Sunday Reads: March 31. 2019

Stuff I Looked At Elsewhere & Read

• Brilliant Hiding Spots Cats Have Found While Avoiding The Vet - Sad and Useless.
• 11 Year Old Ukulele Phenom Covers Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit - Twisted Sifter.
• King cake donut holes - Cake n Knife.
• Fluffy Japanese Pancakes: Souffle Pancake Recipe - I am a food blog.
• A New Book Explores the Wide Range of Charming Homemade Cat Ladders in Switzerland - Colossal.
• Fluffy buttermilk pancakes - Brown Eyed Baker.
• An Atlas of Literary Maps Created by Great Authors: J.R.R Tolkien’s Middle Earth, Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island & More - Open Culture.
• Download Vincent van Gogh’s Collection of 500 Japanese Prints, Which Inspired Him to Create “the Art of the Future” - Open Culture.
• Octopus Squirts Bird - Nat Geo.
• Searing Bands of White Light Mark the Ocean’s Rising Tides in a Coastal Community - Colossal.
• Free Brush Pen Calligraphy Worksheet - The Postman's Knock.
• SBREBrown reviews the Fountain Pen Revolution 14k and Ultra Flex Nibs.

Stuff I Apparently Did This Week

• Caran d'Ache Amazon Ink
• Staedtler Triplus Fineliners Writing Sample
• Writing with the Pelikan Souverän M1005 Stresemann Fountain Pen
• Letters & Textures Modified Pilot Parallel Workshop at the Chicago Pen Show 2019
• Caran d'Ache Blue Sky Ink 

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If you're doing any browsing and shopping, please do check out my sponsors in the sidebar, because they help make all this possible. Some of these links are affiliate links, which provides me with a small commission but does not add any extra cost to your purchase. Some links are just referral links, but there is no obligation to purchase through any of these links. Your purchases through my links help support this blog and allows me to fulfill review requests. Either way, I appreciate your readership and your support so much, so thank you!

Discount codes here!

Caran d'Ache Blue Sky Ink

This Caran d'Ache ink was part of the Earth series that was discontinued several years ago. The bottles were a pain to fill pens from, but the labels and inks were beautiful. The elegance of the heavy glass inkwells was way cool. I wish they would stop discontinuing amazing things. Fortunately, this is a color I can find elsewhere so I'm not totally crushed about this one.

Letters & Textures Modified Pilot Parallel Workshop at the Chicago Pen Show 2019

Join me and Salman Khattak at the Chicago Pen Show in May to explore the variety of lettering and textures that can be produced with a Pilot Parallel Pen modified to write like a Folded Pen.

$60USD/$75CAD

REGISTER HERE!

You will also learn some cool creative techniques to get the most out of your Pilot Parallel Pens including how to make splatters and create gradients.

The workshop will also introduce the use of a Brass Folded Pen. We will have some available for testing and playing.

All supplies will be provided (and are yours to take home). Just show up with an enthusiasm to explore a different way to enjoy pens and inks.

Writing with the Pelikan Souverän M1005 Stresemann Fountain Pen

Thank you to Pelikan for loaning me this pen for a review! You can read my full review of this fountain pen here but I wanted to do some scribbles with this whopper of a nib for your (and my) viewing pleasure. If you enjoy such videos, please like & subscribe on YouTube! You're my motivation.

Staedtler Triplus Fineliners Writing Sample @STAEMars

Shop for Staedtler Triplus Fineliner

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Caran d'Ache Amazon Ink

This Caran d'Ache ink was part of the Earth series that was discontinued several years ago. The bottles were a pain to fill pens from, but the labels and inks were beautiful. The elegance of the heavy glass inkwells was way cool. I wish they would stop discontinuing amazing things. It's not a particularly unique green, but I loved the overall presentation of it. I'd grab another bottle if I found one at a decent price.

I have since replaced this discontinued ink with Montblanc's Irish Green - not an exact match but I'm actually really happy with Irish Green.

Sunday Reads: March 24. 2019

Stuff I Looked At Elsewhere & Read

• Salted nutter butter and caramel pretzel cookies - Bakers Royale.
• Oddly Satisfying Valentine's Day Chocolate - YouTube Kevin Parry.
• 30 ways to make your own jewelry - A Beautiful Mess.
• Sweet & Salty Potato Chip Toffee Cookies - Sally's Baking Addiction.
• Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Coffee Cake - Love & Olive Oil.
• Brilliant cross stitches - Sad and Useless.
• Paper Artist Folds Cranes and Then Gives Them Intricate Decorations - Twisted Sifter.
• 50,000 Photographs Combine to Form a Detailed Image of the Moon and Stars - Colossal.
• When a Cat Co-Authored a Paper in a Leading Physics Journal - Open Culture.
• Can you solve the three gods riddle? TedEd.
• First mammal species recognized as extinct due to climate change - Nat Geo.
• The Two Most Powerful Ways to Create a Healthy Eating Pattern - Zen Habits.
• So we found a live bat in our archive - The Museum of English Rural Life.
• Dazzling Jellyfish, Snakes, and Turtles Glow with a Multitude of Colors in Vibrant Tattoos  - Colossal.

Stuff I Apparently Did This Week

• Cross Violet Ink
• Muji Gel Pens
• Montblanc Elixir Parfumeur Collection Fountain Pen Ink
• Unboxing Bond Travel Gear Wallet & Field Journal & Tomoe River Notebooks

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If you're doing any browsing and shopping, please do check out my sponsors in the sidebar, because they help make all this possible. Some of these links are affiliate links, which provides me with a small commission but does not add any extra cost to your purchase. Some links are just referral links, but there is no obligation to purchase through any of these links. Your purchases through my links help support this blog and allows me to fulfill review requests. Either way, I appreciate your readership and your support so much, so thank you!

Discount codes here!

Unboxing Bond Travel Gear Wallet & Field Journal & Tomoe River Notebooks

Thank you to Bond Travel Gear for sending these supplies for me to check out and share with you. This is a sponsored post but I will do my best to share an unbiased opinion with you. There are no affiliate links here.

Tomoe River Pocket Notebooks - 3 Pack

Tomoe River Field Journal

Travel Wallet

Tomoe River A5 Notebook

Montblanc Elixir Parfumeur Collection Fountain Pen Ink

Montblanc products come at a premium. You may love it or hate it but a new fountain pen ink with the added twist of being "perfumed" warranted a look, at least so I could tell you what I think! This is one of the three new Elixir Parfumeur inks in the collection: leather orange.

Montblanc describes the collection as follows:

The Montblanc Elixir Parfumeur collection embraces exquisite unisex fragrances, as well as the use of oils and the finest plants, to express maximum intensity. The scents stimulate emotions and memory through a reinterpretation of the most beloved raw material scents of all time. The scent of leather first came into fashion in perfumery in the 17th century around the time of Louis XIV. The perfume of the Elixir Leather ink evokes a wild yet exquisite moment through long musky and smoky notes, along with a tanned leather fragrance.

At about $90USD for 50 ml of ink, the price per ml is pretty high and it's quite the premium. I love the smell of the ink - it's not so much scented as it is perfumed. There is a difference once you smell a scented ink and a perfumed ink. The ink smells quite delicious - smoky, musky, leathery, woody. It does not make me gag like many scented inks do. I actually don't like scented inks because I hate how it lingers on the page and makes my pen reek. I like the smell of this stuff.

Would I buy a bottle at this price? Definitely not. I really like the color because I like warm browns but I go through ink too fast to be ok with this. It doesn't have a lot of shading and I could not see much in the way of sheen. It's well-behaved, at least. How about you? What do you think of it?

 

Muji Gel Pens @mujiusa