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Today's Word: une liste de tâches
: a task list, to-do list, work list
Audio file: click here to listen to the following sentence in French
Bullet Journal est une méthode d'organisation personnelle développée par le designer Ryder Carroll. Le système organise la planification, les rappels, les listes de tâches et d'autres fonctions organisationnelles dans un seul bloc-notes. Bullet Journal is a method of personal organization developed by designer Ryder Carroll. The system organizes scheduling, reminders, to-do lists and other organizational tasks into a single notebook. –Wikipedia
A DAY IN A FRENCH LIFE by Kristi Espinasse
I will jump right in and tell you what's exciting me for the new year…. BULLET JOURNALING!
I have been longing to go back to notebooks for some time, but this year–with the ever-spiraling bullet journal movement–I am going to put pen to paper and dive right in to an inky everafter….
Fact is I'm late to the party. Though I won't receive my carnet for another day or two, l've already begun blocking some pages–and can recopy or tape them into the agenda when it arrives! For that is the very nature of a "BuJo" (BUllet JOurnal)–we compose and assemble it any which way we please!
To begin a BuJo (it took a while to embrace the cutsey-trendy term, but embrace I have!) any blank book will do, but it is helpful to have a dotted, grided, or lined page. You then divide the notebook into sections…with an Index at the front that corresponds to the pages you will hand number. You will do that won't you? Hand number some pages and join me in this craze?
More like an anti-craze. Crazy are we when our minds are filled with information: to-dos, appointments, birthdays, dreams and lists. What better than to collect them all in one space–and with doodles! Perhaps this is what sets bullet journalists–les bujoteurs–apart: the unique ways in which they illustrate their calepins.
Because of this, there is a plethora of accessories available to the bullet journalist, or bujoteuse (feminine of bujoteur): everything from "washi" tape and stencil bookmarks to a rainbow of pens. But I'm starting with what I have, though I did buy a brand new blank book (with dots instead of lines or grids):
After carefully considering a handful of journals, I chose a purple hippo. I don't know why, must have been the confusing variety of choice or l'embarras de choix! With this journal (there are several colors and you can choose another animal (I got a cerf, or deer, for Jean-Marc) a percentage goes to the WWW charity. C'est bon!
Initially, I hesitated before the bullet journal idea: I already have an organized system in place. But my Google and my notes app lack that fully creative and visual je ne sais quoi that are a BuJo's raison d'être.
My reasons for beginning a BuJo include: wanting to spend less time online, the desire to focus on what is important (family, friends, this blog, landmarks) improve my chicken scratch handwriting, enjoy the hand-to-paper transfer of thoughts, and visually see the info in my head, organized and illustrated… or simply dumped out onto the paper….Indeed a popular page in a bullet journal is the Brain Dump, which I think sounds better in French La Vide Tête:
I also got a bullet journal (un journal à puces, in French) for Jean-Marc– hoping it will allow him to continue to dream, focus and find meaning in the new year. I'm hoping it will be a habit we add to our morning routine of coffee in bed and reading. A few ideas he might use to launch his journal:
He could begin the first pages with the customary index, future log (6 columns in which to glimpse the coming months), monthly calendar…and then the fun begins via "collections" (simply title a new page with something you'd like to list or track):
— Lists of places he has been and cities he would like to see
— His dreams( I know he would like to sail around the world…)
— A "wine finds" section
— A Future Project or "Someday" section….
— Health tracker, for running, biking, swimming…
— And why not more of his unique inventions 🙂
Also, he enjoys card games and puzzles: my hope is he will discover a game he can enjoy within his journal , something to quickly draw up and play (any suggestions?).
The list of possibilities is as endless as time–which gallops on! May we all harness it in, one page at a time, in the coming year.
In books => Read The Bullet Journal Method by Ryder Carroll
FRENCH VOCABULARY
le carnet = notebook, book
le cahier = exercise book, notebook
le calepin = notebook
la raison d'être = reason for being
un journal à puces = bullet journal
ouf = phew
aïe, aïe, aïe = ouch
I also got this book, in French, for fun and inspiration!
Our notebooks just arrived! I'm off to plan, dream, and doodle! If you'd like to order, here's a link to Jean-Marc's deer journal or pick the elephant…or the tiger or…
Discover more from French Word-A-Day
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I was just sitting down with my AM coffee to begin working on the new bullet journal I just purchased when I saw your post! Please keep us updated with how your BuJo evolves. I’ve never tried anything like it so am curious about the process. I’ve enjoyed reading your blog for many years!
Hi Kristi,
I haven’t been much of a journal keeper but my daughter journals and I am going to purchase a couple….one for her and one for me! Could be a great new thing for me!
I loved your entries and the one “plant mâche! 🙂 …. on of my favorites! Balance is a good one and also Re-set throughout the year. That’s great advice!
Bon Weekend!
Happy to see your note, Amy. Thanks for the encouragement to update. Enjoy your journal. Dive in 💕
Just want to say–up there in the new sponsor part, Paris is not the City of “Lights,” it’s the City of “Light.”
I’ve never heard of BuJo, but then I’m usually late to trends! But it does remind me of what I used to do in high school.
Thanks for the correction, Cyndy.
Eileen, One day weve got to take that cruise we talked about–and well bring our girls and our journals. I would love to take my BuJo on a vacation…and take the time to fill it with dreams, plans, and sketches. 🙂 P.S. glad you saw the mâche note 🥬
Very intriguing!!!
Is that your Mom’s hat? Does it give you inspiration?
I’ve been reading so much about bullet journals lately. But you are the first to actual explain what they are. I’m very intrigued. Thank you, Kristin! Happy bulleting!
Thanks, Angie! So many sites explain it much better. Your note means a lot. Merci encore.
Hi Sue, It looks very similar to one of Moms hats, but it is mine. It was a gift from my friend, Kirsten. It makes a great winter sunhat.
Who would have thought? A trend not related to technology! I’m in…
Our dear Kristi,
First of all,you always are in my prayers,but especially so now with chemo for your skin issue.Ouf and aie is an understatement!!Sending both courage and strength!!!
The Bullet Journal idea sounds terrific! Though I had already been journaling about the puppie’s first year,my gosh,what a coincidence with your wonderful post today(!!)I had just purchased a journal(with a Fleur de Lis on it!) for myself and started in on it on the first!! You ,as the always,give me inspiration to keep on!!
Thank you!!
Happy New Year!
Love
Natalia. Xo
Thank you, chère Natalia. No worries about the chemo, it is doing its job, and many people use it (effudex).
I love that you are journalling about your puppy. 🐾💕
Yay! Good to have you on board, Joan. I think we need that bullet journal cruise (I was talking to Julie about this in a Facebook thread. Yikes, technology had me confused about where I wrote that last message!) 🙂
Good for you, Kristi!
I have my own bullet-journal-type-thing–a large At-A-Glance datebook (it’s at least 8 x 10) with plenty of space for each weekday and about half as much (but enough) for the weekend days. Even though I have an online calendar, I live by this thing, too. It’s not as beautiful as yours, but it has the space I need. The pages change color according to the season. It has tabs for the month, and monthly calendars also.
Also, the dates and days are clearly legible. That’s surprisingly rare in datebooks, in my experience. So I keep reordering this one every single year.
Bonjour, Kristin,
When the weather warms why don’t you and J-M take a picnic and le BuJo and have an écrire en plein air date?
This is my first year in retirement after 40 years of teaching. When people ask what was the hardest part of my job, I have to say that instead of making my job easier, technology made it much harder. And when all the students were issued individual laptops, I felt like it was so much more challenging to get and hold their attention. It was almost as if I had been told, “Keep doing your usual good job, but we are going to give every one of your students a puppy to play with while you’re teaching!” How can an irregular French verb compete with playing with your puppy? Being the “guide on the side” instead of the “sage on the stage” was not a good switch for me. Maybe your journaling with archaic pens and paper is a sign that the pendulum is swinging back a little; I’d like to think so…
I love any type of paper notebook for scribbling ideas and thoughts. The bullet journal recently caught my attention at a coffee shop. Nice to see the bullet journal appear once again.
Kristi,
What a great change from the digital world. It might even help some younger people, millennials, who seem to have very poor penmanship or should I just say printing. You have enticed me to think about BuJoing. Keeping a journal is so beneficial to ones health, relaxation and vision of the past, for the present and future. Thank you.
Happy New Year and Peace, Kathleen
There are countless ideas on how to use bullet journals, and they’re all inspiring. I keep a Moleskine hard-cover planner, as well as a separate blank journal for all my stories, brain-dumps, and to document various tasks. I need to have paper and pens in my life.
That last photo of you at a cafe table is beautiful, Kristi. Happy New Year to you and your family!
Katia, Three days into bullet journalling and I can see the need for a separate journal to use as a diary. It will take time to get used to this system but, like you, I need pens and paper in my life so I will keep on. Thank you for your kind words about the photo. 💕
If the bullet journal works for you, that’s great! I might occasionally enter things into such a notebook, but for daily use, I have a pocket calendar and a small (about 3 x 4 in) notebook. They fit in my purse, so are always with me.
I have been making to-do lists ever since my mother got me a desk set (with a to-do pad) when I was 13. Now I make a list every day on the computer, which makes it easy to adjust, and to delete tasks as they are done.
Joan, I hear you! I taught for just a few years, and it was before all the technology we have now, and it was still hard to get kids to pay attention. You might like the article I read a few years ago in the paper. A college professor banned laptops from his classroom. He could see that students not only weren’t listening to him, they weren’t doing anything school-related on their computers. Prohibiting them was the only way he could sort of force them to be involved in his course. Nowadays many profs give assignments online, and I recently met a third-grader who had homework to do on a laptop. But I still think that the teacher who didn’t allow them was onto something.