Congrats to A. Rivera, Curiousity Complex and Alisia! You all made this easy for me. A. Rivera will be sent the Mucha Lily notebook, Curiosity Complex will receive the Da Vinci reporter notebook and Alisia will be sent the Nightingale notebook. You will all be contacted via email to get your mailing addresses.
Thanks and stay tuned for more reviews (video and photo) and giveaways.
Lots of people put pen (or pencil) to paper yesterday in celebration and support of National Handwriting Day. Did you? If not, that’s okay because in our little corner of the internet, everyday in Handwriting Day!
I hope everyone is having a day full of happy handwriting.If not, try handwriting your grocery list, copying down a favorite quote or poem or just jotting out a a few pangrams. If you do, leave a link in the comments so we can marvel at your penmanship — for better or worse.
Happy Handwriting Day!
In honor of Handwriting Day, I picked out my vintage penmanship shirt to wear today. Yep, I am that nerdy.
The folks over at Paperblanks kindly sent me an assortment of notebooks to review. The books have such amazing details on the covers that I decided the best way to review them is with a video. (Please forgive the ums and ahs, this is the first time I’ve done this. I was nervous.)
To clarify from the video, I received four books in various sizes and formats:
Description
Format
Size
Page Count
Price
DaVinci-themed Sun & Moonlight
Mini Reporter
3.75×5.75″
192
$11.95
Letters of Inspiration: Florence Nightingale
Mini
3.75X5.5″
176
$15.95
Mucha Tiger Lily
Midi
5×7″
144
$14.95
Parisian Mosaic Mosaique Safran
Midi
5X7″
144
$14.95
All but the Florence Nightingale book had a black elastic closure. The Nightingale edition has a magnetic closure. They all have pockets in the back with book cloth gussets. All but the reporter-style DaVinci book included a red satin ribbon bookmark.
The line spacing is about 8mm which is probably equivalent to wide-ruled notebook paper. The lines are very fine and brown and do not run edge to edge but leave a small margin round the edge of the page. The spacing is a bit too wide for me, preferring the blank paper for optimum writing freedom.
The paper in the Paperblanks is the same as in planner I used all last year. I’ve included the writing samples here. I have to say that the warm white paper is pleasing and the overall weight of the paper allowed it to hold up to an array of writing tools including fountain pens with above-average results.
You can see from the back that the Sharpie was really the only tool to bleed through.
Overall, the Paperblanks books are some of my favorite notebooks. They are sometimes a little too elaborate for my everyday needs but the construction, paper quality and features plus the reasonable price point make them a good choice. To purchase online, Love Notebooks has the widest selection of books but I purchased my planner via Jenni Bick so I recommend them as well.
For more information, you may want to check out these posts:
Finally, I’d like to give away some of these books to some lucky readers. I’m going to giveaway the DaVinci reporter, the Mucha Tiger Lily and the Florence Nightingale. One to each of three lucky readers. Leave a comment and tell me which of these designs is your favorite or visit the Paperblanks site and tell which one you wish they’d sent me.
FINE PRINT: All entries must be submitted by 10pm CST on Sunday, January 26, 2014. All entries must be submitted at wellappointeddesk.com, not Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook, okay? Winner will be announced on Monday. Winner will be selected by random number generator from entries that played by the rules (see above). Please include your email address in the comment form so that I can contact you if you win. I will not save email addresses or sell them to anyone — pinky swear. If winner(s) does not respond within 30 days, I will draw a new giveaway winner. US readers only this time. Shipping via USPS first class is covered. Additional shipping options or insurance (or customs fees) will have to be paid by the winner. We are generous but we’re not made of money.
DISCLAIMER: This item was sent to me free of charge by Paperblanks for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.
Today, Todoist upgraded its platform with web-, mobile-, browser- and desktop-based versions of the app and an all-new, streamlined look. They are definitely setting themselves to compete with Wunderlist. The new version offers free collaboration and what appears to be extensive functionality, especially with the collaboration tools and could give Basecamp a run for its money for small teams.
The regular apps and web interface are free. The premium account ($29/yr) offers additional features including adding notes and file attachments, task search, color-coded labels, email or text task reminders, automatic backup and synchronization with iCal. I think the premium version will be the way to go since being able to add text, images and URLs to a task would make things so much simpler. The price per year is less than Wunderlist which is $49/yr for collaboration but Wunderlist allows notes and images in the free version but there’s no indication in a list or sub-list that a photo or note is associated with the item. So it works… sort of. I certainly don’t think I’ll miss the wood grain if I switch.
I waffle between loving the cross-platform convenience of digital to-do lists and missing its paper counterparts and physically crossing things off, adding details and saving the completed lists. Being able to add a task on my phone, then review it or deal with it when I’m parked in front of my computer has a lot of appeal though paper could do the same thing.
This app seems like its is the best of all possible to-do list apps, sleek, streamlined and upgradeable for a small fee. Would you or have you tried any of these digital to-do lists?
In preparation for National Handwriting Day, here’s a little advice from Donovan B. from the Letter Writers Alliance on the best way to improve your handwriting. Thursday is Handwriting Day so get your pens, pencils, brushes and crayon at the ready!
