Guest Post - Nellie - One Life, One Filofax

I was interested to read on Friday’s FFAF about people’s views on One Life, One Filofax. I did use to run two. A Personal for home and an A5 for work. In the end I abandoned the A5 as it all go too complicated and the A5 was too heavy and big to carry back and forth from the office. So, I was ruthless and sat down and thought about what I really needed to carry with me. My A5 had all sorts in there... recipes, newspaper clippings, vouchers, business cards, lists, work info... Did I really need it all? When was the last time I was in the office, and thought “where is that recipe for oat biscuits?”...

So, here is what I do now:

For Work Notes:

I have a day book, a hardback bound book where all my notes from the day go. Each morning I review my calendar (we use outlook at work) and make a list in my day book on what needs to be done, who I need to see, call etc. I refer to this constantly and it is with me all day, in fact I am almost welded to it. This means my Filo isn’t full up of notes which I may need to refer to at some point, but I don’t need access to at short notice. The daybook stays in the office. My Filo goes backwards and forwards from home to office with me, but whilst at work it sits on my desk open at the diary page.

Now for my Filo set-up:

I use a Personal Almond Amazona,

I really love the pocket in the front of this. I use it to keep things like stamps, and a card my lovely hubby sent me, and also some emergency contact details I need to carry. I like to have inserts which make me smile, and as you can see I have an Agatha Christie theme at the moment. I change these every few months when I get bored! I also have a 4 colour Lamy pen in the pen loop.

Diary Tab: First I have a Christie book art page.

Appointment with Death – Appointments! Diary! Ok, it’s a bad pun, but I like it! I use a week on 2 pages, cotton cream inserts. I like these as they have a notes box at the top above Monday.

The photo shows a fairly quiet week, normally they are busier than that. For reasons unknown even to myself I started drawing the weather on each day. Does anyone else do this, or doodle on their diaries? There is no colour coding, other than red is stuff I really mustn’t forget! All appointments go in here, personal and work. Each Sunday I review the coming week to make sure everything is prepared. I did try one day per page, but needed the over view of the week. I also used the day planner inserts for a while, but that just took time to fill them out, and I found when I was sat at my desk my Filo was nearly always open at the week to view pages, so what was the point? 

To-Do: I used to use the to-do lists by Filofax, but it really wasn’t working as I never looked at them. So now, I take a normal lined piece of Filofax paper and cut it in half and put half between the two sheets of the weekly diary. This way it doesn’t block everything, but the list is still there to remind me to review it.

Anything which is time dependent eg. Renew car insurance, book 6 monthly check up at dentists etc, I write in the notes box in the appropriate week in the diary. When it comes around I transfer it to the to-do list. If I put it on a separate piece of paper I will forget about it! 

Notes Tab: Under the notes tab I have lists of things. Eg. Shopping lists, reading lists, blog entry ideas, reference lists etc

Some are work related some are not. It’s my general capture area and so has some blank lined and unlined paper. I used to hate unlined paper until I started using Filofax. Now I like it as I can draw mindmaps when I have ideas, little doodles, sketches etc.

Projects Tab: This is for health information, to help me keep on track with my goals. I have a pull out yearly calendar where I mark off what exercise I have done.

Information Tab: This has a London Underground Map, plus reference information like hospital numbers, membership numbers etc. 

Finance Tab: This is empty at the moment

Addresses Tab: I like to have addresses on paper as I have lost too many phones to be sure of their safety! I took out the A-Z dividers as they just added bulk.

I have a business card holder at the back for appointment cards etc.


I am now a great believed in One Life One Filo (OLOF!) and since I have used my Filo only to help me with planning rather than storing stuff which might be useful at some point, I have found things have been much more efficient (and less bulky!). The conclusion I came to is that Filo is about planning, not data storage, and separating the two has made all the difference to me.

Thank you 'Nellie' for a great insight in to how you use your Filofax.