An Adventure in Ink

I bought a calligraphy pen and ink set from a thrift store last week, and Monday night, I decided to try it out.

Being the over-thinker I am, I first punched into Pinterest and read a few tutorials on beginning calligraphy with a nib and liquid ink. It was maybe a bit much, but also, it did help me to figure out where to start and how the dipping pen works. I had never lettered with a dip pen before, but my experiences with marker calligraphy and faux calligraphy were definitely useful in giving me enough confidence to jump in and give it a go!

(please excuse my knee lol)

It came with like a wax-seal press thing, too? Maybe that will be the next new crafty thing I will try, haha

I only did a bit of practice lettering, to get the feel of the pen and explore how the ink ran. I seemed to have to dip the pen every letter (and sometimes halfway through!) for the big letters, every third for the medium ones, and every fifth for the smaller letters and numbers I used in the date. It seemed kind of a lot of dipping to me. I don't know if I didn't shake the ink bottle well enough, or if the previous owner adding anything to the bottle that wasn't supposed to be in there, or if I just don't have the technique right. Anyway, I could see that the way I was doing it would be quite an annoying way to write a longer piece, like a letter or a poem.

In case you are wondering, the double g and y are because, even though I was letting myself be okay with the total imperfection of this page, I really could not stand the first of these two letters that I made, haha

When I took the nib apart to clean it, I saw that it was marked with the size and whatnot, although I cannot read it very well. It does not matter for now, because as it is the only nib I possess, I will not need to identify it in switching it out.

It's also kind of scratched up.

I shall experiment with this calligraphy set some more someday soon, because it was definitely fun, even though it was a bit of a messy and unknown process for me!