Erma Zurita
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Erma's Plournal 2019

12/29/2018

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2018 was my first foray into full-on DIY planner/journaling; also known as bullet journal-ing. My book was a $5 everyday special from Michael's called a Purple Dot Journal by Artist's Loft. I loved this book. It held up extremely well to watercolor and Crayola supertips and the bevy of pens I tried in it. There were a couple of times where ink bled through to the other side but not enough to stop using the journal. I highly recommend this journal for people just joining the community and for all kinds of journaling. 

The cover is hardback and plain. I decorated this with gold and silver paint pens, a black sharpie, and donated stickers of women from around the world and cute little owls from my BFF. 

Seven Seas
However, this year, I decided to make my everyday book a Seven Seas "CROSSFIELD" A5 Grid Journal. It has the famous Tomoe River paper and 480 pages of it. Now I can include all my research notes and endlessly drone on and on when I journal. I can't wait. The Tomoe River paper comes highly recommended for fountain pen users. It is the 2nd reason I chose this book. I am a calligrapher and like to write with actual calligraphy pens and ink, on occasion, and the Artist's Loft pages couldn't take it. I ended up gluing some pages together because of some extreme bleed-through. 
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ErmaZurita 2019 Z page pucker
For some people, the Tomoe River paper is far too thin for them. There is definite ghosting (show-through), the paper puckers when watercolor is used on it creating pages that "crinkle" when turned, and using a hard tipped pen tend to emboss the page on the other side. For me, these factors fell into my "sold" column.  (Left: Puckered paper.)​
I LOVE the crinkliness of the watercolor pages, the embossing gives the page texture, and I embrace the ghosting whole-heartedly. (Nanami has a fix for "show through", if you're interested.) 
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FIRST & SECOND

One of the very first things I do when I get a new notebook is to designate four pages in the very back for a Pen Test. It doesn't matter that I've tested the same pens in another book that is exactly the same, I do it again anyway. This serves 2 purposes:

1.) I use new pens I didn't have when I obtained the first book and
2.) It breaks the anxiety EVERYONE usually feels about first writing in a blank book.

​Pen Tests let you know just how much ghosting there will be and if any of your pens will bleed through. Here are my pen tests for 2019.
ErmaZurita Nanami Pen Test 2019
ErmaZurita Nanami Pen Test 2019
ErmaZurita Nanami Pen Test 2019
I also run a water brush over all the writing to see if the water and ink from the pen will cause bleed through. It looks like I'm golden with every pen, so far. The next thing I do is a book blessing and protection. 

THIRD
​(optional)

While I do the first two, (and during the last month or so), I thought about what my word or quote of the year 2019 will be. Last year's was adopted in April,
​"The magical and the mundane are not separate."
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It is not an absolute that you have to have a word or quote. I only do it because I did it last year.
This year's quote comes from Star Trek: TNG but I'm not ready to unveil it yet. Here's a teaser.
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FOURTH

I skip 4 pages for the INDEX. This was one of the ideas I found in the Bujo community that made me want to try it (along with collections). Last year's experiment taught me that the FUTURE LOG is an amazing tool for the DIY Bujo-er. All your important dates are in one place; easily accessible. I draw in my weeks and months as I go so this is the best place for me to pull all the information from to populate my monthly calendar and my weeklies.
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​Last year's future log (left) and this year's (right.)
The next four pages after the future log are the ones that cover Birthdays, Anniversaries, and Holidays. I tried to combine these in a practice book, but quickly ran out of space. As my mom says, "Ohma... You have too many friend."

NEXT

I start marking (in pencil or with post-its) what my collections pages are going to be. I may start a few pencil sketches for them, but I definitely start working on the first month. The CALENDAR with space to write is the most important part of the month for me. It's like a mini-future log just for the month. I've taken to doodllng in holidays which I love doing. Drawing in miniature is so very fun.
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Keep checking back. I'll be posting often as the year progresses.
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Plournal May 2018 After the Pen

6/6/2018

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Planner + Journal = Plournal - Thanks to Kell S.
"After the Pen" in the journaling community means what does a plournal look like after it has been used for the week. Here are mine for ​May 2018.

May Month & Trackers

ErmaZurita May 2018 after
"Use natural lighting," they said. With natural lighting you can see every bump and warp of the page from watercolor use and every line from the pages underneath. Still turned out pretty though....

Week 18

ErmaZurita May 2018 after Wk 18

Week 19

ErmaZurita May 2018 after Wk 19

Week 20

ErmaZurita May 2018 after Wk 20

Week 21

ErmaZurita May 2018 after Wk 21

Week 22

ErmaZurita May 2018 after Wk 22
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My Love for Crayola

3/20/2018

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It all started with the crayons, right.? Our love of coloring in things and drawing things and melting things.... As a calligrapher, Crayola broad-tipped markers are one of my first loves. The colors and the diversity of lettering styles I can create are amazing. Yes, I know they're not lightfast. Yes, I know they are not archival. But, according to Crayola.com, as of May 2017, they do meet the standards of being acid free. And of course, they are so very affordable. 
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Plournal : Planner, Journal, Bujo

3/10/2018

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As of December of 2017, I went from being a mere person carrying around a planner to a full on 'Bullet Journal' - er-ish. More like a planner/journal person or as one of my favorite online people called it, a PLOURNAL-er. 
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(Journals I have collected over the years.)
What's the difference between what I do now, than what I did before?
Before, I would buy a pre-printed planner and fill it in as colorfully as possible.I started with a daily I had gifted to me once a year, then into a weekly which worked awesomely for work with multiple appointments, to a personal monthly calendar with pages for journaling. One of the things I found in a sojourn across the web, was something called a collection. 
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(My still empty book tracker. March 2018)
This idea, to me, was AMAZING. It was so simple... just track the books you've read in a year... or the shows you've watched, or the movies you've seen, or the podcasts you've listened to, or the advice (good or ill) you've been given... Track it. TRACK IT ALL! But all on the same page in your journal. Whoa!

From there I learned about '*Bullet Journal' - a sort of DIY planner/journal. Its key is the future log and 'bullet' pointed tasks you can migrate to make your busy-ness more productive. Follow this link to the video by Ryder Carroll, who organized the system in the first place.

I have always been a person who takes a lot of notes. When I'm meeting with clients, if I have a meeting for church, if I am studying or researching for something upcoming. I like to write out synopses of my days, record awesome things that have happened or just jot down thoughts I may have had. So I adapted everything (it's a deep, dark hole, the "*BuJo" - Bu-llet Jo-urnal -  community) to something that would fit with what I was already doing and what I wanted to add.

​Further down the rabbit hole brought me to an article about ZIBALDONES. Zibaldones are catch-all books started by Venetian merchants in the late 1400's. 
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(Image: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library)**
Zibaldones are what I WANT to carry because its already steeped in history. I LOVE HISTORY! But I like order, too... So I've decided to make sure I have a table of contents, my collections, and everything else under the sun.
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Just a few pages from the 1st couple of months scattered about that will now be contained in my Zabaldone Plournal.
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I consider everything from December (of the year 0001) until now, practice;  getting a feel for the method (and madness) and as of March 8, 2018, I fully dived into the community. Here are some practice pictures and the big one on the bottom is my new, official, monthly spread for March.
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Below is my 'official' March monthly page with a tracker for work & home.
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I am absolutely in love with this hodge-podge system AND it integrates my creativity far too well with the rest of my life. Expect many more doodles and drawings and artsy monthly calendars. I also plan on some pen reviews. I am on the hunt for an everyday writing pen to replace my current one. I recently discovered the ink is not archival quality... and as other lovers of history will tell you... that is pretty damn important. I LOVE IT!

* 'Bullet Journal' and 'BuJo' are both copyrighted terms and belong to Ryder Carroll and http://bulletjournal.com/
​** Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
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Handwriting Challenge

8/29/2017

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I participated in my first challenge ever. It was very fun. I was able to dust off a hard bound empty book I have loved forever. The challenge was put on by:
tinyrayofsunshine.com/rockyourhandwriting

Check out our corresponding websites for the challenge each month:
Kara - bohoberry.com
Dee - decadethirty.com
Jessica - prettyprintsandpaper.com
Kim - tinyrayofsunshine.com

#RockYourHandwriting Aug 2017

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    Artist

    Erma has been drawing she was a small child. She received lessons in chalk pastels at age 7, taught herself calligraphy at age 11, and learned the basics of figure drawing at age 13. She became a professional calligrapher in 1995. 

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Erma Zurita

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  • Home
  • About Erma
  • Art O'Mine
  • Calligraphy by Erma
  • Social Media
    • Tips and Tricks
    • Graphics Gallery
  • Websites
  • Choice Radio Show