Fountain Pens have been in my life for a year already, and I cannot believe a year flew by! I'm feeling nostalgic, looking through the first journal I kept with fountain pens last year. It's a mis-mash of random thoughts or things I didn't want to forget. Tidbits about fountain pen companies to look back on, so I wouldn't forget. Then the processing of losing our sweet Benny too soon.
The desire to move back to more analog tooling coupled with seeing beautiful fountain pens shared on Mastodon got me curious and looking at pens. Losing Benny being the catalyst for me to pick up journaling again. Finding beautiful grey ink with gold shimmer to honor him in those journal entries lead me down the ink rabbit hole. Which I fell down HARD! Benny is also where I picked up the namesake 'BennysLittleThings' He brought so much joy and laughter to our household and I wanted to carry that on in his memory.
Above anything else, the fountain pen community has been the most welcoming, genuine, helpful group of people I've ever come across in a hobby community. You all made me feel apart of the community from day 1. Folks whom I’ve never met sent me well wishes from losing two fur babies over the past year. We've had wonderful conversations about inks, paper, books, tea and more!!! Honestly, this community is numero uno and to top it all off, outside of my local pen community (which I found because someone online alerted me to them) I've not met anyone in person. I'd really like to!
Where do I start ... wait didn't I already start?
June 2024
My first pen was a Platinum Preppy and I loved it (and still do)! In the beginning I wasn't too sure about nib size, so I safely went went a .05 which is Platinum's Medium nib. Picked up a pack of sample notebooks, very small notebooks to test with.
July 2024
This is when I started to journal again and by the end of the month, I was journaling everyday. A habit that is still in full force. I started to get up earlier in the morning to do this and it felt good. I was also starting to deal with the grief of losing Benny so unexpectedly.
August 2024
This is when I found the PenAddict podcast and started listening to more FP podcasts (Gourmet Pens, Stationery Cafe, etc). It was so interesting diving into the FP world and all the off-shoots, stickers, stationery, and even art. The PenAddict gave a shout of to Gnomedic - a Twitch streamer who did these wonderful, relaxing, morning streams where they would turn on some very chill tunes and journal. This was so amazing to me and that's how I got myself on Twitch. I don't stream, but have found some wonderful streamers and look forward to hanging out with them as they talk stationery, inks, and pens. I'm Archeopen ... say hi! I'd say those have been the biggest things in my fountain pen journey.
Pens
I've acquired 16 pens, and took a liking to F nibs, except in TWSBI's where I like a M or B and that's to play around with shimmer. A goal for next year would be to explore more maker pens and to go to a pen show and get a grind or two done. I've recently started to take a liking to specialty nibs, those ones outside of the standard gamut of EF, F, M, and B and would like to explore that more. I recently picked up an Opus 88 with a Fine Flex nib and two nibs from Kirk Spear (standard F and M - candidates for a grind, maybe?) recently and loooooove them. So smooth.
My favorite Pens in no order really, Hogtown x Engimia PDX, Franklin-Christoph 03M, Opus 88 Demonstrator, and any one of those TWSBI's.
Inks
On the ink front ... and that rabbit hole ... I've acquired 121 inks in a YEAR! What can I say? I don't think another 121 is coming in my second year? Storage really needs to be figured out. I really enjoy color and studied color theory while taking photography classes in 2012. In other-other spare time I enjoy photographing a good sunrise, so really it's no surprise that I took to ink. Fountain Pen ink with all it's properties, shade, sheen, shimmer, dualshaders. It's really neat to see what a color will do in a variety of situations, in a large swatch, in a pen, used with a dip pen, left in the sun even! So many science experiments have yet to happen! Plus, I really like studying colors using chromatography. I was completely blown away by the effects when I first figured out what the heck that was. An ink can surprise me this way and I've come to like an ink or two more after I saw the chromatography then in a large swatch, specifically Pennonia Gesztenvebarna (Chestnut Brown). Which has become a favorite.
Collecting ink also means ink swatching. I took to that really fast and started out using cotton swabs in my journal and little tester notebooks. Then I caught wind of Col-O-Dex cards by The Well-Appointed Desk. These are big enough to use to make a nice big swatch and also use a dip pen for a finer line around the edges and I think the cards looks really nice that way, it helps my brain arrange. Plus it's a cool way to use all the inks. So I swatch them as them come in and log them in FPC (Fountain Pen Companion). My FPC link is Fountain Pen Companion: Archeopen I'd love to trade ink samples!
Around September last year, I found about about the Dominant Industry Ink Archiving Book, very likely from an early OliveOctopusInk stream and thought wow what another cool way to use these inks. I put it on my wish list for my birthday and got it! It was a little intimidating at first, but over time, I figured out how I'd want to approach it, picked up a water brush for the first time, grabbed some paint brushes we had but never used from an unopened art kit and gave it a try. I was hooked immediately. What a relaxing way to use all these inks! After dinner, I can be found painting / coloring each night. Through this process, I've also found that I've taken to true watercolor. So I've been dabbling in that, recently picking up small sheets of cold press watercolor paper and drawing mushrooms and flowers to be painted in with watercolors.
hand drawn mushrooms and flowers; some painted with watercolors
Favorite inks, again in no order, Sailor Afternoon Tea, Wearingeul I am a Cat, The Wet Pen Rainier Blue, Teranishi Night-time Soda, Pennonia Gesztenvebarna and Taccia Koiami ... and recently DI x Wonderpens Ginger Chicken <--- perfectly matches my own ginger chicken (Mitchell) whom we lost late last year at 16 years old. Sweet boy. I have inks now that pretty closely match all the kitties in my life, those are fun to use and are a beautiful reminder of my babies.
Overall on the ink front, I'm intrested exploring different papers to see how differences in the paper (coated vs. not coated) can affect color or ink properties.
What's next
Fountain Pens have been my gateway back to journaling. Using any color I desire and pairing that with stickers and washi tapes, not only helps keep my journal interesting, I also find it helpful to be able to write down the things in my head. Say things 'out loud' in a way and work through thoughts in a safe way. That goes for the good things too, which I've really put a lot of thought into. Journaling about good things is helpful. It helps measure my growth and keeps me accountable. Keeping a consistent journal is really important for my mental health these days.
I'd like to go to my first pen show, there are four that are within driving distance, so it's a matter of Philadelphia, Baltimore, Ohio, or DC, although I'm not sure my anxiety can handle a big show like DC (plus I don't want to be in DC in the current climate). But I do look forward to meeting and connecting with other good people in the fountain pen and stationery community in person.
As the year went by I am figuring out what I like in a pen. I'm letting go of a few early pickups in hopes to put funds toward something that will round out my tastes a bit better. Otherwise, no real plans to add additional pens.
The blog
When I started this blog last year, I started it to be able to share my experiences as a beginner. Since I got heavily into ink, I started to share reviews; that wasn't necessarily my intent and I certainly don't want to influence anyone and add to the consumer culture. I do like sharing what inks I'm enjoying and how they might perform on different papers. I think I might try to approach that a little differently as I try new papers and start to share some color studies.
Thank you to everyone who follows this little corner of the internet. I hope you get as much joy from it as I do sharing it. I love the interaction it's brought and I always love to hear other people's thoughts on inks they're using or their recommendations.