During the different seasons I am sure you all enjoy a variety of activities.  Do you remember them year to year?  How far ahead do you plan family get togethers or indoor entertainment for the children?  Perhaps you want to try new experiences with friends or a loved one?  Maybe you like to be productive during the winter months with DIY projects.

Hello, it’s Alex (@TheJournalCorner) from the Archer and Olive ambassador team.  Today I am going to share some ideas on how to plan for activities during the winter months.  Here in the UK this often means we are more limited to indoor entertainment and with a young family that can often feel like harder work.  I find having some ideas listed helpful for a rainy day!  It may be your favourite hobbies are more restricted in the winter too - here is a chance to plan some new experiences.

Supplies needed

For these pages, all you need is a notebook and pen.  You could add colour or even accessories like stickers and washi but they are not essential.

• Archer & Olive journal
• A selection of coloured pens like these calliographs 
• Black writing pen
• Washi Tape
• Decorative stickers like these
• Colour notepad
• Scissors 

If you are looking to purchase anything from Archer & Olive, please use ‘Alex10’ to save 10%. This is an affiliate code, so it allows you to support creators like me too.

Activity Planner

I have already shared with you some ways I use my journals to manage family life for a new school term or for meal planning.  One use of a journal is as an ‘Activity Planner.’  This can help whatever age your children are at home and be referred to when boredom strikes and in school holidays.

You could include notes on days out, reviews of places visited, opening times of sports centres and lists of places to visit.  

But today’s blog is not just for parents.  It may be you have more time to see friends in the winter months and want to create a ‘bucket list’ or some date night fun to lift spirits on darker evenings.

Today we are going to look at how to organise some pages dedicated to entertaining yourself and loved ones during the winter months.

Activity Categories

Of course the types of activities will depend on your own interests or those of your family but could also be used as a ‘try new things’ challenge for yourself or as date night activities.

Here are some category ideas:

• Free vs Paid for activities
• Indoor v Outdoor activities
• Local or Need Transport
• Memberships/Passes to use
• Creative activities
• Productive challenges e.g. DIY, declutter
• 1 hour to spare v a whole day
• Plan with friends list
• Seasonal jobs that need doing

Organising your Activity Lists

You could choose to dedicate a whole journal to seasonal activity lists and projects or just use a few pages in your Bullet Journal.  Think about what suits you best and if you think you would refer back to them again next winter. 

If you are creating a list for family fun, it may be a good plan to all sit together and contribute ideas.  There may be suggestions that are new to try or you may need to plan ahead and budget for.  

Perhaps you can dedicate one day a week or month to meeting up with a loved one or friends and keep it consistent over the winter.  Often with the darker days and weather it is even more important to have things to look forward to.

If there is some disagreement over which activity to do, you could make a list on coloured paper and then cut it up.  These suggestions can then be placed in an envelope to randomly select an activity you then have to do that day!

See the full video here: 

Lists of Winter Activities to help inspire you 

While the focus on this blog has been to organise and plan winter entertainment, this printable should get you started with some ideas:

Summary

I hope you have found these ideas for your journal useful and can put it to use this winter.   For more journal inspiration come and say hello @thejournalcorner. We always love to see your creations, so please tag @archerandolive or use #aoshare on Instagram.

The Archer & Olive blog has several articles that you may enjoy further on this topic. More on winter bucket lists can be found here and here.  You could also try some winter doodles for self-care.