i tried, i really did.
the ravenous reader had to make a quick run into the office supply store for printer ink yesterday. i tried very hard to ignore the stacks of spiral notebooks in all shades and colors, the sky high rows of three ring binders, the plethora of sticky notepads in fun shapes and sizes.
you see, the ravenous reader loves all things bookish, and that includes notebookish too.
most definitely.
my love for notebooks started long, long ago, with Harriet the Spy and her secret notebook. a black marbled composition book marked “keep out! this means you!” it contained her deepest, darkest, most meanly kept secrets. of course, i immediately procured one for myself, and proudly toted it around throughout my sixth grade year. (lucky for me, i was a popular enough little girl that the notebook became a fad rather than a stigma.)
then, Charlotte Bronte’s fabled handmade miniature notebooks, in which she along with Anne, Emily, and Branwell created their childhood epic stories about the imaginary kingdoms of Angria and Gondal, sparked a new interest in creating one of a kind notebooks of my own in which to pen my tales of death and psychological disorder (my favorite topics as a teenage writer!)
so you probably will not be surprised to learn i have a soaring notebookstack squirreled away in my cupboard. it includes about 10 spiral notebooks with rainbow pastel colored vinyl covers which i use for my personal journal, a 5×7 cloth bound, unlined book which i think about using colored pencils to sketch in (notice, i said think about), a beautiful lined journal imprinted with a design of music staves and filled with thick, glossy paper which begs for a fountain pen, a pile of post-it notepads which end up sticking out all over my review books…obviously, i have no need of any more notebooks.
but you see, right there in the office max was a rack piled high with brand new moleskines. i have not indulged in one of these little black beauties in quite a while. but how i love them, with their ribbon marker, their secret pocket in the back, their lovely stitched binding that falls open so nicely.
sigh.
of course i had to bring one home with me.
what else is a notebookish person to do?
now tell me, do you have a notebookstack? what’s in yours?
Bookstack 
I’m the same way (although I have never indulged in a Moleskin). I think I have three thick spirals and two hard-bound right now, also one fabric-bound watercolor sketchpad. Same with the sticky notes, pens, little notepads, paperclips, bookmarks, etc.
My whole house is a notebookstack! I’m convinced that the real reason my husband became a schoolteacher is because it allows him to indulge in office supplies: post-its, index cards, notebooks in every size and shape (including moleskines), pens and pencils of every variety, paper clips, staples, you name it. I love it all, too, and so do my kids. Normally I am pretty hard-hearted when they beg for treats, but when it comes to office supplies, I am SUCH a pushover!
I do love notebooks, I cannot deny it. I have a beautiful hardback one with fraceful tulips in the Dutch style on the cover that I’m putting my motherhood notes in. And another new one with splashy spring flowers on the front that’s spiral bound which I’m saving up for quotations. They are so irresistible, I quite agree.
Oh goodness! I think I posted once about how many blank books I have stacked up and waiting for me! And, you can usually find gorgeous blankbooks on the clearance carts of the bigboxbook stores… I’m always thought that if I ever owned a retail store, it would be books/greeting cards/office supplies (but only the FUN office supplies -pretty! colorful! etc.)
I love notebooks and all office supplies really. Stocking up at the beginning of the school year is such fun.
I have a moleskin I use as a journal and Ijust bought a mini moleskin in brown off Etsy which had been decorated with silver trees, it’s beautiful.
I love notebooks. People buy them for me for birthdays because they know I can never have too many and they are on safer ground there than buying me books I might have already read. When I cleared my office at work last summer the friends who helped me very nearly collapsed under the weight of the unused ones I’d stored away in my desk drawers just in case I should ever be without.
Ah! the notebooks, like you I cannot pass them by even in the grocery store where the variety is quite tempting.
Last week as a matter of fact a friend with whom I sometimes shop, looked at me and asked ‘didn’t you buy one last week? why do you waste your money like this?’ I am planning to do my shopping without her from now on and indulge in a notebook if I feel like it, which I do :p
I would have a difficult time passing by office notebooks……
O.K., I knew that most of us in the book blogging world had the same strange habits when it came to books, but I didn’t know that there were others out there who also loved notebooks, sticky notes, pens, bookplates, etc. etc. Wow, we are a strange, but wonderful group. 🙂 I always looked especially forward to back to school shopping as a child and as an adult taking my own children. I simply couldn’t understand why they didn’t care one way or another about which notebook they chose. So, I got to choose for them, and I always got a few for myself, as well.
I love stationery of all kinds – though I tend to just look and ooh and ahh rather than buy – as it just ends up gathering dust!
I got a free moleskine journal at a trade conference last year and WOW is that the most amazing paper to write on – I save it for writing notes I know I’ll return to 🙂
I cannot, cannot, cannot resist a notebook, blank book or pad. If it has a pretty cover, all the better. Or a totally plain cover that I can foof up with something. Tiny little ones with postits. Bigger ones (but small enough to fit in the purse). Oversize sketchbooks. Pads of paper (with and without commentary from some enterprising merchant). Oh, and those composition books we used in high school and college…
Paper? Don’t ask a collage artist about paper. Big pieces, little pieces, salvaged bits of wrap I can’t bear to toss (I can rip that up and put it on a card someday, you know!), origami, you name it.
And having said that, the ONE thing I DON’T have is a moleskine!
My goodness, a torrent of notebook-ists out there! Isn’t that funny, that we’re all like that??
I only wish I could come up with words worthy enough to fill all my notebooks 🙂
I don’t think I could live without my moleskins. Although there are many many other notebooks around the office and the house. Harriet ruined us all didn’t she?
Oh my! Tucked away in my attic, at my other house, is a spiral notebook filled with enough teenaged angst to blow the roof off. Do you think our inability to resist such notebooks has something to do with their aura of unexpressed potential? They seem to be begging us to put our mark on them.
I just have to add, I feel a sudden need to make a trip to the office supply store. See what you’ve done!
I’ve always loved notebooks. I had notebooks to draw and scribble in long before I learned to read or write. I still have a couple – mostly filled with mysterious scrawled alphabets of my own devising, and tracings of my hands and feet! I guess all of us bookish types love the wonderful possibilities of a blank notebook – I know I can never leave the office supply store without picking up a couple, whether I need them or not. Well, reason not the need, after all.
Oh yes, I’m addicted to journals too 🙂
Even though I make journals, I still buy tons. I can’t help it. I love anything from those marbled composition books to the beautiful Moleskines. And, I never leave the house without a journal in my bag.
Oh, Becca, I love notebooks too. I regularly go to the art supply store and buy sketch books to use as my journals. My favorites have a plain brownbag color for the cover and there I like to write quotes that inspire me or make small drawings.
i just love hearing all your notebook stories! but with every comment, i find myself wanting to rush out and buy some more!
I’ve always wondered why they’re called moleskins.
I’m also a notebook person! I too was inspired by Harriet the Spy–in fact for a while I kept a journal much as hers was. Now my notebooks are used for less… secretive purposes. But old habits die hard.
Oh yes, I am too a notebook person! My bedside table has a small cupboard specially set aside for my growing collection of notebooks, journals, scrapbooks and diaries…some lined, some blank, some both…some spiral bound, some sewn, some leather, some paper, some simple, some elegant, some hilarious (a huge poppy cat pad given to me by a sales rep!)…all absolutely necessary. And I mean necessary, even when I haven’t written in half of them!
I started buying moleskins a couple of years ago, and I have been completely converted. They are the best possible notebook to carry around (my preference being for the A5 classic ruled moleskin) and fill with lists, sketches, book recommendations, my attempts at writing and general randomess. Moleskins…yes, I will not be looking back!
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I (a male, by the way:]) am obsessed with journals and notebooks myself…Black or brown leather journals, standard black Mead (or an off-brand) composition books, spirals (solid colors only),cloth-bound sketchbooks and legal pads all fill my room, acting as both burglar deterrents and insulation. My hobby is poetry composition and occasional song-writing, but I keep an everyday-event journal and every time I buy a reference book (Latin and Rastafarianism were the last two) I have to buy a spiral or comp. book to write notes on it with.
If you want a good note book for everyday things, try the Mead leatherette composition books. For a decent, tough, long-lasting bonded leather journal, my favorite brand is called Markings, and I’ve bought them at Wal-Mart and Borders bookstores before.
—–random—–
P.S: I agree with most of you that Moleskines are the best bet! My first leather journal ever was a Moleskine… I got it when I was seven. Even now, ten years later, I can go back and reread my awkward, clumsy handwriting and less than fluent entries, with binding and pages intact.
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