A note on planning: The administration of creation

Since I have been asked a few times, on how I plan my mail art mailings and swaps, I have been thinking about it and what the most effective way is to keep an administration of creation. At the moment (at it has been this way for a while) I have planning systems all over the place: in my midori passport and in the full size. I have stuff on my phone planner, on my swap-bot Dashboard, facebook event pages reminders, notes on my desk... and just trying to remember it all by heart. So in short, it's all over the place (and nowhere specifically). But I know (and have done so in the past) that there is a more efficient system to keep track of all these swaps/mailings. Let me share my past plannings first with you.

What I have done to keep track of my 365 Mail Art project in 2012/13 is getting an undated planner, a beautiful one above is with art from Gennine Zlatkis published by Chronicle books, to fit my needs for the administration log on  which mail art item number is sent to whom. I also took a photo of every mail art item I send out (I still do) and logged it in my photo albums and home and on flickr. It took me over a year but I did finish off the 365 project and also did a few Bonus numbers because I has 4 weeks left in the planner.

If you follow the above picture to my flickr album, you'll find a discussion on this very topic from a few years ago! On each piece I also stamped a journal stamp (from Artemio set) and wrote the number and year on it. For mail art sent in 2014 and 2015 I used the monthly pages in the beginning of the book to keep track or mail. And eventually filled the book up completely. So this systematic way of keeping track of sent mail art worked perfectly, as it was a project with my own time and deadlines and had a specific book to log it all in. 

But this year keeping track of things like this didn't work out as smoothly. I started to log it in my undated monthly MTN planner, but I also do my Monthly updates in there and I just forget to log my mail art in there as well. Also now I have a bit of a problem with keeping track of the serial number because I am making a bunch of mail art but sending them out later for swaps that fit the description. And my log numbers got a bit screwed up ...

Whoops! But I've started to get better at it again!

The fact that a monthly calendar system did help me out in the past, I decided to get the midori passport size monthly planner of this year (hey, it was on sale!) to fill in the daily prompts for the CZC. I then stamp a little mushroom in it to note which ones I have done. It works for me because it's an every day carry item for me and when I have some time to look over the prompts and get an idea, I just flip through my turquoise craft ideas book in the same midori to write down or sketch some specific ideas I have. And look, I'm nearly caught up with the CZC prompts!

This craft idea's book is used to note thoughts I have on certain swaps and quotes I find interesting etc. It's become my inspiration book for when I'm on the road and need to jot in some crafty thoughts. 

I am really interested to know; do you keep an administration of your creations? How do you log your mail out goings and what items do you use for it? I would definitely appreciate a comment below with your thoughts on the subject. It might be of help to my new set up and I will keep you all updated on my endeavors on this as well. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day! 

Namasté

Paper Goods: On a field trip with Fieldnotes Pocket Notebook

At the beginning of this month a fun bi-annual event took place in Haarlem, the Stripdagen. I went there on Sunday afternoon and it was so much fun! The weather was great and there was so much to see and to do. I decided to bring along a little pocket book and asked various artists to sketch in them, like I did last time.

This year I took with me a Fieldnotes pocket notebook for the artists to sketch in. I kindly received a mixed Compilation set from Mishka from Bureau Direct for review purposes and it's great for an every day carry. Lightweight and a great small size (a6) for a purse/handbag or a back pocket.

In the compilation set you will receive 3 Fieldnotes pocket notebooks (I received a mix of ruled, plain and graph paper, but you can get a 3 pack of any of the variations mentioned), one Fieldnotes band of rubber and one click ballpoint. It came in very nicely packaged in a Bureau Direct Logo plastic sleeve. I decided to take the graph notebook with me on this trip and I have a few shots of it being used in action. I asked all whom wanted to participate to draw me a kitty :)

The first drawing in the book is done by Leslie Saurus. I really love her artwork!

Also got a fun drawing from Doeke from Studio Doeke. He was a cheeky one and did not draw a cat for me, like last year he simply refused to do that. But he did make a fun drawing in there none the less. I suppose it will be a running gag from now on, in two years he will not draw a cat for me either ;)

And of course, when you love cats, Anne from Pony People cannot be missed in the compilation! Here she is drawing one of her cute kitties (similar to the ones you see on the T-Shirts on her stall) in my book.

Her stall was so cutely decorated with these fun cat balloons! And look at those cute pins! I definitely got one of the pencil kitties for myself.

Lots of kitties drawn in my @fieldnotesbrand notebook at the #stripdagenhaarlem yesterday :) Thanks so much everyone :) #kittycat #comic #drawn #notebook #edc #everydaycarry #bureaudirect #stationeryaddict #collection #fieldnotes #kitties #catsareawesome

A video posted by cheetarah (@missthundercat) on Jun 6, 2016 at 4:54am PDT

I do not have an in action shot of all the drawings, but here is a video of all the drawings made in the book. People used all kinds of materials to draw in it, like pencils, fineliners and even sharpies. I asked them to use one page and not the back because I didn't want any drawings being over lapped by bleed through. It was a fun and successful fieldtrip and the notebook was almost filled up all the way. At the end I added some kitty stamp prints on the cover of the notebook and named it "the kitty edition".

The kitty related loot from the Stripdagen. I definitely support cat-loving poor artists! Everything is super awesome, but the best thing I got was a customized drawn pin of Meesha (left to the notebook) which says "It's always nap time". And yes Meesha is currently napping in her new basket as I write this.

Soooo adorable!

I hope this gave you some idea's on how to make your Fieldnotes Pocket Notebook a special limited edition one :) The next comic con in Amsterdam is in August and I am hoping to collect more kitty drawings in the other pocket notebooks as well. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day.

namasté