Guest Post - Helen - Aston Personal Set Up

In response to the requests on my Reader under the Spotlight article here is the first in a series of posts about my various set ups. This one is about my planner, which as you can see is in a Personal Mushroom Aston. I like the simple elegance of this design. Grown up, I think. It gives me the illusion that I am too. I chose it to be my personal because it was one design where I didn’t like any of the colours of the A5.

However when I first got it, I thought that there was an irritating design fault. Let me show you on the Orchid Aston which I also have but have not set up with anything too exciting as yet. See how the front cover seems not to quite meet the right hand edge so that the papers show a little? But there is plenty of slack in the closing strap. It annoyed me a bit until I worked out how to use it to my advantage.

So, let’s open it up. I expect the first thing you notice is the pen solution. I had moved down from an A5 planner and only having one pen loop was a challenge as I like to colour code entries. However that extra fullness allows for me to put two Staedtler Triplus fineliners here and it then closes beautifully.

The pen holding method is probably unnecessarily complex but it pleases me. Stiff card would do the trick. This is two layers of fabric bonded to a layer of Pelmet Vilene ( the stuff that makes curtain pelmets stiff) and edged with zigzag stitch on a sewing machine. The fabric makes me happy to see as I bought it when visiting fellow Philofaxy reader Diane Perin Hock when on a big three month round the world trip so it holds good memories whenever I open the filofax.

Also in the pocket behind the pen clip I have some stickers and in front a car breakdown service card, a European Health Card, a Tesco voucher ( for days when guilt free chocolate expenditure is required) and a collection of sticky notes. Grown up sticky notes from cavallenini – they come in a lovely tin like this.

Behind a plastic fly sheet I have a detail from an Aboriginal art work. I just photocopied it from a book. Again it reminds me of the Round the World trip. There is another on the back. Sadly the trip was pre my Filofax usage – what a missed opportunity!!

 

I have three diaries. First the official tabbed monthly. This is for overview purposes, mainly so I can see when I have weekends away or at home and to dedicate to my creative work. At the bottom I have added in some information from my studio journal about the projects I have timetabled. It is pencil because I anticipate an element of change. This is new use for this space which I picked up from a webfinds video. The project planner will be the subject of my next guest post.

Behind the monthly I have carry forward dates and a record of how many days holiday I have used from work and for what.

Then is the weekly diary. In front of it I have the filofax supplied years summaries. Although this is a personal planner I do have it on my desk at work with me and I often turn to this when timetabling cases into the future. I am just starting to personalise this Filo a little more, again using stickers from Cavellnini. These are not cheap but, with respect to all of the rest of you, I am not a girly Paperchase sticker person. But I do love travel and letters so this tin was irresistible. I am awaiting some washi tape of a similar nature from the US to really allow me to personalise more. I will show you when that arrives from the States if Steve permits![Steve: But of course you will be allowed!]

At the front of my weekly section I have am Ideal Week sheet. This is something I picked up from Michael Hyatt’s regular emails. Rather than explain it I ma better giving you the link to his explanation here. It is not a rigid thing rather a reminder to include all the types of activity in my life that I would like to be there. And a reminder that there is only so much time to go around and it has to be apportioned.

I am then using the Olympic Inserts that I look from the £7 Lineburst binder I got from Staples that is now a health journal (and yes, I will be showing that too). This has room for appointments well into the future and also I use the notes page for weekly goals. My colour coding is, green for creativity, red for exercise and black for pretty much everything else. I use the brown today ruler to mark my place in this section.

This diary changes from a weekly to a diary for the period of the games which kind of messes up my usage but is very useful for ensuring I know when to be glued to the TV! Next year I will use a plain week to a page with notes.

Then I have daily pages. I have already mentioned on a guest video some of the problems I had with these pages and my ineptitude with printing. But now I have them sussed and I really like the space to write what I plan to do, what I actually do and lists of to dos and general jottings. I use the Olympic ruler for this section and have begun to jazz it up with the stickers but I can do better on that when my washi tape arrives!

I keep about 5 – 6 weeks of daily pages in the filofax at a time. I than have a plastic envelope for ephemera. Currently it has some travel tickets for an expense claim I need to do.

Then a finance section. I don’t want to show the personal details here so I’ll just say it details my personal budget and what the money in my current account is allocated for on lined paper and I use the Filofax expense inserts to note down what I spend and mark that with a second brown ruler. I might do a post with fake entries on my method of using a Filofax to deal with budgetary things if anyone is interested?

In the to-do section I have just a few lists as mostly I put the to dos on daily pages so I can see them. That allows me to allocate them to a day when there is time to do them rather than have an ongoing never-ending list. but there will always be some rolling lists of non- times specific tasks. Yes, I have a to do list of the things I want to do with my Filofaxes! I have a list of films I want to see on love film, local art shows I want to see but have not yet scheduled a date for, journal prompts and at the moment a list of books bought/ read but I am probably going to transfer that back to an A5 soon.

The note section is not well used. It does hold instructions on how to use my printer for filofax inserts ( that is not guarantee of success foe me!) mostly this is black paper in case I want to scribble something down or give a note to someone else. Most of my notetaking proper will be in a A5 which I usually also have with me. I have another plastic envelope for oddments I want to tidy up but have no real place for, at the moment it has a picture of a mural I found inspiring, a list of CDs my husband wanted for his birthday and a receipt for a piece of kosher parchment I bought from Israel (it seemed essential to an art quilt at the time but it turned out its wasn’t!) and the label from a set of wind chimes I bought in California. I clear that out from time to time and put them somewhere more appropriate or trash the bits that are outdated. I then have address indexes which actually have addresses behind them.

The zipper pocket is currently empty. My pen is a waterman roller ball. It was part of a set I used for work ages ago but I lost the fountain pen and this was all lonely in a drawer until the Filo arrived to play with it.

And that’s my planner. Does what it says on the tin with the minimal of fuss!

Thank you Helen, lovely to see the full details of your Aston set up... next week you will get to see Helen's Malden...

Laurie's personal Aston as Financial Filofax

Now that I'm trying to become homeowner, I have to stick to a strict budget. I know Personal Finances 101: the first step to sticking to a budget is to track all expenditures.

Last fall I used Expenses pages in my Filofax to track my expenditures, and it was really good except I never did anything with the information. This time it's for real: I have to calculate how much I'm spending each month on groceries, gas, and other expenses so I know if I'm sticking to the budget or if I'm overspending and need to cut back. So I write everything I spend into the Expenses pages in my Filofax, then at the end of each month I'll break down the totals by category.

For a few days I used my Aston as my wallet too. I used the full-length pocket inside the front cover for cash and the zip pocket in the back for coins.  My cards went in the slots inside the front cover. But I discovered this was harder to deal with than my wallet. Maybe I'm just used to my wallet, but I found the Filofax-as-wallet was too fiddly. I had the cards and cash in the front, but had to flip to the back to fish out coins. I had to flip to the expenditures pages to write in the amount while waiting for my change or for my card to process. It just didn't work well for me so I went back to my wallet, and now I usually put my receipts in my wallet to write in later when I have more time.

In addition to tracking expenses, I'm tracking gas (petrol) usage to get an idea of how much my car uses. I have a sheet of paper where I write the Date, Place I filled up, Price per Liter, Number of Liters I bought, and Total cost. That way I can see how often I fill up, and see price trends so I know which places usually have the cheapest prices.

Recently I became a member of one of those bulk-buying stores. I keep a list in my Aston of things to buy there, because I plan to only go once per month or less so I need to keep a running list.

I'm also making a list of items I buy periodically (like printer ink cartridges) with price comparisons at different stores. Whenever I happen to be in each store, I'll write the price of each thing so the next time I need to buy, I'll know which store to buy at.

I'm compiling a list of one-time purchase items we'll need for the house. There are some big-ticket items, like a lawnmower and electric hedge trimmer, all the way down to more mundane things like a mop and bucket. I'll note prices at different stores so when it's time to buy these I'll know where to get them.

And, I'm making a wish list and gift list for myself and family members, so when something we want goes on sale I can remember to buy it.

Because this Filofax goes everywhere in my bag with me, I also write things down that I want to do in the local area or elsewhere in Scotland. I'm always seeing notices for cool events that are coming to the castles near me, concerts, cultural events and other fun stuff. Now with my Aston handy I can capture all this information before I forget.

Also, in the front of my Filofax I keep Emergency information and numbers, car insurance info, and the Home Sweet Home form from the Family Lifestyle Pack for quick-reference numbers for utility companies, phone/ internet and mobile providers, etc.

I don't use this Filo as my planner, but I do use a monthly calendar in it to record coupon expiration dates so I can use them before they expire.  I also write in bills' due dates, and I keep a list of recurring annual expenses (car insurance x 2, MOT inspections and car tax x 2, Life and Accident insurance, Home insurance, etc.). Keeping a list of these dates and amounts due reminds me to save a little each month for these to avoid being surprised with a big outlay when they are due.

I have a Sticky Notes accessory because I use sticky flags to mark my lists. I refill the accessory with tape flags from Tesco.

I also have my Filofax calculator on the rings for quick calculations.

And, I keep my contacts in the A-Z tabs for easy reference.

I use Business Card holders in the back of the Aston to hold business cards and my library card.

Sorry no photos but since this is all personal/ financial info there's nothing I can really show you!  If you want more specifics just let me know. :)

Aston Filofax in Orchid

I've had a lot of people asking me about my personal Aston in Orchid, what the color is like, how is the leather, etc. Here is my full report!

The Aston, like other luxury Filofaxes, comes in a nice Filofax box.

The stitching is beautiful.

I've had a lot of people ask me about the color, which is pretty well represented here (on my computer at least). It is a pinky purple. I would call it a dark mauve.  The stitching is lighter, more pink.

The inside layout has card slots and a full-length pocket in the front:

and a full length zip pocket in the back:

The leather is so incredibly flexible that the cover bends completely back easily (and there you can see my street in the background).

The Aston lays flat right out of the box. It comes loaded with the Cotton Cream diary, tabs and pages throughout.

The back of the binder has more of the beautiful stitching:

Another view of the front:

A good image of the color:

This shot with the flash shows the texture of the leather. It's not pebbly like the Finchley.

Many thanks to my dad who very generously gave me my Aston as a birthday present!!! Thanks Dad!

Filofax Aston - Review

The Filofax 'Aston' is one of the new styles released in 2011. As its name implies the Aston is at the luxury end of the product range. It is made from 'Deluxe Leather', the stitching detail as you will hopefully see from the photographs is quite delicate and very well done.

So how does the 'Aston' compare to the other organisers in the range... ones you will most probably be more familiar with.  My first impression when I opened the package was 'Finchley'. It has the same soft feel of the Finchley mini that I have. It is very soft to touch, but may be not as supple as say the Malden, but no were near as stiff as say a Finsbury or a Classic.

In pocket size the Aston has the following features:

• 19mm rings, yes I've measured them! This is the same as the Malden. 
• On the left hand side there are four horizontal credit card slots, and a full length vertical pocket behind them. 
• On the right hand side there is a leather zipped pocket. On the Finchley this is a mesh pocket, not as nice as the leather on the Aston in my opinion.  There is also an elasticated leather pen loop. 
• The Aston comes with cotton cream inserts: Diary(Week on Two Pages), To Do, Ruled paper, Addresses, Three letter index, Brown ruler.  

What the Aston pocket doesn't have is a full width exterior rear pocket, which the Finchley doesn't have either. But what it does mean is that the pocket size does lay flat virtually from day 1. I compared it to my 'broken in' Chameleon pocket, which does have the rear pocket and the Aston does lay flatter than the Chameleon pocket.  So the lack of the rear pocket or the ability to lay flat could be a decider for some people.

However, when I have tried the Aston out as a Wallet/Filofax and it holds everything that I need to carry: Passport, Drivers licence, Credit Cards. The rear pocket I only use for paper money and as I carry less and less of that these days, the lack of the rear pocket on the Aston wouldn't be a big issue for me.

So some pictures, this is the pocket size in Mushroom. The leather 'panels' reminded me of the crease lines you get on a car bonnet (or hood if you are in North America)

 

They continue on to the back of the organiser as well, but without the centre stitching, so just like a boot or trunk of a car.

Without the stationary you can see how flat the Aston lays. 

 

A close up of the inside front cover. 

And also a close up of the base of the spine, stitching all the different panels together must be quite a task, even if it might be done by a machine these days. 

And finally open with the cotton cream stationary back in place. 

The Aston is available at present in the following colours: Black, Chocolate, Orchid, Mushroom. It is available in Pocket, Personal and A5 sizes. and the prices range from £72 for the Pocket, £83 for the Personal and £125 for the A5. These prices are the same as the equivalent size Finchleys.

The Aston I'm told will be available on the Filofax website sometime in June 2011.

Aston Chocolate

Aston Orchid

I would like to thank Filofax for the opportunity to review this new model and for sending me this free sample.