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Year in pixels: how to keep a mood calendar for 2027

A year in pixels turns 365 days into one picture: every day is a dot, coloured by how it felt. Here's how to keep one through all of 2027.

How it works

Choose a small set of colours, one for each kind of day. Every evening, colour that day's square. That's all. Over weeks, the page starts to show things a diary entry can't: a heavy stretch in February, bright weekends, a calm summer.

A colour key that works

Keep the key short and the same all year. Describe days, not people: 'heavy' is about the day, not about you.

Paper or phone

• Paper: a 12 × 31 grid in a notebook or printed sheet. Lovely to colour in, easy to forget at home.
• Phone: always with you and can't get lost. In Quiet Journal you pick the colour in one tap and add one line; the month mosaic and posters build themselves.

Keeping it going

• Colour at the same moment every evening.
• Missed a few days? Fill them in from memory, or leave them blank. Blank is fine.
• Look at the whole page on the last day of each month.

Pair it with a line a day: one line a day journal · journal prompts

Questions

What is a year in pixels?

A calendar where each day of the year is one small square or dot, coloured by how the day felt. By December you have the whole year on one page.

How many colours should a year in pixels use?

Five to seven. Fewer and every day looks the same; more and you'll hesitate each evening. Quiet Journal uses six.

Can I start a year in pixels in the middle of the year?

Yes. Start today and leave the earlier days blank, or start on the 1st of next month for a cleaner page.