Collections: Lucky Clover Pencil Box

First off- special thanks to all the lovely mentions and comments regarding my colour wheel bottle vase photo!  One little bird, down home amy, and the Room6 blog.  Oh and then this little post from On a secret mission about 2 canadian bloggers, one being myself and one being the very talented Arounna from bookou.  It's made my week start out with a smile!

So here is another little glimpse into some of my hand-me-down art supplies.  This wooden pencil case- a lucky pencil case with all the 4 leaf clovers around it, was passed on to me by my great-aunt.  It's kind of the perfect case for Ink nibs and pens, don't you think? 

And the sweet little houses and the snow and trees, mixed in with all the different patterns, how lovely is that?  There is something about opening a box like this and pulling out the nibs that makes me want to write a letter.  You know, a real letter on nice stationary.  Using ink, because my writing looks so much better when I use a proper nib and ink. Have you ever noticed that?  Remarkable. 
I have a pen pal- I really should say 'had' because I'm notoriously bad for writing her back now, but I have had a pen pal from Germany since I was in grade 3.  We kept in touch all these years, she visited me when we were in grade 12 and I visited her in Stuttgart about 8 years ago.  I still have all her letters to me- most of which are in german, all of which were written with a real ink pen.  I'm quite certain it's my turn to write and so I think this might be a good place to start.  But where to start when it's been so long...

New collages

I'm off to unload my kilns and will hopefully have some lovely new ceramics to show you here next week and to up-date my shop with! 
In the meantime, I thought I'd show you some of the little collages I've been working on in the evenings when the boys are put to bed.  I received a few new inks and nibs, got some new washi tape in the mail this week, and have found a use for some of the sun prints that I made with the boys last summer.  I also had picked up some vintage stamps at a craft sale (can't remember who I got them from, sorry) that had bird and flower themes so those have been fun to experiment with.  I had bought some Daler Rowney heavy weight paper at the Art Supply store and it's amazing for drawing and painting and gluing papers on.  Doesn't curl up at all.  Also amazing for pen and ink, which is want the pine needle was drawn in.  Along with some new lino stamps I had carved and the blue and white patterns from the insides of old envelopes, I just had some fun with these and am looking forward to making more.  Sometimes when paintings just seem a bit too daunting, it's kind of nice to work small and on a collage.
Have a happy weekend! 

Pen & Ink

 

Here are some more glimpses into the past with some photos of notebooks that once belonged to Dean's Grandparents.  Mostly in german and almost illegible, there is such a beautiful flow to the letters and numbers.  This last image with all the numbers is actually music notations with the words to old hymns in German.  It has inspired me to dig around in my supplies cupboard for my old nibs and ink again. 

I know there are a number of very talented artists using calligraphy and pen & ink these days.  Here are just a couple that I've found recently:

Shana Murray

Betsy Dunlap  

I just remembered that there is also a great article with some other calligrapher's in the new Uppercase Magazine...