How to Create A Calendar in Canva
Crafting Your Perfect Calendar: A Step-by-Step Guide Using Canva
Introduction
In a world where time is of the essence, calendars play a pivotal role in keeping our lives organised and efficient. Whether you’re a student juggling classes, a professional managing work deadlines, or simply someone aiming to seize the day, a well-designed calendar can be your ultimate ally. In this tutorial, we’ll explore the seamless process of creating a personalised calendar using the user-friendly platform, Canva.
But first, let’s clarify what a calendar is:
Definition
A calendar is a systematic arrangement of days, weeks, and months, serving as a visual representation of time. It acts as a roadmap for our lives, helping us plan, organise, and track events, tasks, and appointments. Beyond its practicality, a calendar can also be a reflection of personal style and creativity. With the right tools and a touch of imagination, you can transform a mundane schedule into a visually stunning masterpiece.
Now, let’s dive into the exciting realm of calendar creation with Canva, where creativity meets functionality.
How To Create A Calendar
Welcome to the instructions on how to create a great calendar. I do have an instructional PDF manual on tables. It is available on my Paetron and my Gumroad.
And I have an upcoming video. I say upcoming as I have to re-record it. Screen recorder didn’t work on time so the video became distorted.
But enough of that, lets get into the real reason.
The Instructions
Starting to create a calendar in Canva is a straightforward process. Follow these step-by-step instructions to kick off your calendar design:
1. Visit Canva
Open your web browser and navigate to Canva’s website (www.canva.com). If you already have a Canva account, log in using your credentials. If not, follow the prompts to create a new account.
If you don’t have an account, you’ll need to sign up for a free account. This is very easy as it is free and accessible to anyone over the age of 12 or 13 without parents’ permission.
Afterwards, check all of your registered information. And proceed to your own dashboard. After entering your username or password. Or after your select the connecting link to Canva from your personal or business email.
1. 2 Methods of Creation
Before I go any further here is an important fact to consider. There are generally three methods that are present when creating a Canva product. And in this case, creating a calendar as a Canva product. They are:-
- Ready Made Templates — These are digital versions of different calendars designed for easy use.
- Customisation — That is when you use the dimensions such as pixels, inches, centimetres to create the digital product.
- The Drop-down Menu — This can be found either in the centre or the side of your home dashboard.
Now, we will proceed to the next step. The Design.
2. Choose a Design
Once logged in, you’ll be on Canva’s dashboard. Click on the “Create a design” button in the top right corner. In the search bar, type “calendar” and select the “Blank” or a template that suits your style and preferences.
If you’ve chosen a blank canvas, you’ll need to set the dimensions for your calendar. Common calendar dimensions are around 11x17 inches for a printable version. Adjust the width and height accordingly.
3. Create a table
When you create the document, you would be approached with the dashboard of editing a blank canvas. This would include Canva elements, Canva apps and other Canva features available. They would be represented on the sidebar
For the table menu, there are two options. By placing your finger on the keyword symbol “ / ” button or using the Canva AI assistance button.
With the assistance, you can type the word table and the option would appear in a drop-down menu. Select the option by dragging your mouse over the amount of rows and columns. This is when you go and get the purple squares it would declare the amount of each.
Also, you can add more rows and columns by the “ + ” symbol. It will appear on the table once you hover over it.
Fact 1: With four week months, you would get approximately four rows and five columns without adding a heading. Five rows if you add the heading which is the name of the month.
Fact 2: And for five week months, you would get approximately, three rows and five columns without adding a heading. Four rows if you want to add the heading which is the name of the month.
Next adding the numbers, texts and symbols.
4. Add Text and Numbers
As a normal digital table in a spreadsheet, you can do the similar feature and press the empty cell to enter text, number and symbols from the keyboard.
Remember to create the calendar month according to the real world months on other calendars. You can use the TimeandDate.com (https://www.timeanddate.com/) as a popular option.
5. Add Calendar Elements
Canva offers a variety of elements you can use to build your calendar. From the left sidebar, click on “Elements” to access shapes, lines, and icons. Drag and drop these elements onto your canvas to represent days, weeks, and months.
Spice up your calendar by adding images. Click on “Elements” and then “Uploads” to use your own images or explore Canva’s extensive library. Drag images onto your calendar and resize them as needed.
6. Customising the Layout
Adjust the placement of elements, resize them, and experiment with different layouts until you achieve the desired look. Canva allows for easy customisation with its drag-and-drop interface.
Also, remember the alignment of text and numbers is important. Including the font size, style and colour. Size, not too big or small. And style along with colour, as not to divert you and others looking at the product. Mainly, you want them to be legible to even the naked eye.
7. Choose a Colour Scheme
This step can before or after or during completing Step 6.
Click on “Background” from the sidebar to select a background colour or pattern. Ensure that your colour choices align with the overall theme and aesthetics you want for your calendar.
You can also attain this feature of a solid background colour by selecting the square option beside the font style on the top bar.
8. Save Your Work
Periodically save your work by clicking on the disk icon or using the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+S or Command+S). This ensures that you don’t lose your progress.
9. Preview and Download
Click on the “Preview” button to see how your calendar looks. If you’re satisfied, click on the “Download” button to save your calendar to your device.
Other Methods of Creating A Calendar
If the feature of adding tables is not available then you can do the following other steps below.
1. Insert Text Boxes
Click on “Text” from the sidebar and add text boxes for the month and days of the week. Customise fonts, sizes, and colours to match your design. And place them together and form the calendar together. By stacking the text boxes at the size of five I think. Not too sure about this.
2. Use a large rectangle
Create a rectangle by selecting “Elements” on the sidebar. And then type in “rectangle” in the search bar. And then you can separate them by adding lines. Each by a simple amount of inches. Rather forming a grid structure.
You can use the features related to margins on a paper to help to separate the lines.
You can find this feature when you go to the top bar and select “File” and then scroll down to “View Settings”. Then the option “Show margins and rulers”.
And then also the snapping feature is on the same drop down bar. I might discuss this further in the future.
Congratulations! You’ve taken the first steps in creating your personalised calendar in Canva. From here, you can continue to refine and enhance your design based on your preferences and needs.
Now how to export your wonderful, little creation.
Exporting The Product
After you have created your perfect calendar, you can do the following : -
- Order Physical Cover — You can either order an physical version of your calendar from Canva. Fees may vary in the future. And the option would appear at times to ask if you want this version. Or you can find the link in their ordering section of the drop-down menu available.
- Download digital copy — This can be either the required file types for example JPG, PNG or PDF. The other file type are more for moving items.
Other Facts
- With digital version, you can always translate it into a editable PDF format. And then use the calendar as your personal digital calendear. More on that in the future.
- You can create sections such as priority, to-do notes and just notes. You can see some examples in many of the Canva ready-made templates.
- Incorporate images can be a little tricky as some might be copyrighted. Even though they have been placed on Canva’s platform. But according to Canva, once you edit it to be unrecognisable then it is deemed as your own created image. This is for when you are selling the calendar.
- You can make gridless calenar by changing the colour of the lines to the background colour.
- Sharing the calendar might be tricky as soon people might think you are a graphic designer or some design guru. And ask you to do one for them. And you would be the mainstay designer of all your family and friends. Okay, okay, this one is a little goof.
Conclusion
And there you have it. Here was a pretty long blog about “How to get to design an calendar in Canva”. Hope it wasn’t too long. Hope this could be good for you, your business or your client. Maybe for your print on demand store.
And if you want to know about terms such as drop-down menus then you can check out my Basic Computer Info blog on Google Blogger. I just started blogging about basic computer skills and how they help in the everyday world.
Or just research out YouTube for this topic. As it is good to look at more than one source.
Or you can watch my YouTube channel PigleyWigglyEgg, where one of my topics deals with discussing Canva related topics. Be cautious, my channel is still relatively new so it might not be present at the moment. But my Paetron and Gumroad are present. So if you want the “Create a simple table” then find me at The Smiling EggHeadCompany or tsunamikidja on Gumroad.