From “The Journaling Type” to Kayastation!

Hey guys, I am so excited to be back here! It’s been so long and I have changed so many things! First tI no longer will be names “The Journaling Type”, I will still keep my channel and instagram public but I made a new YouTube Channel and Instagram (check them out, is free).

This is the new design I have created for my new channel, I had a logo with the name in cursive done in procreate but currently I am at my parents home and the iPad I am carrying does not have any of my new designs.

Either way, the next good news, I been going to college! I started studying Visual Art, I will be entering my second year and my last of my degree, or at least here in Massachusetts. I have learn so much and I been having an amazing experience, thank you to all my professors and all my school friends that have made it an awesome experience. I don’t want to sound like I am bragging but I have been working so hard to get all A’s in my classes. To see this, me succeeding in my classes makes me happy because I had many bad thoughts of my self for years, not being able to get good grades after I started 8 grade and having so much problems understanding my classes but I been working hard and also been doing great, so I want to thank everyone who believed in me.

I think this year of college will be hard because I will be taking more classes. Also I am not sure if you remembered, I live in a camper van, almost 5 years soon in December. I will no longer park my vehicle in my friend’s house and that now adds a new stress that I will have to be paying, finding new places to park every day or week. I also have to admit that because of my pass relationship everything was and still is in my name so now I am paying for a debt that is pushing me back a little which forces me to find a job during college. For the past year I have been able to survive with my leftover funds from college, having a secure place to park have helped me focus on my classes and my art but now that I need to constantly move my van meaning spending more gas and also no longer have the financial help from my ex-partner which paid for his share of the bills now everything fall into me, because like I mentioned, everything is under my name freeing him from any financial responsibility.

Things happened and I have come to be okay with the my current situation but I can’t lie, it have been very hard and many mental health problems along the way but I am trying my best and I know things will get better! Currently I am in Puerto Rico, my family found me a place to station my vehicle during the summer in massachusetts and I been surrounding my self around good people, which was needed since back home I don’t know a lot or any people and have no family there.

Stopped at Ruben’s Café with my mom and her friends after an activity around 11:30pm, food was decent! Missed PR food 💕

But my art has been good, I have been more creative since I started college. I have created more art and I started journaling again. For 2024 I stopped journaling, I wasn’t doing great mentally and I felt that I needed to spend money to try any new stationery product to be up to date with the stationery community to the point that I would use my paycheck just for that. I had to stop, I couldn’t anymore and I needed a break. I came back with a different way of seeing things and a more creative Karen (Hi, that’s me, I am Karen).

Last night drawing section!

I always wanted to have my own stationery store or to be able to make art and sell it but I was never that great in drawing or making my own art. After one year in college I have learned so much and have gave me the confidence to try again and make my own art. I have been creating for a few months now and it’s been such a learning process, I been loving every minute of it.

I even made some art and gave them for free at the Chicago Stationery Fest (which I made vlogs of it, up in my YT Channel, here is the playlist). This was such a fun fest, best fest I have ever been to, I can’t wait for next year fest with Yoseka, I literally can’t wait!

If you never been to a Stationery Fest you should, is actually a great experience, maybe I should do a post talking about it and showing some pictures. I am so happy I took the chance, best trip I had this year so far!

My mom hired me to take videos for her in a activity that she had, this is me in the bathroom, bathr. picture! lol

Well guys, that’s all I wanted to share here. I wanted to give an update and also let know I am still alive. I always hope that I continue posting weekly but I end up doing something else and leave the blog for some other time and end up forgetting about it!

The logo and the name of this blog will change, currently I am in my moms/grandmas house and the iPad I am using is not letting me edit some things but when I get home I will fix this.

Thank you for being here, thank you for your support and understanding and thanks for being a follower here. I hope to continue posting and keeping this blog more up to date. There should be a lot of stationery related post and once in a while some life updates.

See you soon, thank you for stopping by! 👋🏼

Passport Traveler’s Notebook

Hello, fellow journalers! How is this Tuesday treating you? Is it snowing where you are?

It was crazy raining all morning, and it will be snowing until 2am of the next morning, let’s see how it goes!

I wanted to talk about passport traveler’s notebooks! This is a size I have been using since I started journaling, actually, I don’t know if I already talked about this but my first notebook for journaling was a Moleskin cashier that I used to buy in T.J. Max back in PR. It was a journal and a place to keep track of my students and their progress. Later I learned more about journaling, stickers, and washi tape and so I went into a rabbit hole haha

After using an A5 as my journal for a few months I got my first passport on AliExpress and it has been the size that I fall back on all the time. Is also the size I use when traveling, is so convenient.

Chic Sparrow classic passport in the Outlander collection, the color Fergus.

Since I started journaling in a passport traveler’s notebook I haven’t loved any size like I do for the passport. One of my other most used sizes/notebooks is a Hobonichi Weeks size and I love this notebook the reason why I keep using it is because I like the Hobonichi Weeks and I love the different covers they come out with every year, I just wish I could buy a Hobonichi Weeks without the planner part because this size is perfect for me, and like I said, I love the covers but either way, I got a little side track.

Another thing I love about Passport TN’s is that I can fill out one entire insert on a trip. I love having different inserts for each trip, it brings me joy when I take them out, is like every insert is a little memory and there are many memories I would like to keep.

This here are all my passport I have finished since 2019, around 6 inserts. I currently am in the process of finishing one and I am about 6 pages away. It’s funny because I could definitely see myself finishing 2 to 3 inserts a year but I have around 3 to 4 different journals every year, so some years I can finish 2 inserts, and if I am lucky 3 but most time at least 1 a year.

Look how chunky this is!!

This is a Chic Sparrow Passport Plus, a discontinued leather. Is a TN with 6 elastic, 1.5″ inches wider than the original passport that’s why they called it a “Plus”. I don’t really use this size, I used to when I had a passport planner but now it houses my finished Passport Inserts!

And this is also a Passport Plus, where I house my recent TNs from last year. The cover is Chic Sparrow from the Austen collection, color Emma which is available in their website! I have a link here for 10% off, I get 25 points if you use my link (you don’t have to but it would also help me.) The Austen collection is very much loved by almost every Chic Sparrow lover, is a pretty leather.

A passport is a pretty small size, sometimes you have to be a bit creative to get the most out of your pages. I like to use two pages or more for journaling but never just one. I journal in even numbers, for example, If I want to journal more after my 2 pages I would do 2 more, so 4 pages but I wouldn’t do 3. Is that weird? I don’t know…
I like when both pages are related, okay, I don’t know what I am saying at this point or if I am making any sense, sorry.

But because I do one spread, I have a larger canvas to work with and have more space to glue ephemera and add writing as well. There is so much you can do if you get creative.

For example, you can also add another page to your spread, you can either glue it in the middle of the two pages or use a washi tape or a stapler. A paper clip is removable and I like its aesthetic of it.

If you look at this slideshow, I used two pages, one for writing a quick entry and the second one I glued in a menu, I had to cut down the menu, and I didn’t like how it looked folded. I added some Distress Ink to my menu, I like the look it gives, and is buildable. It is a great mixed media and I love using it in my journals.

You can also just glue in one big ephemera, I do this all the time. Sometimes I really like saving packaging, I like the nostalgic feel of it.

I remember where I got this because it was at Downtown Disney, 2022. My boyfriend and I went to Downtown Disney with my family and we bought some drinks and Pretzels from the cart in front of the Disney store. They might not look that much but for me, there is a story of that day and the place.

The good thing about having a journal is that it is yours and you can add and do whatever you want if you want a simple journal just for writing then perfect. You journal however you feel like it, these are a few of the many ways I like to journal and for me, the passport is such a great size, I feel like I can do so much in this small size.

Well guys I think this has been a great little post, showing you guys a few of my journaling spreads and the way I enjoy journaling. It’s fun and it helps, it definitely has helped me during the years, creatively and mentally.

So start journaling, you don’t need a “fancy” notebook to start. I had many notebooks from Walmart and T.J. Maxx before I found out about Traveler’s Notebook.

I will try to make a video this week about my passport and more tips on ways to journal. I will also include flip-throughs of past passports from trips. So go ahead and SUBSCRIBE to the channel to know when I upload a new video.

Thank you so much for being here and I hope this post was useful and fun.

Have a wonderful day and God bless you all!