Category: Ink

Fountain Pen Favorites for October 2016

Laura2 Comments

calendar image

October has been awesome, but also has passed a blurry haze. Fountain pens and inks are all very nice. But baseball playoffs have been the bomb. So it’s a little surprising to look back and realize that October was full of fountain pen highlights. This is practically the World Series of Fountain Pen Favorites.

1.  Sailor Kin-Mokusei. A gorgeous orange.

2. Sailor Waka-Uguisu. A great yellow-green. And I don’t even like green.

3. Kaweco Light Blue AL-Sport. Icy blue; I love it.

4. Field Notes. My Field Notes box runneth over. Literally. My daughters did steal ask for some of my new orange and pink ones, which I shared with unworthy mixed feelings understandable mixed feelings. But I’m still flush with Field Notes. I better go write some things down. Like, how to be a better mother. You know, for next month.

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Photo by Dafne Cholet, Flickr, used under Creative Commons license.

Lamy Safari: The Chicago Cubs Version

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Go Cubs Lamy Safari modification

We do what we can, here at Fountain Pen Follies, to cheer on our favorite baseball team. And this year has been magical. On Saturday night, the Chicago Cubs baseball team won the pennant for the first time in 71 years. Tonight they will play in the World Series, for the first time in 108 years. What in the fountain pen world can commemorate that? How about a Chicago Cubs Lamy Safari.

Cubs colors are blue and red with white, and a baseball is white with red stitching.  My Chicago Cubs edition Safari is made from the cap of a white and red Safari, and the body of a blue Safari.

Go Cubs Lamy Safari modification

It’s inked with J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage (“Wild Ivy”), in tribute to the ivy-covered walls of Wrigley Field, the Cubs home park.

Go Cubs, go. And thanks for a great year.

In Medias Res: New Sailor Inks, Plus the Peche to Sakura-Mori Comparison

Laura2 Comments

Sailor inks

It does look like an Easter basket just threw up on me, doesn’t it?

But thankfully not. It’s just that I just got three more of the new Sailor Four Seasons inks. Up there are Sailor Waka-Uguisu, Sakura-Mori and Yuki-Akari.

Candidly, I am not a pastel person. But I have been happily surprised by these three inks. In fact the final ink of the trio, the one I only grudgingly added to the shopping cart,  because I absolutely loathed the color of the online swabs, turns out to be my favorite of all. Go figure.

But first things first. Here is a comparison of Sakura-Mori, the new Sailor pink, with the old Sailor pink, Peche.

Sailor Sakura-Mori and Sailor Jentle Peche comparisons

That’s perhaps sad news for Peche devotees. Sakura-Mori is a warmer color, and isn’t really very much like Peche.

But Sakura-Mori is lovely, nonetheless, if you like pale pink inks. It’s a delicate pink with a blush of orange, I believe. Now, a light pink ink is not be the most versatile, useful color, for sure, but I have a soft spot for the barely legible ink category, so I like this one.

Scribbles and Scratches

Laura6 Comments

Sailor Kin-Mokusei writing sample

Of course you can’t read that, but that scribble is meant to say “Sailor Kin-Mokusei,” and it’s on the edge of a scrap of paper I found this weekend as I started to put together a review of Kin-Mokusei ink. I dug out a little photo, blew up the relevant part, and here it is.

The orange Kin-Moksei is one of the eight Sailor Jentle Four Seasons inks that are soon to arrive in stores outside Japan. The brown-green ink you can glimpse just above Kin-Mokusei is Rikyu-Cha, which is another.

I know it’s not a proper photo, but that’s okay for me, because this scrap of image shows why I love Kin-Mokusei.  It’s a bright and shiny yellow-orange with lovely shading. It looks happy and exuberant, but also organic. For a bright ink, it’s actually subtle.

I will write a proper review with proper photographs and perhaps words that make sense. It’s just that those take time. And we had the Cubs. The cross country meet. The sun coming out for two whole days in a row. So much good.

But this scrap reminds me of something good, too. To take the time to enjoy the little things you come across unexpectedly — the scraps and scribbles, the unplanned encounters, the song you hear on the radio, the wrong turns leading somewhere interesting. Anything that makes you smile, or gives you an “aha” moment.

Even if it’s just a little scribble of ink. After all, that’s why we love this silly stuff.