It was time for a new calendar year and I had no 2026 calendars in the house! You might reason that I didn’t need one until January, but I like to mark my appointments on the calendar and these are usually made ahead of time (not much point in marking down an appointment for last week). I have kept some of my favourite old calendars for their beautiful scenes to go with each month, but the weekdays and numbers don’t match those of the coming year.

I put my thinking cap on and made copies with my printer, of the numbered parts of old calendars, and then got out the whiteout and a pen to make the adjustments. In 2026, January 1st is on a Thursday, so I used a calendar page that starts on a Thursday.

Then for February I used a page that started on a Sunday (because January ends on a Saturday).

Two things you need to know for making the pages:

Is it a leap year? – Does February have 28 or 29 days?

How many days are in each month?

Here is a little verse to help you remember:

Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November,

All the rest have thirty-one,

Except February, twenty-eight days clear,

And twenty-nine in each leap year.

The calendar isn’t perfect but I used some of that scotch tape that doesn’t show as much to tape the new pages over the old calendar pages. I had to use white out to get rid of a few things written on the old page (like notations that named holidays that didn’t happen in the month I was using the page for), and I used my permanent ink Sharpie to mark in the number of the new year.

It has a bit of a “homemade look,” but it works for marking down appointments and days to remember. Best of all, I get to keep my favourite photos from the old calendar intact.

I have another calendar that I really like and will make it into a new one for 2026 as well, now that my first experiment has been successful.

It’s not as if it’s a work of art that I intend to hang in my living room. It will be by my desk which is my own business and if it’s not perfect, I can live with that.

I plan to have a happy new year with my old year not too far away, under the new pages.

And another thought I just had – I’m doing my tiny bit for the environment by recycling/reusing my calendar.

Have a very happy and healthy new year, everyone!