Wednesday 21 February 2018

All Change! Planning & Prompting - How A Notice Board Will Help Improve My Blog...

Disclaimer: I haven't been paid to promote any products, just sharing my latest little project that's making me ridiculously happy x

Hi Honeys,
How is everyone?  Here we are running towards the last week of February and the days are getting a little longer, the skies a little brighter and today we've reached the lofty temperature of 8 degrees! That's almost a Summers day here ๐Ÿ˜Š

In an effort to make up for last year, when our dreams of an organised, down-sized home were knocked off track by my health issues, I'm trying to set in place some organisational systems to help us to get back on track.

My latest project though is aimed squarely at myself, and at getting this blog back up and running.

Planning and prompting - How a notice board will help improve my blog...

So, having determined to (try) to get myself back on track this year I thought I'd start by actually planning my blog posts. Yep, you heard me dear ones.  "Rosie! You mean you don't have squillions of posts scheduled months ahead?" I hear you say..... Well, no honeys.  In my drafts folder right now there are... I'll check and do a screen cap for you....

Blog posts waiting in draft

Well, look at that! I passed 500 posts without noticing. Oh dear.  That actually makes me feel quite bad.  That's worth celebrating isn't it? Oh well, missed opportunities are no stranger I'm afraid, honeys ๐Ÿ˜ฉ  Well, anyway, as you can see there are 43 posts sitting there waiting for me to do something with them.  Maybe finish editing photos, writing text for the photos I've taken, all in differing stages of completion, they're all sitting there waiting but as for scheduled posts there are none.

You see that's one of the (many) issues I have to address with this blog and I hope that I'm making a (tiny) start on that project today.   Let's take a look will we?
Backing up my posts is something I've always done (you can see how here honeys) after all, a lot of work has gone into each of those posts but planning.....

Almost every single post I've written so far has been written on the day it's been published.  I haven't ever used a planner or diary to write/plan ahead of myself, instead I write a post when I'm inspired.  I've (very rarely) written a post and scheduled it to be published on another or next day but never more than one.

Mostly, I wander around with ideas in my head of what to write about next of course, which might be jotted down into a notebook but that's about as far as it goes.  This blog means a great deal to me honeys it really does.  The fact that lovely readers like you also visit means even more. Thank you for that dear ones, I wish I could hug you for keeping me company ๐Ÿ’–๐Ÿ’‹

It's time to get serious about this little blog and give it the care and attention it deserves. I'm really not even sure what that means exactly yet but I thought I'd try to take a step in the right direction and be more deliberate in the planning of my posts.

To that end, I thought I'd set up a system I think will work to not only capture post ideas as I have them throughout my day but to also act as a prompt to remind me to actually keep to some kind of a schedule in writing them.

A New Planning & Prompting System For Rosie's Cottage


Items used for this project were: 


one (small) picture ledge (the smaller of the two MOSSLANDA picture ledges from Ikea)
one magnetic notice board 60 x 40 cm (which was supplied with 3 magnets and a small pen)
one eraser/pens pack - found this at Asda (Walmart) it was around £1 

A New Magnetic Notice Board Now Sits At The Bottom Of The Stairs Ready To Capture Passing Thoughts For Blog Posts Or To Make Plans For Things To Do

Above, with apologies for the dreadful photo quality, is the notice board sitting on the picture ledge, with the pack of accessories (eraser & pens) sitting in front.  It is just impossible to take photos, even using a flash in this corner.  It's always dark and in shadow even with both the hall and stair lights on.

There is a large window (as you can see from the curtain nearby) right next to this little area, directly at the bottom of our stairs but something just seems to swallow up the light.  Ordinarily I'd solve this by hanging a mirror of some kind facing the window to reflect all of the lovely natural light from the window over into this corner but there is simply no wall to hang a mirror onto.

The window faces the half-glass door (it's very beautiful actually honeys, it has a design of a rose etched into it) leading to the living room and facing the little wall this project is taking place on is the all glass door to the kitchen.  It is what it is I'm afraid honeys.

This little wall where we begin our project is, like the rest of the lower hallway and the walls of the staircase themselves, covered in a layer of artex.  Just looking at this image makes me despair, it really does.

Artex was a trend/fad very popular from the late 1970s onwards and can be found everywhere, walls, ceilings... just yuk!  If it's the last thing we do we'll banish it from our home but that'll be quite a job honeys since the last owners seem to have been determined to cover every last surface in it.

Eradicating all of this artex would also make such a mess too as well as cause me no small amount of trouble in breathing no doubt because of my asthma.  I was advised by a friend at work to just have someone plaster over it all to leave lovely smooth walls to begin decorating anew and I think that might be what we'll do.

Back to my little project then ๐Ÿ˜Š First task was to fit the small picture ledge to the wall, which Hubby did for me, thank you sweetheart x

A New Planning & Organising System Began By Installing A MOSSLANDA picture ledge From Ikea

Next day, with laundry all done and Hubby at work, I set about tidying and organising this little space, setting up the notice board and adding some beautiful, wise owls for inspiration ๐Ÿ˜Š

A New Planning & Organising System - a new magnetic notice board sits on the picture ledge with magnets, a pen and an eraser

I do love these owls ๐Ÿ˜Š The largest is a cookie jar and I found him in the Asda (Walmart) sale a while ago and Hubby bought the three small owls, in their see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil poses for me a while ago too from Poundland of all places.

Birds of a feather flock together as the old saying goes and I think they look rather good all sitting together.  What do you think honeys?

On the noticeboard itself I attached the pen supplied with it, which I was very pleased to find was magnetic.  The large board eraser from the set bought in Asda is also magnetic and so that too went onto the board.

A New Planning & Organising System - Both the pen and eraser are magnetic making them easy to store and keep track of

This is super helpful because it'll keep them nearby and help prevent them being lost although they could just as easily have found a home on the picture ledge itself, in front of the notice board.

Next I added a few magnets, the little green, yellow and blue dot ones were supplied with the notice board and the other three were in my box of magnets.  Does anyone else remember the Groovy Chick character? 

A New Planning & Organising System - On the other side of the notice board are some cool magnets and a reminder to make every day fabulous :)

I then scribbled a message, make today fabulous, to remind myself that each day is what we make of it and my new blogging planner was all set to go ๐Ÿ˜Š

I know I must be very "late to the party" on the idea of planning posts ahead. Everyone does that, right? but now is as good a time as any to change how I plan my blog posts and if I'm able to plan ahead a little more maybe this blog won't go so quiet when I'm not feeling very well.  I'm actually feeling very positive about this idea honeys, what do you think?

Over to you dear ones, any suggestions, ideas or pointers would be gratefully received ๐Ÿ’–๐Ÿ’‹  Till next time, smile lots, hug even more and enjoy the sunshine we're lucky enough to be seeing, yaaay Spring is on her way ๐Ÿ˜Š huggles always xx

Huggles Always, Rosie xx

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