really not. You don’t have to wear loads of bangles, just one of these is enough. You can wear it at some family function.

The golden is for `200/-  and the silver one is for `100/-  from Bhuleshwar, Girgaun.

This is a gift. J

So to sum up the whole post, the best shopping places are the ones which are generally neglected.. like the Local Trains, The shops at the very end of the lane etc J we don’t always need to go to Fashion Street, or Linking Road or Hill Road. There are some other places in Mumbai where you get a very good bargain.

Homemade Bookmark!

And Easy and fun way to make your own Bookmarks at home… and whats better?? You can make it out of all the useless things in your house…

What you need –

Old greeting card or invitation ( if you have the envelop as well its better )

Old magazines

Glue

Scissors

A ribbon / wool

Fancy stickers ( you can skip this)

Cut the greeting card and the envelop in a shape / size you want your Bookmark to be….

You can stick the sides which are printed together so you get two blank sides on the either side of the paper… it also makes the bookmark strong

You should get something like this

Cut out shapes or designs from the magazine… you can use the colorful papers which you find in magazines. 

Or else you can cut out your name from the magazine…

Now go wild and stick the designs, shapes, your name etc on the bookmark

Take  a woolen string or a ribbon

Use a paper punching machine and punch a hole on the top of the bookmark... use a ribbon or a wool and tie it up through the hole… Decorate with stars or hearts or fancy stickers if you wish...

Annndddd there you go… your Bookmark is ready :D

Happy Reading!