Getting organised for the New School Year #StationeryWednesday

I have declared a break with convention in the DG home.

Rather than follow the more conventional calendar that runs from January to December, I will operate a calendar that follows the Academic year, from September through to August. It is such a frustration to receive the year’s events for the diary in September and then find I have to transfer all this data from one diary to another only three months or so later. Thus I am getting organised for the New School Year.

Handy therefore that I am now a fully fledged member of an Elite group of bloggers bound forever in a circle of love and trust over their obsession with stationery: the #StationeryWednesday Bloggers.

I have loved stationery since I was first issued a Stationery slip at Prep School and got to visit what can only be described as a Santa’s Grotto of wonderment, smelling of fresh paper and sharp pencils. It was probably no more than a cellar cupboard but my goodness it became my personal Mecca. For how could you fail to be organised when you had a brand new pack of narrow-lined paper and a dozen razor sharp HBs to do your bidding?

Indeed my organisational skills, honed in the grey and despairing slopes of the Yorkshire Dales (bear with me: I’m getting caught up in Romanticising stationery here) has been one of my strongest CV skills. Pre-childbearing I was able to hold my  calendar in my head, know where I was supposed to be- an when- on any given date. Even with DH added to the mix, and my various charges, I was a walking Almanac. But the childbearing years, the dog and the chickens, have all taken a toll on my timetable and now that Dimples has headed off to school I’m afraid my brain is fried.

So when Bureau Direct came calling with their #LOVEStationery blogger outreach I pounced on them. And now I get to pick something every month from their amazing online range of stationery to choose to test out and give my honest feedback on. I’m part of a team, so follow the hashtag to see what we’ve all been reviewing.

In my case, I chose the Quo Vadis Septanote** Diary in a fabulous azure blue colour. It has a week on a double page spread, each day broken down into times, with additional areas across the pages for notes and jottings. The paper diary refill fits flush with the pretty cover and the whole thing feels very sophisticated, so it’s perfect to sit on my kitchen table for everyone in the family to jot their appointments in. It has teeny tiny perforated corners to tear off so that you always know which page you are up to- though I have yet to master the Art of Neat Tearing. And at the back of the diary is a slew of pages for notes, the 2015/16 year-at-a-glance pages- so essential for forward planning, along with world maps, International Dialling codes and time zones which have fascinated The Girls.

An added bonus is the address book insert, which allows me to keep note of new addresses, emails and numbers that I need for daily life but don’t need to put in my address book. You cannot help but feel like life is under control with this in your hand! Because it’s refillable, it represents good value, even before you add the £24.95 price tag.

** The Septanote is currently not available online for you to look at, but the 2015 Quo Vadis Prenote has just come in and it is identical in terms of layout, design and price.**

Also included, an unexpected gift, was the Papelote notebook strap in pink, A5, which fits around the diary perfectly and is ideal for ensuring that I have pencil, pen and highlighter ready for use at all times.

And if you want to #StationeryWednesday,  sign up to the Bureau Direct newsletter,  delivered each Wednesday to your inbox.  An exclusive 10% discount code is shared on the first Wednesday of each month, so it’s absolutely worth the seconds it takes to sign up.