Planning in 2024: The 12 Week Year

It’s 2024 and this time I’m doing neither yearly goals nor themes. I find themes to be too vague to be useful: they don’t provide enough structure or motivation for my needs. My old yearly goals worked perfectly before I got cancer, but now I can’t commit to a full year of goals (my brain just won’t let me). So I’m trying something new this time: the twelve week year. The idea is to treat each quarter as a new year, with all that entails.

I mapped out the first 13 weeks (from the 31st of December to the 30th of March) in my Leuchtturm1917 Bullet Journal, each week on two pages. On the left are the days of the week and on the right is my set of tasks for the week. The list of tasks is divided into two columns, and each column is divided into categories. The left column is for categories and tasks that vary widely from week to week: blogging, general tasks, various courses and challenges I’m taking. The right column is for my permanent categories that happen every week in the quarter: health, reading, connections, meditation and journaling.

The health category tracks fitness and health related tasks (on a given week it will have checkboxes for running, swimming and gym sessions for example, as well as reminders to go to the dentist or get my blood pressure checked). The reading category is for where I want to be with my reading in a given week (halfway through book x, 30 pages into book y). Connections is something I added after reading Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism and it’s been well worth doing: I call or meet up with 2-4 friends every week. Messaging doesn’t count, only phone calls, zoom calls, or physical meetups. If there’s one habit I’d recommend picking up in 2024 it’s this one. Meditate and Journal are just tracking locations for my meditation and journaling sessions.

I then set out goals in various categories for the entire “12 week year”, as if it was a full year. Each of these will be evaluated at the end of the 13 weeks, and a complete new set of goals will be set for next quarter. The goals are all SMART goals: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. Unlike themes there’s a possibility of not achieving all my goals, but that’s also something worth learning and carrying on to the next “year”.

So for instance under my health category for the next “year” is to get back to a 5k running base and an 8k long run (I’ve had a break in running for a few weeks due to illness and travel). If at the end of March I’m only at a 7k long run that’s not the end of the world, it just means that I need to take that into account when planning my next 12 weeks.

I then break down the goals into tasks that go into the weekly page. Each week I look at my goals, calculate where I am and where I want to be by the end of the week and fill out the weekly planning page accordingly. I use the calendar side of the page to block out time sensitive things or things that provide useful context (days of the week where I work from home and those where I work from the office, rainy days, holidays, etc).

To be clear: I don’t block the tasks for all the “year” in advance, but rather on a week by week basis. Only the goals for the entire 12 week period are planned in advance. The goals themselves are realistic, and many of them are broken into “base goals” and “stretch goals” much like in Kickstarter. At the last week of the quarter I set aside time to review and “shutdown” the quarter and plan and set up the new one coming up. If I end up not liking the weekly page setup, if there’s a goal that just didn’t work for me, if there’s something new in my life I can easily take it into account without feeling like I’ve “wasted” precious planning time or I’m bailing out on my plans.

So, if you’re unsure on how to plan your year, I suggest just planning the next 12 or 13 weeks. It may just work for you.

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Summary

Diamine Inkvent 2023 is over and what an Inkvent it was! This year’s calendar was my favourite by far, mostly because of the break from the usual red-green-gold run of inks, and the very low volume of “filler inks”. This lineup is strong and interesting:

Grouping the inks by colour family you can see how different this year’s Inkvent is compared to previous ones (2019, 2021, 2022).

Pinks: I think these are the most pink inks we’ve had in an Inkvent Calendar and I’m all for it. The scented ink was terrible, but as there were only two scented inks out of 25 and only one that was really bad (Sweet Dreams) I’ll give Diamine a pass. Both Cashmere Rose and Masquerade were stand out inks, worth considering full bottles of.

Blues: It was a stand out year for blues, with not a boring ink in the bunch. Glacier brought all-of-the-glitter, all of it, and Early Dusk, Nightfall and Blizzard are all interesting inks even though they are blue (one of the more standard of ink shades).

Greens: This Inkvent had only three green inks, with Velvet Emerald more of a teal colour. Of the three Diamine Sugar Snap stands out.

Reds: The first Inkvent calendar to feature just two red inks, but both of them solid choices. Go for Bah Humbug for a darker take or Tinsel of a brighter one. As I don’t really use red inks, the choice to include only two red inks this year was a boon for me.

Oranges: two oranges this year, one utterly unusable (Buck’s Fizz) and one wonderful (Fireside Snug).

Purples: Who’s surprised that this year the purple Inkvent calendar featured no less than four purple inks? Nobody. All of these are great but Jacaranda is my favourite.

Browns/Earth Tones: There are four of these this year if you include Atral (which is a black/brown ink) and Weeping Willow (which is a duo-chrome ink). Weeping Willow is stunning and the number one ink that I’ll purchase from this year’s Inkvent.

Outliers: the only yellow ink this year is Diamine’s Fortune’s Gold and that’s fortunate as I don’t use yellow inks. Sadly Diamine Moon Beam is the sole grey ink in the lineup, but at least it’s a very pretty one.

Which inks are my favourites? These seven:

They all have interesting base ink colours and oftentimes something else going on. I have too many inks already so I won’t be buying 7 more bottles to add to the collection, but of the 7 the top three are Weeping Willow, Jacaranda and Fireside Snug, and I may buy bottles of those.

What did you think of this year’s Inkvent? Do you plan on purchasing any of the Inkvent 2023 inks?

If you haven’t purchased the Inkvent 2023 calendar it’s likely that you’ll be able to purchase it at a discount now. It’s a great way to get some cool inks to play around with, particularly if you like shimmer inks but don’t see yourself getting full bottles of them.

Cafe Sketch

A quick cafe sketch in my Stalogy B5 with a Lamy Safari Diamine Merry and Bright.

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 25

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 25 door:

Day 25’s ink is Diamine Raise a Glass.

It’s the final ink of Inkvent, and as usual it’s a 30ml bottle of ink in the colour of the calendar: purple.

Diamine Raise a Glass is a dark royal purple with green sheen and what I think is chameleon shimmer (the bottle isn’t marked so it could just be regular shimmer, but it looks like a chameleon shimmer to me).

This ink is Diamine throwing everything it has on this ink: a super saturated, rich, dark purple base with a lot of green sheening and then the chameleon shimmer on top. The base ink is so dark it often appears to be black, and the chameleon shimmer works well with it. This is an ink for wide nibs and patient people as it takes a looong time to dry.

I smudged this sketch because I forgot how long this ink takes to dry and wasn’t careful enough. This is Arthus and he’s my favourite bear. I bought him 20 years ago at Hamley’s Toy Store in Regent street, London. They have a rather hidden display for collector’s bears and once I saw him I knew I had to have him despite his high price tag. The seller at the till was so taken with him she held him in her arms and had trouble letting him go. The sketch was done from an above angle that doesn’t do him justice, but look at his photo later on and you’ll see why the lady reacted as she did: Arthus is a bear that begs to be picked up and cuddled.

Here’s Arthus, my absolute favourite, in all his cute glory:

This brings this year’s Inkvent to a close. I will post a summary post with all the inks side by side as well as in colour groups tomorrow. In the meanwhile: Merry Christmas to all who celebrate!

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 24

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 24 door:

Day 24’s ink is Diamine Sugar Snap. It’s a shimmer ink.

Diamine Sugar Snap is a sap green ink with silver shimmer. One of the few green inks in this year’s Inkvent, it’s an elegant take on a natural hued shading green ink with a bit of pizzaz.

Diamine Sugar Snap shows a good amount of shimmer but something about the combination of the silver shimmer with the mid green ink reminds me of the silver hair found on certain plant leaves (it’s unattractively called pubescence, but the effect itself is both attractive and useful). This is a shimmer ink with class.

This Dean’s Bear (English, of course) is called Truffles, and there’s something about him that makes me think of him as an elder bear. He’s from Mary Shortle‘s of York, and was made on Dean’s Bear’s Centenary. Dean’s Bears is now part of Clemens Bears, which is sad, but at least they’re still manufacturing bears. Truffles has the classic Dean’s Bears look with the elongated snout and the oversized nose.

Here’s the original bear, Truffles:

Diamine Sugar Snap was a surprise to me – I was expecting a brighter green ink with a flashier shimmer effect. The choices Diamine made here elevate this ink and make it more interesting than some of their previous green-inks-with-shimmer inks, and Diamine Sugar Snap also has a name that isn’t really holiday themed. This makes this ink a solid new addition to their regular shimmer ink lineup, unlike inks like Merry and Bright. What do you think? Would you buy a bottle of Diamine Sugar Snap to use not in a holiday setting?

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 23

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 23 door:

Day 23’s ink is Diamine Fireside Snug. It’s a standard ink.

Diamine Fireside Snug is a dark orange standard ink with a lot of great shading. It’s one of the few inks in the Inkvent calendar that would make for a great everyday ink. The dark dot on my swab is due to an ink drop on the Col-O-Ring card that I didn’t notice before swabbing the ink.

The base ink colour is a reddish orange that is dark enough to be readable even with a fine nibbed pen, and the shading it provides is pretty spectacular. I have very few orange inks in my ink collection, and this one is definitely one that I would add to it.

You can see the ink shading in this sketch of Mud Pie the teddy bear. He always appears a bit “squashed” and that’s part of his charm.

The original bear (purchased at Stonegate Teddy Bears in York):

There’s only a handful of standard inks in this year’s Inkvent and they’ve all been solid inks, but Jacaranda and Fireside Snug have been a cut above (I’ve decided that it’s completely unfair to call Diamine Weeping Willow a standard ink, and so I’m putting in into a separate category). If you’re looking for an alternative to Noodler’s Habanero, this is it.

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 22

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 22 door:

Day 22’s ink is Diamine Tinsel. It’s a shimmer ink.

Diamine Tinsel is bright red ink with red shimmer and a lot of shading and it’s gloriously Christmas appropriate.

It took 22 days for Diamine to pull out the red Christmas ink but they knocked it out of the park with this one. It dries darker than it writes on the page, with the base ink being a bright red ink with orange shading. The shimmer renders it darker and richer and really makes it something special. In previous Inkvents Diamine leaned too heavily for my taste on the red inks, but this time they picked them carefully and sparingly. While Bah Humbug goes for the dark red theme, Diamine Tinsel is the full on festive bright red with shimmers on top.

I probably should have sketched today’s bear with blue ink, but Diamine Tinsel it is. The reason I bought him is because of those eyes. I just couldn’t say no to them.

Here’s the original bear (what do you think of his eyes?):

Diamine Tinsel was the festive red ink that this Inkvent calendar needed. Whether you use it to write Christmas cards or letters to Santa, this ink definitely has “Christmas” written all over it.

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 21

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 21 door:

Day 21’s ink is Diamine Tranquility. It’s a chameleon ink.

Diamine Tranquility is a magenta ink with chameleon shimmer in silver, gold, green and blue. It’s a very party ink with a very un-party name.

There’s a bit of shading in Diamine Tranquility, despite it being on the saturated side. It’s the kind of ink that I envision Barbie using in her correspondence, and I have no idea why it was named “Tranquility”.

This isn’t an artist bear, but it was unusual enough for me to purchase it. It’s a German bear, which I think I purchased six or seven years ago in Berlin.

Here’s the original bear:

What do you think about Diamine Tranquility’s name? I’d name it something like Diamine Festive Cheer or Holiday Fun or something along those lines. A “Tranquility” ink for me evokes a blue or lavender ink, maybe even without chameleon shimmer at all.

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 20

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 20 door:

Day 20’s ink is Diamine Astral. It’s a chameleon ink.

Diamine Astral is a chameleon ink with a brown-black base. As the base ink is dark, the chameleon effect is more pronounced. The result is a very readable ink with blue, green and silver glimmers in it when viewed in certain angles.

Diamine Astral is a dark, saturated ink, so there’s little to no shading with it. What interest it provides is all down to the chameleon effect.

In certain angles the writing glows with chameleon shimmer:

And in others it all but disappears:

I was sick when I sketched this, so it’s not my best work. I thought about sketching in the fur, but Diamine Astral is so dark it would have turned the whole sketch into a black glob of ink.

Here’s the bear, one of the more unusually shaped ones in my collection:

Diamine Astral is a bit of an outlier in this year’s Inkvent. The base ink colour isn’t what I’d call festive, and the chameleon effects were seen better in other Inkvent inks. Would you see yourself using it?

Diamine Inkvent 2023 Day 19

This is the Diamine Inkvent 2023 day 19 door:

Day 19’s ink is Diamine Cinnabun. It’s a scented ink.

Oh no, another scented ink. Did I mention I don’t like scented ink?

Diamine Cinnabun at least has a more subtle and less artificial smell than Diamine Sweet Dreams. The ink smells of cinnamon and is a cinnamon coloured ink. Like Diamine Sweet Dreams it’s very, very wet, so choose your nib wisely.

If Diamine Cinnabun wasn’t scented then it would be a useful sketching ink. As it is scented, it has the same flow issues that I’ve experienced with other scented inks in the past. On the other hand, without being scented it would be just another brown filler ink in the calendar, so I guess I understand Diamine’s choice here.

This ink feathers and spreads even on fountain friendly paper with a Lamy Fine nib. If you’re planning on using it, choose your nib and paper wisely.

Today’s bear is from my favourite teddy bear makers, Dean’s Bears. It’s a British company, and this is their Centenary Bear. You can see the shading in Diamine Cinnabun, even if you can’t smell the ink.