Tips on Starting Your Bullet Journal

I started bullet journaling last year because I love being creative and creating my own planner sounded fun. I looked at some tutorials and learned some of the basic styles and tips.

I had no idea how much time I planned to spend each month until I started. Some of the themes I chose were more time consuming than others, but I enjoyed putting my time into those details. For example, my cover for October, my Beauty and the Beast month.

I will be posting some of my monthly covers, weekly spreads, and theme ideas in the future, but this post is some tips for getting started on your journal.

Tip #1: Find a good journal

Even if this is your first bullet journal, I would still get a good quality journal, because you will be using it all year. You want to be proud of your work at the end of the year!

For my bullet journal, I used the Leuchtturum 1917 Dotted A5 journal. I would highly reccomend this one because of the nice binding, the folder in the back, and page numbers. I also reccomend Moleskine journals which I have used for other things in the past.

I would most of all find a journal that has dotted pages, not lined or blank. If you have lines, then I think it hinders your drawings and illustrations on the pages. If you have a blank journal, you are more likely to have slanted lines where you want straight ones. The dots can help you equally space your weekly spreads and help you draw a straight line 🙂

Tip #2: Find art supplies that work for you

The pens I use for drawing all the lines and boxes for my schedules are Pigma Micron pens. They come in different thicknesses and the ink is also waterproof if you plan on doing any watercolor. I also use them for drawing some of my illustrations for the planner.

When I want to add some color to my journal, I use colored pencils, markers, pens, or watercolor paints.

I recommend prismacolor colored pencils because of the vibrant colors and the easy blending capabilities. Here is a picture of one of my spreads with colored pencils:

For markers, I have a variety of markers that I use and would not reccomend a specific brand, but comment below if you have any amazing marker suggestions for me that I can add!

I use Pilot G2 pens for colorful pen lines and details in my journal.

I reccomend for watercolors to use a small watercolor paint set (not the tubes of paint) and watercolor resivoir brushes. I like these because there is little mess. Also, before you start watercolor on your journal, make sure the pages can withstand watercolor and do not bleed. I know that the one I used (Leuchtturum 1917) withstands watercolor well.

Here is a spread where I used watercolor:

Tip #3: Starting the bullet journal

I would suggest that before you start with the first month you are beginning with, put a yearly goals page and a cover for the year. Here is a picture of my cover:

Tip #4: How to start your first month

Start your first month with a cover that you can put detail and creativity to showcase your month’s theme. Your theme can be anything from geometric patterns to Star Wars!

Then, make a calendar or schedule for the month, taking up as much space as you need, because it is your planner that is fully customizable based on your preferences! Also, have a small 6-inch ruler so you can have clean lines for all of your schedules.

After the schedule, start your weekly spreads which can vary in styles. Some are extremely organized with clean lines and others are conveying a story or theme for your month. Pinterest has some great spread layouts if you are stuck! If you are just starting, I would go with a more simple theme with a few illustrations, like the first spread I did for June:

Tip #5: Don’t go crazy with the extras

If you look on Pinterest, you probably will see some pictures of different kinds of “trackers” like mood, water, and fitness trackers. When I started, for the first few months I just stuck to planning out my month without extra pages.

Since then, I have tried a few extra tracker pages, but in the beginning I would not try these and just stick to the basics.

Tip #6: Have fun and enjoy bullet journalling!

Seriously, I mean you have to enjoy the theme you have and not get too bogged down by all of the details. I know that for myself, I had a hard time coming up with some of my themes and then was not that motivated to do my journal that month.

But, it is beneficial to have your own custom planner because you can organize your tasks however you want. So, go out there and let out your inner creativity by doing some bullet journaling!

*All of these tips are my personal preference and you may have different styles and ideas that work best for your bullet journal.

Comment below with suggestions or other tips for me.