15 Things to Capture in Your Commonplace Journal
The North Star Journal Co Guide
Commonplace journals are like well-traveled suitcases — they’re not meant to stay empty. The more you fill them, the more their pages feel like home. Here’s what to start tucking inside yours today:
1. Quotations That Stop You Cold
From Jane Austen to Joan Didion, capture the lines that make you put the book down and stare into space. Bonus: Pair with your favorite highlighter or fountain pen.
2. Overheard Conversations
The bus, the café, the park bench — life is a stage, and strangers are endlessly quotable.
3. Recipes Worth Making Twice
From your grandmother’s chocolate cake to the perfect vinaigrette, these are edible heirlooms in the making.
4. Sketches + Diagrams
Not just for artists — draw your dream kitchen, a garden layout, or the way the moon looked last night.
5. Words You Love
Archaic beauties like “susurrus” or foreign gems like “saudade.” Define them in your own hand.
6. Passages from Letters
Copy out lines from handwritten notes you’ve received — it’s a quiet act of preservation.
7. Dreams + Daydreams
The nighttime kind and the kind that creep in when you should be doing your taxes.
8. Lists That Delight You
Books to read, cities to visit, plants to grow, wines to try. (See our List Keeper’s Kit for inspiration.)
9. Questions Without Answers
The ones that gnaw at you — philosophical, practical, romantic. Let them breathe on paper.
10. Snippets from Nature
Press a leaf, tape in a feather, sketch the pattern of raindrops on your window.
11. Fragments of Art + Design
A paint swatch, fabric scrap, museum ticket, or the postcard you brought home from Paris.
12. Personal Aha! Moments
Those flashes of clarity that arrive in the shower, on a walk, or mid-argument.
13. Family Stories
Record the little ones before they vanish — the way your grandfather carved apples or the phrase your aunt always says.
14. Lines from Music
The lyric that hits you in the ribs and makes you play the song twice.
15. Rituals + Recipes for Living
Your morning tea routine, Sunday walk route, or a seven-step process for the perfect bath.
Pro Tip from The North Star Journal Co
The beauty of a commonplace journal is that it’s a living collection. Don’t wait for perfect handwriting, perfect paper, or perfect order. Just start. You’ll find your patterns later — and that’s when the magic happens.