More MMMG Goodness, now with pictures!

Due to the anonymous comment on my last entry, I was directed towards The Hach to help me fuel my MMMG planner addiction. Before I talk about the planners, let me comment on The Hach. I have no affiliation with them and I paid for my products so I feel no reason to say anything one way or another about them. That being said, this was an excellent company to buy from. My items shipped quickly and they even refunded some money to me for shipping. My shipping cost less than expected so I actually got that money back! When does that ever happen? Never! So, if you have a few bucks to throw around, visit The Hach, because they were awesome. I will surely be placing another order soon as they have some Washi tape calling my name.

Back to the planner addiction...I have no idea how I will use the 134 planners I have now, but I am going to give it a shot. I also ordered pens, because I clearly do not have enough of those either. When I am going to get my own episode of Intervention for all of these paper product purchases? My friends really should be stepping in at some point.

Maybe my friends and my husband view my paper/pen addiction as a victimless crime (if you excluded the damage done to my bank account...) And when I think about it, really everyone wins, because I am about to share some MMMG goodness.

(Notice the handwritten thank you note from The Hach as well!)

I think the paper is thin on the Planner.M model and the paper wouldn't be suited to fountain pens.

I haven't actually written in any of these because I simply can't bear to taint the pages if I am not using it. I hate writing in something and not using it. However, from the feel of the pages, the Past Present Future and Tomorrow planner will take gel pens and wetter ink ok, with limited bleed through.

Here are a couple of pages from the Past Present Future, it is basically laid out like a weekly Moleskine. There are blank calendar pages in the front and then some additional unlined and lined journal pages at the back.

Overall, if you are looking for a functional, undated planner with weekly layouts, MMMG is great option.

Lets not forget the pens! These are just standard color pink and purple ink pens (ignore the lighting issues, it is Iowa and gets dark at 2:30 this time of year.) They are .38 and really are nothing special in the pen department, but I liked the aesthetics and simplicity of the barrel. Seems like a good enough reason to buy something I suppose. I will probably pick up more in this set because they write well enough and I wouldn't be heartbroken if I lost one.



Anyone else out there love these planners? If so, let me know which one is your fave!

MMMG Millimeter Milligram Planners

I love planners. I have made my own planners, made planners for other people, printed out free printable pages, used Moleskine's, Quo Vadis, generic Mead academic planners, assignment books, the uncalendar....I've been around the planner block. But like with most things, I want to try something new and travel to far off planner lands. I started my journey with these two planners from Poketo:
Weekly Planner
Perpetual Planet Planner (in brown)

But now, I need every single planner at MMMG. Millimeter Milligram is a Korean company I believe, and they sell every planner an addict could ever dream of. I literally must have every single planner listed below.

Check these out:
New Day
Daily Color
Planner. M
The Collage Book of Daily Life Travel
Tomorrow-L
Past Present Future and You (Large version)
Daily Color

Apparently you can order online, but unfortunately the site doesn't seem to link to an US version. I have the "Draw Your Tomorrow" planner already. However, I want nearly every other planner on the site.

I'm not sure why I need all of these different planners, it seems like a bit much. However, being rational when it comes to paper products isn't something I am good at. My point is, if anyone knows of anywhere that is selling these adorable MMMG products, tell me in the comments. I don't care if the store is from overseas or in the US. As long as there is an English version of the website, I will be happy. If you can't help me find these awesome products, feel free to suggest some of your favorite planners in the comments!

In the mean time, I will try and do a review on the two planners from Poketo and let you know what I think!

Dialogue Journal and Rolling Writer

It is coming up on my favorite time of year, school supply season! I have already started browsing the displays cropping up at the mass market stores, but I also love college bookstores. I decided to beat the rush of students and visited a nearby college bookstore yesterday. I came came across this Dialogue Notebook by PaperLuxe and the Pentel Rolling Writer pen. This book has a soft flexible purple cover with attached elastic band. I couldn't get the book to open flat, but I think it will be more likely once it broken in. The pages are lined on the front and blank on the back. This was actually the selling point for me and I how I use journals. I like to make collages in them and a blank page would be great for that. Or I could use this book as a DIY planner and a mix of lined and blank pages would be perfect.

My main complaint is the layout of the lined pages, that the spacing on the lines is wide like a Rhodia, I prefer a ruling similar to a Moleskine. There is also a lot of wasted space at the top and bottom of the page and there is a logo, which I typically do not like. (You may need to click on the picture to see the lines they are kind of faint.)

The paper performs as expected. I did a quick test with several pens.



All showed through on the back but they didn't bleed through to the next page. I would recommend this book as more of an art journal rather than a writing journal, but you would have to be aware of the medium being used to avoid bleed through.

I also want to talk about the Pentel Rolling Writer (the first example in my pen test above). The package lists this pen as a .8 however, it is liquid ink pen that is very bold. I have come across this pen a few times, usually in offices where I have worked and immediately appropriated them as my own. I rarely see these in stores and when I do, I buy one.

I even have several dried up ones in my pen box. I love the pen but if I could nitpick one thing, it is that the width of the line varies greatly as you can see from the pen test above. The package says it is because of the writing pressure that is applied. I feel like it more about the angle of how the pen is held. That being said, I still enjoy this pen and like to use it for journaling.

Does anyone else use this pen? I rarely see them in circulation so I am not sure how popular they are.

Quick Cheap Pen Review

Tomorrow is my first day at my new (old) job. Needless to say I have continued to fantasize about how I am going to supply my new office and have been dying to make the rounds to every office supply store and website known to man. Unfortunately, a rowdy going away party and homework limited my shopping time this weekend.

Because I was short on time, I decided to visit Wal-Mart to get my pen fix! I picked up a package of pens by Papermate. I liked the clean white styling of the pens and I thought they might go well with the white supplies at Poppin. I also picked up a pack of Elementz markers made by inc. I really have no need for these, but I thought they could be useful when decorating my planner pages every week.

I decided to test these pens out in the notebook I received in the Germany Rad and Hungry kit. As a side note, I am so in love with Rad and Hungry! I have previously speculated on what different countries office supplies were like and it seems as though Rad and Hungry read my blog and decided to start a company to satisfy my curiosity! If you aren't yet signed up with Rad and Hungry, you should do it right now, or you are going to be the only kid on the playground without a notebook from Latvia and paperclips from all over the world.

Back to my review... the Der Brunnen Block notebook paper is 70gsm and reminds me of the writing tablets that you used to see everywhere, both in size and the weight of the paper. I'm not sure if you can tell in the pictures, but the grid lines on the paper are done in grey, rather than blue. I like this better than normal grid paper simply because of that fact.

The Papermate pen is a Silhouette Elite and is classified on the package as a medium pen at 1.0mm. It is really just your standard ballpoint pen. It wrote smoothly and didn't seem too goopy. There is nothing fancy about the pen, but nothing bad either. I can see filling an office supply closet with this type of pen if you wanted to get away from the stick pens or avoid gels.

Closer view of the ink shows a little bit of skipping, but I think it is because it is brand new. I don't think it would be a problem long term. The pen comes in blue and black.

The Elementz markers very metallic. The picture doesn't really do the colors justice. The package says they work well on light and dark paper. They are not listed as permanent markers, but they do say that they are fade resistant. These markers are labeled as fine tip. However, that clearly isn't the case, they are similar in size to regular sharpie, so they may not be best for very detailed crafts. I am sure I will get some use out of these pens, but they won't be something I use everyday.

Both the ballpoint and the markers showed through on the back of the paper. However, there was no bleed through on the markers. So if you are looking at them for crafting, I don't think it would be a problem.

Now that I have my pen fix in for the weekend, I have to start deciding what notebook and pens to take with me on my first day of work! I know I will be taking a lot of notes during my training and I want to ensure I have a trusty pen and a notebook that I won't mind using for awhile as i get up to speed in this new job. I am already planning on using my Uncalendar as my work "to-do" book (but I follow my own system, not the one at their website). I have all manner of bound books, office project notebooks, Rhodia pads etc. to choose from. But I would love to hear from you in the comments! What would be your must have supplies on your first day of work?

I'm still here and back with a new review!

I have not posted in a very long time, I just got busy and my work was stressful. For awhile I didn't do much in the way of collecting pens and notebooks. My once monthly jet pen orders had even fallen by the wayside for a few months.

Recently I have restarted ordering from www.jetpens.com at least 1x per month and bought a subscription to http://www.radandhungry.com. I am also starting a new job in a week where I can fill my office with anything I want and I am super excited to place a large order from www.poppin.com. I think this new job is going to give me some more time for my hobbies because it will (hopefully!) be far less stressful.

So today I visited the local Blick store after work and bought a variety of pens and then came across some new journaling products. All of the products are made by SMASH. I bought a journal, some page markers, a stamp, quotes pad and tape (not pictured).

I didn't even open the plastic on the journal to see what kind of paper was in it at the store, but I knew I could use the stamps and quote pad in my planner if I wanted. I am not doing a complete DIY planner right now, but I am using a Moleskine planner and making and collages and doodles in it most weeks. So it is a combo scrapbook/journal/planner.

Back to the SMASH items. The journal had a a plastic envelope on the outside and then another plastic cover actually on the journal.

front


front cover without plastic and showing double ended pen/glue stickback cover


explanation page

first page

sample pages

stamp/page markers and quote pad and page samples

I haven't tested the paper to see how it takes different kinds of inks. Overall I get the sense that this journal is very versatile but probably not for journalers who just write. I can't see my self using it as a daily journal but more as an art project journal. The pages are quite varied and there are many many more designs than what I have shown. I could almost see myself using this as a DIY planner but the pages are very unstructured and might night suit me from a planner aspect. The pen that comes with it is cute because of the glue stick, but I do not see myself using the glue stick. I am a bit more particular when it comes to gluing stuff into my books. It sees like a run of the mill glue stick so I am not sure how well it will work.

I do love the stamper and quote book. The stamper is not self inking which is kind of nice because it gives me an excuse to buy ink pads! I like the fact that there is a date as well as phrases on the stamp. I think it could be really fun, but again I see myself using both the stamp and the quote book in my planner more so than in the SMASH journal.

Overall people who scrapbook, do a lot of collage type projects or art journals will probably like this line and they seem like fairly decent quality and since I bought it all for less than 20$ I think it is also at a great price!