I'm A Planner Hacker!

Quite literally! Hubby and I embarked on a new journey: planner hacking. We hacked apart, almost literally a planner. We took this:

well, not THAT exact one... but "A" Webster's Pages Color Crush binder... 

And made this:

Yes, We hacked the binder! We made it into a Color-Dori. Haven't y'all seen my new found passion for all things 'dori? I LOVE my new Color-Dori!! I mean LOVE! I will give you a quick toot(torial) about how to do it!

First, empty the binder. Next, take your trusty drill w/ a 5/16th drill bit and drill

 and remove the outer portion of the rivet, not drilling into the ring assembly. 

This will allow you to remove the ring assembly leaving two raised rivets on the binder itself.

Use the channel lock pliers to remove the outer rivet casing.

Drill out the center of the raised rivets with a 1/8th drill bit careful to not drill into the binder/"leather" itself. There is a metal backing BEHIND the "leather" we will get to that in a sec. 

These things? I have NO idea what they are called, but they work like... amazingly well to snip what's left of the raised rivets. At this point, we were just going to leave them, and just live with it but hubby being the guy he is... had to go one step further... Taking out the metal backing that is BEHIND the "leather". You can see a faint outline of it in the above picture. So, me being me, I thought we were done... so I don't have pictures of the taking out of the metal piece. BUT, I can tell you how it was done!

Make a small incision at or above slightly the remaining rivet hole. Don't worry, you only need to make one slice, and that will be covered up in the end! Taking needle nose pliers, remove the metal strip, and viola! Almost done! This is where you need to use that washi we allllllll have but rarely use. COVER THAT STUFF UP! Like so:

Now, this is the final picture... but I will tell you how to put the grommets in!

We used 5/32 grommets or 4mm. Same size. Using a hole punch, we punch a hole smaller than needed and then hammered the grommets in. Now, the whole grommet process is new to me, so I will link you to a grommet YouTube video that can help ya there. 

Grommet How To. It's on fabric but the principle applies...

Sooooo.... here is the final product!

Psst:... hubby doesn't know he gets to do this again ;) Yay! 

Let me tell you... I LOVE THIS Color-Dori! It is AMAZING! Yes, I have to do special sized inserts for it, BUT if you do this w/ your personal sized binder... I WILL post these sizes in my etsy shop for you! Just ask! 

Thanks everyone! Have a great night!

PS: I am going to say it here FIRST. I have started using #stringgirlnotaringgirl on instagram, and I am the first one! EEP! Help me create a buzz w/ that saying!!!