Blue Sky Smart Notes Spiral

July 2, 2016

Was so pleased to discover the Black n' Red poly spiral notebooks and finally see what ink looks like on nice paper. I got a couple of the little 4x6 ones, thinking to get rid of the nasty little memo pads I keep on my desk but these little ones are $3 and change.

Last time I was at Walmart, I came across a similar spiral, Blue Sky Smart Notes - double-wire lay-flat, poly covers, a little narrower and a bit taller. I was leery at first, the paper wasn't as thick as the BnR but it was definitely better quality than the memo books and the surface felt fairly smooth when I ran my finger over it so I decided to try one out.

The front-facing side is narrow ruled with a margin line and a subject and date box across the top; the rear side is a grid. Both pages have a thin border line around the edge which does cut into the usable space slightly.

The paper was a pleasant surprise. It's not quite as bright as the BnR but show-through was minimal on almost all the inks I tried, with some bleed-through from the usual suspects - slight with Vert Empire and Levenger Claret, slightly more with Dark Lilac and, of course, Pervenche and Twilight. Shading shows nicely on most shady inks (even Twilight, though not Pervenche); sheen is exhibited as well, obvious with Lilac and Oku-yama thicker lines on wetter writers, and more subtly on finer lines, as with the Yama-dori.

Nice thing is the price, $1.88. Not a replacement for the BnR but a decent alternative that saves a little dosh.

September 23, 2017

This looks good. I'm always on the lookout for affordable, high-performance notebooks.

In a similar vein, check out my review of the Carolina Pad Ucreate Sketchbook

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/327566-bleed-through-battle-ucreate-sketchbook/?p=3920982

October 13, 2017

This is my new pocket notebook. It goes everywhere with me. I also have a couple of hardcover 5.75x8.5 wirebound notebooks, a 5x8 weekly/monthly planner, and a monthly deskpad calendar that I have on my office wall. All of the paper is FP-friendly. The calendar has no show-through whatsoever.