Penable checklist

[Skydiver]

I am planning on penabling my wife for her birthday. What should be on a penable checklist and what is the priority order?

 

This is what I've thought of so far:

1. Fountain pen

2. Ink: cartridge(s), or bottle(s)

3. PF friendly paper: notebook, or pad

4. Pen case or pen rest

5. Ear cleaning bulb

6. Ink syringe

7. Ink samples

 

Any suggestions or recommendations of what else to add or remove from the list above, or reordering of the list?

 

Any suggested ink color family that I should cover as first ink or two? A black (or blue) as a first, and then a blue (or black) as a second?

 

Right now I've got the pen and paper covered. She probably doesn't need a pen stand since she already uses a mug for her other pens.

 

Just struggling with that ink color because I can't ask her outright without giving away the surprise factor. I've been surveying her work desk and she seems to use both blue or black equally. I've not seen a pattern from the gel pens she uses whenever she sometimes does some destressing coloring books with my daughter.

[DrPlush]

Quote

Any suggested ink color family that I should cover as first ink or two? A black (or blue) as a first, and then a blue (or black) as a second?

This depends entirely on the person you are giving them to. Personally, I never ever use blue ink and I think black is fine but uninspiring, so the way to win me over would have been to show me I can have as many shades of purple as I can dream. 
 

When I am trying to introduce someone to fountain pens, I prefer to make it not overwhelming by not introducing the parts that are optional straight away (as otherwise people seem to think they are compulsory), so I don’t give bulb syringes or syringes (these might be best practice but the vast majority of pens in use don’t get cleaned regularly and are fine), and I wouldn’t give a full bottle of ink because then the person will be stuck with an ink they might not like. I would give cartridges in a variety of colours, and samples/a converter if I think the recipient will be into it enough to try. However, given I assume you live with (or near) your wife, in this case I’d choose a nice pen and a variety of cartridges, and then tell her she can try any of your inks whenever she wants and then just teach her cleaning etc. when the time comes.

[Skydiver]

Awesome advice! Thank you!

[Skydiver]

Interesting timing of the Goulet Pencast 104 covering gifting.

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

I don't use black, and there are very many blues.

That assortment of ink cartridges would give her an idea.

.....................

First you have to find out, if she has any interest.......I've never heard the end of giving my non-golfing wife golf clubs.

 

What width ball point does she prefer?

Personally I find narrow ball points ...now...Narrow is not what I will buy BP cartridge for again. At least an M and may try a B...some coming decade.

I was back in the dark ages into narrow BP's.

[Sailor Kenshin]

What colors does she like in general?  Would bright colors delight her?  So many of those around.

[Skydiver]

Fashion-wise, she likes reds, but she's currently in mourning the past year so it's hard to discern if any has changed since she's always in black. House decor-wise, she's always gravitated to blacks, whites, and dark browns. She does say that oranges are growing on her.

 

It's why I am trying to keep an eye on what here coloring book preferences are.

 

I do know that she likes the Diamine Marine and the Pilot Kon-Peki the few times I've let her try my fountain pen. I can't tell about the Pilot Mirashaki-Sushuki (sp?) that my daughter had her try.

[Penguincollector]

Ink sample holder. I prefer the ones from ink-a-pet, because I collect penguins.

Ink-a-pet vial holders

[Skydiver]

That is too much cuteness!!! What a find.

[Penguincollector]

7 minutes ago, Skydiver said:

That is too much cuteness!!! What a find.

 It might help cheer her up a bit, there’s turquoise! 

[DrPlush]

7 hours ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

First you have to find out, if she has any interest.......I've never heard the end of giving my non-golfing wife golf clubs.

This is so true. I tried for years to get my partner interested in fountain pens, and he is extremely supportive in general so he always listened and tried the pens but he never really got into using the pens and accessories I gave him. However, after about four years he slowly started getting more curious and would ask to try different pens I was using, and maybe another year after that he asked me to help ink up his own pen again and started using it every day. Very occasionally now he has asked to keep (or use, really) one of my pens after he’s tried it.

 

So, I’m really glad to share this interest, but trying to make him appreciate it initially by gifting him a pen didn’t work at all.

[Skydiver]

My wife has taken a small interest into calligraphy a few months ago, but she's been doing it mostly monoline with ballpoint and gel pens. It's nothing major like doing pieces, but more of taking more care in writing the thank you notes and greeting cards that she writes. Or she would sometimes doodle and write names or quotes on a pad. She's been using some of the fancy cursive handwriting I recall she and the other girls in my high school class would use, instead of regular day-to-day cursive. (Yes, we've been classmates since grade school, and we are in our 50's now.)

 

I figured it would be a perfect time to gift her a fountain pen with a fine nib so that she can continue to do her monoline calligraphy, but get some extra flair into it with automatic shading without having to put any extra effort in what she is already doing. (This evening, I noticed she was having fun with the stub nib I put on a TWSBI Go. I may need to get get a stub nib for the pen I've already picked up for her.)

 

If she really gets into different inks and ink samples, I'll definitely have to get one of those cute holders as stocking stuffers.

 

I truly understand that gifting and hoping to spark an interest may not work. Over all the years I've known her, it's always been a 50-50 chance as I gifted various books, music, art, etc. This time, I'm hoping for a nice confluence of interests, but I'm also ready for a fountain pen may just be too much of a hassle to maintain. (Guess who kept her technical pens running through high school. 🙂 )

 

[Misfit]

Does the pen you selected take international short cartridges?  If so, check out the Diamine sets like Jet Pens sells. There are several sets, including one with Marine. 
 

https://www.jetpens.com/Diamine-Fiesta-Ink-Set-20-Cartridges/pd/21324

[Skydiver]

Alas, it's a TWSBI 580 in Rose.

 

I pulled the trigger on this TWSBI ink color set:

https://www.gouletpens.com/collections/twsbi-ink/products/twsbi-1791-bottled-ink-gift-set#

 

[Skydiver]

So my general reading of above is to pare down the list to just:
1. Fountain pen

2. Ink: cartridge(s), or bottle(s)

3. PF friendly paper: notebook, or pad

[amberleadavis]

Add a converter to the list if you are not buying a piston pen.  I really like cartridges for newbies as they are super simple to keep with you in your purse and you can just wash the nib in a sink and change colors with the new cartridge.

[Bo Bo Olson]

Writing is 1/3 nib width&flex, 1/3 paper and 1/3 ink, and in that order.

 

Paper is so much more important that many think. It is the dance floor your nib and ink tango on.

 

The passed Sandy1 our grand Ink guru, would use some 4-5 different good papers, with an ink and the normal span of 4-5 regular nibs, and it was astounding how different that or those inks could look on different papers.

Unfortunately, her brilliant work was lost somehow. Just the words are left.

So one can no longer see, what a huge difference papers made to the hue/tone of an ink.

Over the fifteen years I've been here she used some 10 or 12 good still 'affordable' papers.

Those papers were not for sticking into your printer, though you could. So a ream or a 100 sheet box can last years.

I tried to get a list of those papers of Sandy1, started but it didn't go far.

A list of Sandy1's papers

[Jayebird]

Have you put thought into the form of the paper? My husband bought me a very nice A5 journal, as he knows I journal regularly. We both take lots of notes for work, but he likes loose leaf in a binder (using Kokuyo paper), whereas I like a spiral notebook such as Maruman (I then hole-punch and transfer to my binder). Making sure the paper is a format she'll use will help encourage using the pen.

 

So look at her desk - what is she writing in? Then get the FP friendly version of those paper products. From your replies above, some nice paper for cards might be good! I've switched to loose sheets of very nice fountain pen paper which I lightly glue inside fancy cards since often the card stock is not fountain pen friendly. I've been using Nebula Notepads: https://www.gouletpens.com/collections/notepads/products/nebula-note-basic-pad-large-white-paper

 

I wouldn't worry about cleaning supplies - I imagine you'd lend her yours if needed (or you may find yourself the designated pen cleaner/filler - as has happened to me). And perhaps helping with maintenance might be a reasonable "cost" to having a shared hobby where you can talk about your enjoyment of the pens and writing with them.

 

 

[Skydiver]

@amberleadavis: My gut feel is that my TWSBI Swipe will be "borrowed" on her "go-to-the-office" work days, and may also end up being the "ink sampling" pen since it takes international standard cartridges as well as comes with 2 converters.

 

@Bo Bo Olson: Thanks for that paper list. That will be very useful reference in the future.

 

@Jayebird: Yes, I did put a lot of thought into the paper format based on what I've seen on her desk as well as her preference for papers and cards when not working. She like legal pad style pads and steno-notebooks. Rhodia and Mnemosyne have those covered and are stashed away in my closet waiting to be wrapped. She's also expressed missing having a planner and I've scoured as many FP specific reviews of planners and settled on the premium Clever Fox one. My daughter is stashing that away until its time to gift wrap. As for the cards part, I'm still looking for something along those lines, but I figured those will be good stocking stuffers later if she really gets into fountain pens.

 

 

 

[PAKMAN]

I found when I was trying to hook my first wife on pens that she didn't want her own ink and just wanted me to clean/ fill her pens for her from my supply. She did pick a nice purple ink to use. She just wanted a slip case for her pen to haul it in her purse.