Dailies and Weeklies and Monthlies, Oh My!

You will hear certain terms quite frequently when you are in the bullet journal community – a few of the most common ones are dailies, weeklies and monthlies. Each mean exactly what they sound like, but it can get confusing when the terms are being thrown around with the assumption that you understand them perfectly. That is why I am here to help – I am here to explain each of the three terms and then provide spread ideas and additional resources so you can implement these into your very own bullet journal!

Daily, Weekly & Monthly Spreads

Daily Spreads

A daily spread is when you dedicate one page or one whole spread to just one day. In these instances, you would be able to log all of the events and activities that occurred that day, keep a to-do list, habit tracker, meal planner or any other information which would pertain to your life. This could also be a place where you could implement more of a journaling aspect into your bullet journal. While this is not my preferred type of spread, I have used dailies a lot when I travel. This gives me enough space to log everything that I did each day, as well as a place for me to list meals that I ate, special moments that I want to remember and how many steps I took. Below, you can see how I laid out my daily spreads for my trips to Disney and Europe last year.

Weekly Spreads

A weekly spread is a culmination of an entire week’s worth of logs on one spread. These allow you to log many of the same aspects which can be logged in the daily spread, but on a bigger scale. Think of this as an outline of the week ahead, you can add your activities and note down a to-do list and then check items off as you move throughout the week. While I am still in college and have a multitude of things to do and events to attend each week, these spreads are a lifesaver! There have even been times when my days would be so jam packed that I would need to have everything laid out by time, and these weeklies allow for that easily! Other weeks are more flexible, so I can have room for a motivational quote and areas to track my water intake and exercise. Below are a few different examples of ways in which I have set up my weekly spreads in the past.

Monthly Spreads

A monthly spread is essentially a place for you to lay out your entire month at a glance. Typically, this will be set up as a calendar format so you can fill in each box with activities. Other times, however, I have seen people use a list format to simply state the events going on and then they will have room to keep a running to-do list, habit and mood trackers, quotes, doodles and any other notes they would like to keep. As I have mentioned in other posts, I love using monthlies because I can easily plot everything I have going on and then when new activities arise, I can quickly tell whether or not I am available! Designing and color coordinating these spreads are also a fun form of stress relief for me, and I love to look back and see all of my creations for each month. Below are just a few examples of my monthly spreads over the past few years.

An amazing resource to find even more information about dailies, weeklies and monthlies is Thass & Kirs' blog Diary of a Journal Planner! They have posted articles specifically on daily, weekly and monthly spreads and their ideas/examples are fabulous! I hope these explanations helped and that you can take some inspiration from the examples provided in order to make scheduling your life just a bit easier and more enjoyable!

- Kristen