Printable 2015 Weekly Planner
How To Make a Weekly Planner Using Your Own Resources
Looking for the perfect weekly planner? Yes, I know you can buy these things at CVS right now for less than ten dollars and yes I know you can also search for free printable calendars and find tons of free printable templates out there. What you can't find is a free template that allows you to change things before printing. And if you are anything like me, there is simply nothing as great as creating something from scratch.
That is why I spent the better part of the last week creating my own planner on Microsoft Word. And now, I'm sharing my template with you. And I'm not sharing it as an un-editable PDF file. You can download my word document, entirely, edit anything you want, and create a planner from your own printer.
The following set of instructions detail how I put together my planner. Understand that many things below can be changed, tweaked, added, or subtracted for your planner. Hope this is as awesome for you as it was (and is) for me!
A Note on the Size
When you download the Microsoft Word file (if everything works right) you will find a 168 page document that appears to be formatted out of order. That is because this planner has been formatted to print on standard letter sized paper in such a way that you can essentially fold it in half down the middle and it is ready to go. (Two pages per sheet and double sided, so, four planner pages per one piece of paper used.)
Be sure to read through STEP 2 completely before printing.
Also, unfortunately, my printer would not print outside the standard one inch margins, so I cut mine down to eliminate white space. If your printer exceeds the margins or you do not care about white space, the finished product would be an 8.5" X 5.5" planner with room in the middle for spiral binding.
Materials Used
- This word file (.docx compatible)
- 42 sheets of 8.5" X 11" paper
- a paper cutter
- an elementary school folder
- $4 spiral binding (courtesy of Staples)
Step 1: Download File and Customize
- Page 1: My planner begins with a personal information page and 3 emergency contacts because that is how many I need on every single school, church, and medical document I sign for my kids. You could put just about anything here that you want.
- Pages 2-7: In light of the New Year's Resolution theme, my planner serves two purposes: listing long- and short-term goals. I have chosen to have four main things to focus on throughout the year: House Projects, Writing Ideas, Things to Organize, and Prayer Requests. You could change these to any focus of your choosing. Some ideas include: health/fitness goals, budget, school or career goals, meal plans, or recipes.
- Pages 8-31: Empty monthly calendars. I do not actually use my planner for monthly planning so the spaces are relatively small, but still useable. There is also margin space for additional notes.
- Pages 32-??: Weekly calendars for daily plans and a page for goals preceding each new month. I use my calendar strictly for home and family management, so between now and July, while I know laundry is a weekly constant, I have no idea what will be the most important big projects I need to accomplish. It helps me to re-center my focus by creating a new "big goals" list at the beginning of the month. More often than not, the first few items are leftovers from the previous month, which is perfectly acceptable to me.
- Final Pages: At the end of the calendar I simply provided several empty lined pages. I am a nut for list making so who knows what gems I'll find to put back here. I already have garden ideas, movies to watch, and things to sell on Craigslist, but that's just me. You can fill these pages with anything you can think of.
Step 2: Save and Print
Forgive me, but I must think of my mother when giving instructions on how to print something with more details than "hit print." I'm going to guide you from the very beginning. These instructions work with Microsoft Word for Mac. Hopefully you can figure them out on your PC as well (or perhaps someone can leave detailed printing instructions for a PC in the comments, if it is terribly different).
- [File]
- [Print...]
- At the top of the print menu you should see 3 drop down boxes.
Printer: (select your printer)
Presets: (select "default")
Final Box: go to "Layout" - Under "Layout":
Pages Per Sheet: 2
Layout Direction: highlight the first box (looks like a Z)
Border: None
2 Sided: "Short Edge Binding" (this might pop up a warning about custom destination paper size. Simply click "continue"). - [Print]
**If you are nervous, try printing pages 1-8 first. This will only waste 2 pieces of paper total and you can see how it will come together.**
Step 3: Cut to Desired Size
- I pretty much just eyeballed what I wanted mine to look like and used a paper cutter to cut it like this:
Step 4: Cut in Half
- Cut the entire stack in half. Obviously, a classroom grade paper cutter isn't going to do the entire thing at once. You can take it somewhere, or you can be very careful to keep the pages in order as you cut it a few pages at a time.
- Keep each half pile separate and in order!!
Step 5: Put the Two Piles Together
- It is nearly impossible to describe how to do this correctly. Just look at the pages and figure out how it would have worked if you folded the paper in half. This is how the piles go together, and the planner will be in order.
Step 6: Add a Cover
- I used a ten cent green folder from the back to school shopping drawer, cut to size. You could use just about anything here, but I think a file folder would work, or some cardstock, or a leftover Christmas box cut to size. Be creative!
- If you want to skip this step you could 3 hole punch the thing and stick it in one of those half sized binders, or cut the entire planner to fill a filofax (though it is probably a little wide for that).
Step 6: Bind It
- I took mine to Staples and had them do that sort of cheap/fancy spiral binding (and the guy messed up a little on punching the holes which is, of course, driving me nuts).