New Traveller's Notebook

In my post on Planning 2016, I said that I'd ordered another Traveller's Notebook, to hold the booklets in which I'll be doing my writing and publishing planning in 2016. But, what did I choose??

I considered whether to get a Field Notes sized cover as I have a heap of Field Notes booklets and I could have easily used them to do my goals to next action planning. Except they are not fountain-pen friendly! It would have annoyed me far too much to have the plans I want to keep, written in biro on rubbish paper (sorry to all you Field Notes fans out there). So, it needed to be good paper for the notebooks and a cover I would want to use all the time.

Midori TN or A5 size then? I had some 013 booklets that would be okay with fountain pens and quite a few A5 booklets (or they could be cut down to Midori size from A5 if necessary).

Well, the aspect ratio of A5 always pleases me more than Midori's tall and skinny size, but, A5 was going to be a touch too big to be honest, and since I had a couple of the 013 Midori inserts I could use for planning, Midori TN size it was. But which cover? There's the original Midori ones in black or brown or a whole range on non-Midori brands on Etsy to choose from.

I much prefer a stiff cover to a floppy one and I can never tell from people's pictures or videos whether the Midori TN is a stiff cover or a floppy cover (maybe someone can tell me in the comments?). I also need a colour pop. I've too many discarded Filofaxes which testify to that! So, I ordered a non-Midori TN cover (also called 'Fauxdori', but I'm not a great lover of the term). I ordered it from Sun Leaves on Etsy (https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SunLeaves) and chose the blue colour (K on the drop down menu) with black elastics and my initials embossed in the bottom right hand corner (the way I have them on my red Traveller's Journal from Stamford Notebook Company).

I really liked the look of the ones in Sun Leaves, because the edges of the leather had been finished nicely (too often, it's just the raw edge of the leather but these are hand-finished - bevelled and burnished) and they didn't have the brass bit sticking out of the spine (which I feared would scratch my desk!). There's a great selection of colours to choose from, getting the initials embossed was included and you could choose the colour of the elastics too. I had a long look at un-dyed leather ones too, especially on Eternal Leather Goods (https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/EternalLeatherGoods) but I didn't like the brass sticking out of the spine. The un-dyed leather would turn a beautiful caramel shade in time, but it may take longer if it's a TN that stays on my desk, rather than travels with me.

So, winging its way to me is a blue TN cover from Sun Leaves. We won't get any post until the 5th January, but hopefully it will arrive soon after that! Pictures and another post when it gets here!