Small Format Bullet Journal: Trial & Error

I've been bullet journaling for nearly three years, and over that time I've toyed with straying from the format, I've experimented with different layouts, and I've tried different kinds of notebooks.

Over the summer, my friend emailed me a link to a Kickstarter that combined two of my loves: notebooks and organizers. I backed the project immediately. I'd always used a medium-size notebook for my bujo, and hadn't considered ​using an infinitely more portable tiny notebook for the job. Nothing like a fancy/functional case to make me consider something new, eh?

Something else the campaign got me to consider was whether it might be helpful to keep a separate notebook for each of the major projects I work on. The PocketDoJo organizer is designed to hold three notebooks, see, and as it happens there are three major kinds of things I do: my work, client work, and advocacy work.

I was super excited when my PocketDoJo arrived, both because new notebooks are super exciting, and also because the organizer solves the problem I always have with pens. Pens are never attached to my notebook, which means I never quite have one on hand when I need it.

I set up each of the notebooks and got down to it.

Ish.​

You can see in the image above that the notebooks (now sold by the company formed after the Kickstarter ended: Efficiency Supply)​ are designed well for bullet journaling – no need to make your own checkboxes.

But there's something about the notebook design that, though totally functional, doesn't appeal to me. It's possible I've become a design snob while I wasn't paying attention. ​And also? There's simply no reason to keep a separate notebook for each project I do, because my bullet journal is mostly a notebook full of to-do lists.

Though I intended to finish each of my three ​new notebooks before abandoning that system, I bailed after only a few weeks.

But two great things came out of this experiment:

1. I do love the PocketDojo case. I always have my pen handy (even my fountain pen!), and the case can hold other things if I need it to, like additional pens, or business cards.
2. I don't feel like I've sacrificed anything by using a small notebook instead of a much larger (heavier) one, so it's easier than ever to have my bullet journal with me at all times.

Having discovered that size doesn't really matter, I've bitten the bullet (see what I did there?) and signed up for the Field Notes quarterly subscription. Their notebooks are exactly the right size for the PocketDojo, their design appeals to the snob that seems to have spawned inside me, and the stories behind their limited editions are awesome (I'm in love with the lunacy notebooks they made this fall – watch the video!).

Do you keep a bullet journal? What size notebook do you use? Do you find that bigger is better, or that smaller gets the job done just fine? Any tips for maximizing the small approach?​

(Here's what it looked like when I looked up from the bench where I took the photos of the notebooks for this post. I love Granville Island so much.)