Welcome From Northern-Ish Virginia

[CarriesAPen]

Hi. I'm Maria and live near Woodbridge/Dale city. I came here to find other people who share an interest in using fountain pens.

 

I am recently exploring going a bit more analog and improving my writing. So far I like the results of deliberate analog organization. I like giving my hand a break by writing with an instrument that feels like an extension of my hand.

 

Fun fact, my one and only quality pen at the time, an Aurora, was stolen off a desk at a previous job a couple of years back.

[mitto]

Greetings and welcome to FPN. Sad to hear sbout your loss. So what pen(s) are you using right now. Hope you would soon be able to grab not one but quite a few quality pens of your choice. What about having a vintage Parker 51 aerometric?

[Flippy]

Greetings and welcome to FPN. Sad to hear sbout your loss. So what pen(s) are you using right now. Hope you would soon be able to grab not one but quite a few quality pens of your choice. What about having a vintage Parker 51 aerometric?

Or a Vacumatic?

 

Anyway, welcome aboard. Cheers before jeers!

[CarriesAPen]

We will see. Hoping to head to the DC show.

[Carrau]

Welcome aboard, Maria, from Charleston, SC.

Mike

[ThomasB]

Hello and welcome from Baton Rouge, Louisiana...Enjoy your time here

[fjoly79]

Welcome to FPN, Maria!

Francois

[Tasmith]

Welcome to FPN!

 

You have many great fountain pen stores here in the DC area, Bertram's Inkwell in Rockville, MD https://www.bertramsinkwell.com/, Pen Boutique in Bethesda, MD http://www.penboutique.com/, and Fahrney's in DC https://www.fahrneyspens.com/. There's even a Montblanc Boutique in Tysons Galleria Mall http://www.montblanc.com/en-us/home.html.

 

Be sure to get on each stores email list to be notified of in-store events and specials.

 

If you have an interest in calligraphy, or just want inspiration for improving your handwriting you can join the Washington Calligrapher's Guild http://www.calligraphersguild.org/ .

Edited August 2, 2017 by Tasmith

[jar]

Welcome home. Pull up a stump and set a spell. Did you know that Petersburg once was a major fountain pen manufacturing city?

[jar]

double post.

Edited August 2, 2017 by jar

[Sasha Royale]

Welcome, Maria !

. . . . . . one, who CarriesAPen. I hope you do that, now. I hope your are no longer

" LeavesAPenOnTheDesk ". Dante assigns a special place in Hell for people who steal fountain pens. I remember Dale City, due West of Waldorf, Maryland, from my University Of Maryland days. Beautiful rolling hills !

What are you currently using for daily writing ?

[Wahl]

Hi Maria

[CarriesAPen]

Hey. Fantastic forum and great company!

 

For daily use I keep a couple of the pilot metropolitan. They are solid enough to handle the abuse I dish out and if I mess up there is a Staples up the street with a few more of them. I currently use namiki blue black for my work appropriate ink. I have ordered an oxblood color that I'm fond of to change off for daily writing. I take alot of notes with my work and the smooth pen helps immensely. My hope is to locate a blue-grey-black ink that cleans up easy, is smooth, and has a light sheen. Suggestions are very welcome.

 

I'm also currently eyeing a fog blue from de Atramentis and maybe a green-black, I think Dickens was in the name.

 

I have two other pens that were handmade by a local craftsman (Woodbridge, Pendemonium) that I saw at gun and knife conventions. My current favorite of these is olive wood from Jerusalem and has a basic chrome magnetic close and post. It has medium heft, feels very smooth in my hand. The craftsman supplied me with a variety of nibs from EFine to medium (no. 5 I believe) and twist converters to support my use of the pen. So far the mechanics within all his pens are easy to adjust, clean, and maintain.

 

For fun I also tried a set of pilot parallel after seeing a YouTube video where the pens were filled from water colors. I went wth, I have some water colors around here, let's try it, FOR SCIENCE!...That worked very well, was very wet, it dragged hard on water color paper and did fine on some craft paper from Michael's. It was a bunch of fun but not something I'd do all the time.

 

I have been to Fahrneys in DC, because I worked in that area a while, but none of the other stores. I am influenced alot by social media and look online alot for supplies. Looking forward to getting to see all of the local stores as buying local is my preference, where practical.

[PenChalet]

Welcome to the Fountain Pen Network, Maria! We're glad to have you with us!

[PAKMAN]

Hello and Welcome to FPN!! Glad to have you as a member!!

[Chrissy]

Hello Maria and welcome to FPN.

[justvrod]

Hi Maria, Welcome from Springfield VA, I recently joined FPN. What a great source for information on Fountain pens !

[justvrod]

Welcome to FPN!

 

You have many great fountain pen stores here in the DC area, Bertram's Inkwell in Rockville, MD https://www.bertramsinkwell.com/, Pen Boutique in Bethesda, MD http://www.penboutique.com/, and Fahrney's in DC https://www.fahrneyspens.com/. There's even a Montblanc Boutique in Tysons Galleria Mall http://www.montblanc.com/en-us/home.html.

 

Be sure to get on each stores email list to be notified of in-store events and specials.

 

If you have an interest in calligraphy, or just want inspiration for improving your handwriting you can join the Washington Calligrapher's Guild http://www.calligraphersguild.org/ .

Thanks for sharing this !

[OCArt]

Welcome to our little corner of the universe from a pen user in San Diego.

[Tasmith]

Thanks for sharing this !

 

You're welcome!

 

You are just a few miles from this weekend's DC Pen Show: http://www.pencentral.com/