This Vintage Calendar Idea Is the Sweetest Way to Make College Memories

In my last few weeks before graduation, I’ve been feeling very sentimental. My friends and I have been checking items off our college bucket list as fast as possible — and I’ve been trying to remember all of my favorite moments from the past four years. 

Aside from the Snapchat memories that I watch periodically, I didn’t do a very good job of documenting my undergrad experience. When I saw this TikTok video by @Jennperezmiller, I wished I had thought of this perpetual calendar idea for keeping track of college memories back in my freshman year.

In the video, @jennperezmiller explains how their grandmother used her perpetual calendar — a calendar with numbered days, but no year, so you can reuse it for as many years as you’d like — to keep track of everything of note that happened to any of her family members that day. 

For example, she notes that on June 15, the calendar says that “it was 102 degrees in 2015,” that “Jock, their Boston terrier, died Wednesday 1977,” and that @jennperezmiller had her wisdom teeth pulled on Thursday in 2006” — all on the same day years apart.

The idea of using a perpetual calendar to keep track of sentimental events for a family is so sweet, but as a college student, it would be such a cool way to record memories across all four years of school.  For instance, my freshman year would be marked full of parties and football games where I never stayed past halftime. Sophomore year I’d have marked down the day my boyfriend and I first met and the day I moved into my first off-campus apartment. Junior year, I’d have written down the date I got my first internship and the various dates I published stories for different publications for the first time. And probably a million other things I’ve forgotten by now but would have loved to remember.

I think I’d have the most to document for senior year: Our school’s last football game, my boyfriend’s December graduation, the date I got my offer letter for my postgrad full-time job, the afternoon I adopted my cat, and the last night at my favorite college bar sharing one last karaoke song with my friends. 

My perpetual calendar would be one final victory lap and love letter to my undergraduate degree, but I love the idea of saving it so that I could continue adding onto it in my life postgraduation, and maybe even passing it on to my children one day. 

There are all kinds of perpetual calendars, like hyper minimal flip-style ones you just use to show each day’s date. For this memory-keeping idea, though, you’re looking for a paper version with room to write notes for each day of the year, like this one. 

There are also standing desk calendar versions, but if you’re looking for one just like the calendar in the TikTok video, you could also make your own with as much room so write as you’d like using cardstock cut to size, a hole punch, and binder rings. No matter what year you are in school or stage of life you’re in, a perpetual calendar can be a beautiful way to keep track of each day’s little memories, maintain perspective, and open a little note from your past self each day.