In-the-bag test of the Baroque (part 2)

Well, how is it all turning out? A bit of a Curate’s Egg.

How have I set it up?

Largely as I thought I would.

Anatomy:

The Baroque looks smooth on the outside, but when you open it up – wow! There is this fabulous embossing (which is what made me buy it!). It is a decidedly pretty filofax.

On the left it has a full height, zipped pocket. This could be used for coins but I have my business cards in it. Behind that are 6 half-height pockets and one full height pocket. On the right-hand-side it has a slot for a notepad (though this could also be used as another pocket) and the thinnest pen-loop you can imagine! I have managed to get my slim Parker ball-point in there (Parker Sonnet) and there is no slack. The mini pen I got free from filofax with the Gourmet set just about goes in there as long as you don’t want it to go in as far as the clip. I’ve found the loops on my A5 Finchley (strangely, just the red one…) to be tight too. [The ones on my jade Finchley are quite roomy and I can easily get a Frixion pen in them.] Anyway, the Baroque has the mini FF pen in there but it looks a bit odd as it is only half in the slot. Maybe it will stretch a bit with use?

Set-up:

First up I have a pocket (sadly slightly opaque) with a card from Malawi in of guinea-fowl, made from feathers. These were being sold in aid of a school when I was there and I just adored them. I bought about 10 packs of the cards and everyone always likes them. Anyway, it’s in there to remind me of Malawi and to make me smile.

the little birds always make me smile

Behind it I have a clear plastic page and then a home-made organisation-sheet to indicate what’s behind the different tabs. These are three of the four buckets: to-do, diary and information. Immediately behind the home-made sheet are about 20 pages of note-paper to act as a landing pad. Some of this is filofax paper but most of it has been salvaged from old non-filofax organisers that were in the cupboard!

See what I mean about the pen!?

The to-do list is self-explanatory – it covers everything in my life I have to do, except the stuff from purgatory work. I have also put shopping lists in here on a separate page.

The diary – I am using up the city-dweller diary that came in the Gourmet filofax, but I’m glad I need it for nothing more than an aide-memoire as the unremitting grey and tiny font is already driving me crazy. If the in-the-bag trial works out, I will get a lined, WO2P for next year and insert notepaper between the pages to use for my daily-list. At the moment I am just writing the daily-list on the bit where I am supposed to note ‘life’ and ‘play’ things. My handwriting seems to have miniaturised itself too to fit on the diary bit! Not a long-term ideal.

TINY writing needed for the diary bit...

In the information section, I currently have a bit of a mish-mash of things – the personal info,  SOS, travel itinerary, dilemmas, commuter games, top takeaways, fitness plan (nice juxtaposition I thought…) and www pages (all from the city dweller pack). The rest of the guff in the city dweller pack is in a ‘top-up’ non-filofax organiser, along with spare sheets for everything else. Tucked behind this plethora is another home-made divider labelled notes and is the place where I have noted things to look out for (books, websites, blogs etc) and then an A-Z with contacts.

I love these calligraphy animals

Right at the very back (acting largely as a protector since it is empty) is a credit-card holder. In time, I may be so used to carrying this around that I combine my wallet with it. There’s plenty of credit-card space and the zipped pocket could get used for coins (or I could shift the purse-hack out of the mini into it).

Check back in a week to see whether it is still making it into the bag with me!

In-the-bag test of the Baroque (part 1)
The Personal Baroque (part 3)
The Turquoise Baroque is here…