October 2025 Journal Spreads

It' s the same story every October. It's my favorite month, my favorite time of year, and there are so many things that I want to do and make and experience. Which means that, historically, my October spreads never get finished. And this year was no exception.

For this month, my quote was "The magic that you are looking for is in the work that you are still avoiding." And while it's not necessarily something I've been "avoiding", I took this quote as encouragement to do something that's been on my creative list for a while now: DIY stamps. I used pencil erasers, and some carving tools I had lying around (you never know what I have in my stash), and created some fun little spooky themed stamps. A book, a crystal, a crystal ball, a test tube, a cloche, and two bottles.​

My habits page ended up being my favorite. It resembles a gallery wall framing all my stamp illustrations. 

---

Above, you can see the partially finished October review page, along with some extra decoration to celebrate my upcoming marathon in the beginning of November. I also had a spread with our finances, and my long form journaling, but I didn't include them because they would pretty much all have to be blurred out anyway since I didn't snap a picture before filling them out.

My weeklies I did keep relatively simple, with lots of room for sewing notes as I created my daughter's Halloween costume. (She was a bubbling cauldron in case you were wondering).

All the utilitarian parts got done. And even the decoration on those pages got done. But not necessarily in time to enjoy that decoration throughout the month. I think the habits spread decorative edges were officially finished around October 25th. Which means a whole 25 days of it hanging over me as something I wanted to do, and only 6 days of enjoying it in the way I intended.

So once again, I'm resolving that NEXT year, I will go simple, and have beautiful, useful, and FULLY FINISHED pages to help me celebrate my favorite time of year.