With the excitement of the holiday season over and the new year in full swing, journal enthusiasts will be looking for new ideas to make the most of their craft this February. 

Since February is the month of love, we at The Washi Tape Shop have been on the hunt for the most exciting ideas to try out as the new month begins, especially to highlight the people and things you love most.

Capture what you love by including photographs in your journal

One way to celebrate the people and things you love is by featuring them in your journal. As disposable cameras and Polaroids have made a comeback, they’ve become an ideal tool for journal enthusiasts who want to highlight a specific moment, person, or object in their spreads.

You can create specific spreads for images, such as a memory spread, or include these photographs in existing spreads — for example, in space left over in a weekly spread. Printed or developed photographs can be fixed in place using washi tape, stickers, or craft glue, if suitable for the paper in your journal.

Photo by @bujo.by.klsy 

Create playlist spreads to highlight what you love listening to

Many of us listen to music and podcasts on a daily basis. While digital libraries allow us to catalogue our favorite audio content, they may not be the best way to highlight the memories we make while this content is playing.

This explains why the trend of playlist spreads is growing among journal enthusiasts. Playlist spreads enable you to capture a snapshot of your favorite songs, albums, podcasts, and shows at a given time, and make a great keepsake to reflect back on at the end of the week, month, or year. 

Photo by @piasbujo

(Pro tip: If you’re up for a technical challenge, try embedding a QR code (or even an NFC sticker) into your spread. Link this to your chosen audio content to allow you to easily scan and find your favorites. Think of this trick as a gift or easter egg for yourself — a way to find a good song, album, podcast, or playlist to remember a particular moment when you’re looking back on your journal sometime in the future.)

Photo by @piasbujo

Highlight the moments you love by scrapbook journaling

Scrapbook journaling is an inexpensive way to decorate your journal and an ideal option to commemorate special occasions, gatherings, vacations, and more.

Key to maintaining a scrapbook journal is collecting materials to feature in the pages. These materials, usually paper items, should reflect your memories of the time you’re reflecting on – for example, receipts, ticket stubs, boarding passes, or cuttings from newspapers.

Photo by Jessica Hui

Scrapbook journals can also make wonderful gifts. If you want to make a scrap book journal for someone else, consider collecting materials that relate to the recipient you have in mind, such as photographs of them, wrappers from their favorite snacks, and momentos from adventures they’ve been on.

Photo by Jessica Hui

The pages of your scrapbook journal can be finished off in line with the aesthetic you have in mind, by using items like washi tape, stickers, and decorative paper.

Read more on creating scrapbook-style spreads here →

Anxiety journaling as a form of self-care

Many journal enthusiasts and mental health awareness advocates recommend the use of a journal to monitor and reflect on anxieties, as a way of caring for yourself.

Mental health should always be our first priority, but the demands of everyday life mean that it often isn’t. In between work, school, family life and other elements of daily life, anxiety can creep up on us and make it harder to love yourself.

You may consider using a journal to track your moods or to evaluate your days, or to focus specifically on anxiety. One way to do this is by jotting down what triggers your anxiety at a given moment and how you overcame that feeling. This is a good way to remember to love yourself, and how to do that even when you’re feeling overwhelmed.

Spend your time doing what you love with a hobby tracker

Journal trackers are a useful tool for monitoring progress on tasks, projects, and habits. In the spirit of doing the things we love, a journal tracker can also be used to track hobbies.

The options are endless for anyone looking to use a journal tracker to monitor one’s hobbies. You could start with a simple hand-drawn table, using one column to list days of the week and another to mark off the status of a task that you want to complete.

These tables can become more complex over time. Hobbies this system could be used for include reading, playing a sport, exercising, and more.