Hey planner friends! It’s Meka here, interrupting your Thanksgiving prep to share with you my Carpe Diem setup for Thanksgiving week. I used the Gather Together Simple Set.  It includes a few 12x12 double sided papers, journaling cards to cut apart, and adorable themed cardstock stickers.

The journaling cards elements sheets has lot of bits you can use as pocket decoration. Use the cards as-is, or fussy cut around the elements to make them look like die cuts.

I used a scrap of paper as a cover for some coordinating page flags, and embellished with cardstock stickers.

I cut out a pie image from one of the journaling cards to use inside a mini shaker. The pie pic was fine on its own for the front.

The back of the image was just a solid color, so I decorated it with a phrase strip and another fussy cut slice of pie.  Add a little chunky glitter and voila! Okay, it’s not the smoothest execution if you look closely. But in this case, perfection is the thief of joy!

Thanksgiving evokes a warm and earthy image in my mind. The Gathered Together Simple Set has a more whimsical feel than I wanted this time around, so I mellowed things using watercolors. For my dashboard, I painted onto plain Planner Essentials A5 Basic Inserts grid paper as a foundation. I used paint and alphas to pull in the color teal—my favorite color contrast to the rich fall colors of orange, yellow, red, and brown. 

The gathered hearts in the top left corner and bottom right of the Thankful journaling block, as well as the layered leaves are all fussy cut from the journaling card elements.

My Thanksgiving week planner spread uses many of my favorite layout components—watercolor paint, stickers, doodles, and my own hand-lettering.

I wanted to stick with the motifs of the Gathered Together collection. So instead of diving into my beloved washi like I normally do, I cut strips of the Give Thanks and the Grateful Hearts 12x12 cardstock. I used it as faux washi to line the bottom of the page, the headers of the top row, and along the middle of the layout. I even snipped out page flag shapes to fool the eye.

I’m gonna run now and taste test the sweet potato pie before tomorrow’s dinner!  I hope you enjoyed my turkey week planner setup. Come say hi here on Instagram! And have a very happy, heartwarming Thanksgiving!