Missed a Day in Your Planner? 5 Easy Ways to Fill the Space Creatively

How to Backfill Planner Pages Without Stress (and Make Them Beautiful)

Wondering how to backfill planner pages without stress? When you miss a planner day, it doesn’t mean you’ve failed; it just means life got busy! We all have those days where life moves faster than our pens can keep up, so our planner ends up with a blank page (or three). It’s a natural part of life!

Missing days in your planner doesn’t mean your planner is failing; it just means you need to adjust how you use your planner. Your planner spreads can still be meaningful and fun to fill in, even after the fact.

If looking at those blank, unused spaces in your planner is making you feel like you’re wasting your pages, then let’s go through 5 fun and creative ways you can backfill your planner pages without stressing about how to fill them and how to stay consistent with planning!

The Beauty of Backfilling Your Planner

When life happens faster than you can write it down, your planner or journal is usually the first thing to get put aside, leaving you with empty planner pages. That’s why having premade bullet journal-inspired planners, like these, can be a significant time-saver when it comes to setting up spreads and coming up with creative planner ideas.

Depending on the purpose your planner plays in your life, there are different reasons you should go back and fill in those blank planner pages.

Backfilling planner pages can actually make your planner more personalized and meaningful!

Reflection

Writing about your life forces you to think about what is worth writing down and what is worth remembering. If you’re anything like me, remembering what you did yesterday is a struggle. Forget about what happened last week! Reflecting in your planner helps spark your memories and remind you of things.

Creativity

If you don’t want to write about previous tasks and events, then you don’t have to! There are other ways you can fill in your planner in a way that lets you express yourself and make your planner creative. In the end, planners are paper, so you can use that paper however you like.

Consistency

Building a habit takes time. A perfect day of getting your habits completed is very different from a day where you do the minimum to meet them. Using a planner is no different: you can have a perfectly planned day, or you can fill it with scribbles and stickers. Either way gets you on track to using your planner more consistently.

5 Stress-Free Fixes for When You Miss a Planner Day

Your planner can be more than a productive tool. It can be a space for planner journaling inspiration, too!

Create a Sticker Dump: The Easiest Way to Backfill Empty Planner Pages

What is a sticker dump? A sticker dump is a way to use leftover or themed stickers to fill up space in your planner or journal. This is the easiest way you can fill up your planner pages!

While you can use stickers without a common thread between them, you can also use specific stickers to fill up space.

• Use stickers in one color to create a monochromatic look. You can use DIY color stickers to use any color you want!
• Use stickers in a limited color palette. Here and here are some fun color palettes to try out in your journal.
• Use stickers that have the same theme (like these autumn stickers or these magical stickers).

Sticker dumps help with decorating blank planner pages.

Turn Your Blank Spaces Into a Collage or Scrapbook Section

Taking a sticker dump one step further, you can use a missed planner day space to create a collage or scrapbook section.

Here are some ideas on what you can include in a scrapbook or collage section in your empty planner pages:

• Decorative sticker sheets and sticker flakes
• Matching decorative stickers, including washi strips
• Washi tape
• Printed out photos
• Scraps of paper or packaging

Doodle or Practice Lettering: Creative Planner Idea for Missed Days

Another planner backfill idea is to use the empty planner page as a space to doodle or practice lettering.

You can create abstract doodles like zentangles, or as a practice area to draw some simple doodles.

The space can be used to practice the upstrokes and downstrokes of lettering to level up your handwriting.

You can even dedicate a space to doodling or lettering in each day of your planner to introduce a creative ritual into the functional aspect of a planner to decorate missed planner pages.

Use Your Planner as a Reflection or Gratitude Page

A straightforward way to fill missed planner pages is to write. By reflecting on your day or week, you can easily fill the space and remind yourself of what you did.

When you’re struggling to think about what to write in your empty planner spreads, check out this list of prompts to help spark some ideas.

Another way to fill space in your planner is to use the empty pages as a gratitude page and write what you're grateful for. It can range from something small, like a hot cup of coffee, to something large, like a promotion at work. There’s nothing too small or too big to include in a gratitude log.

Add Lists or Trackers Retroactively to Your Planner

Missed planner pages give an excellent opportunity to create fun lists, like the ones listed below.

• Movies, shows, anime, or YouTube videos you’ve watched
• Books, articles, fanfiction, or manga you’ve read
• Bands, albums, songs, or podcasts you’ve listened to
• Your favorite snacks, meals, or drinks
• Fun facts you recently learned

Check out this free list of spreads and tracker ideas for bullet journals, which gives lots of ideas for lists you can create in your empty planner pages.

You can spruce up your list with some mini icon stickers to make your lists stand out.

FAQ

What does “backfilling” a planner mean?

Backfilling planner pages means going back to missed planner days to fill the space with decoration or reflection.

Is it okay to skip days in my planner?

Of course! Life is messy and imperfect; it makes sense for a planner to be imperfect too. Skipping planner days is just part of real life.

Do I need to backfill every missed planner day?

No, you don’t! You can backfill the days that feel meaningful or fun to revisit. Or you can leave the space blank; it’s just paper after all.

How can I avoid missing planner days in the future?

You can try simplifying your layout or using undated planners like these bullet journal-inspired ones. I also have a blog post on ways to stay consistent with journaling that may help!

Embrace Imperfect Planning Without the Pressure

Missed planner days shouldn’t be a source of stress. A planner is a tool to help you be more productive, but it doesn’t have to be just that. Your planner can also be a creative journaling space where you can fill your pages in a way that is a reflection of your life.

Hopefully, you have some ideas on how to backfill planner pages. Whether you make a sticker dump, decorate planner pages with a collage, create some doodles, practice lettering, use prompts to reflect, or create lists, your planner can be a creative journaling space.

So grab your favorite pens, flip back to those empty planner pages, and let yourself play in a way that makes your planner truly yours.

If you’d like a little inspiration on how to make your pages feel cohesive, explore Tablet & Quill’s illustrated sticker sheets to bring a little warmth and creativity to your pages.

How do you backfill your planner pages? Share your ideas in the comments or find me as TabletAndQuill on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, I’d love to see what you come up with!

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