My seasons are spent completely opposite.  Winter is when I am mostly outside gathering ideas and I spend almost all of my summer days inside, working.  Along with another set of Simple365 b&w photos of my everyday life, today I am sharing a few in-process photos of  this book I made as my husband’s birthday present.  Included is the photo of the redwoods that inspired it.  I have another Outside the Lines art supply review of my favorite brush pen for you today as well.

Simple 365 – Set 14

Here is another set of  Simple365 photos from a year of everyday black and white photos.  We had rolled into the first few days of October by this time.  Naturally, I started taking October-themed photos.

Please Click on the image thumbnails to see the photos.

I created a page with all the previously shared photos from Simple365.  That way I can relive my journey through the year via black and white photos, like in an old photo album.

We made one special trip to Los Angeles to bring our kitties home.   The haze of the California desert at Hwy 395!

Tavish, the orange one, Pemberley in the middle, and Merwyn at the front – the merry band of the Ink Torrents Atelier staff! 

The colored photo of the winter forest painting that appears in b&w in the Simple365 set.    As I mentioned in the previous post, I enjoy working on monochromatic watercolor paintings. 

On the last post, I shared process photos of tiny little books and a needle book that I made.   If you missed that post, you can read it here.

I am really happy to share that the last post and other recent posts were featured on these link-ups. 

The Really Crafty

Weekend Traffic Jam

Crazy Little Lovebirds

Monday Morning Blog Club

Thank you so much ladies!! 

Outside the Lines – Art Supple Review

Kuretake No 8 Fountain Brush Pen

Brush pens are mostly used for calligraphy, but I use them  for drawing too.  The variable line width that can be created with a brush pen makes it very versatile.   On my search for a brush pen that is refillable, I came across the Kuretake N0. 8 fountain brush pen.

To get a feel for the pen, I filled it with permanent fountain pen ink and scribbled a few coffee cups with it.  The coffee-addict me approves.

This pen uses cartridges.  I like using my own ink.  Kuretake does not make a fountain pen converter, but a Platinum Fountain Pen Converter can be used with this pen.  It’s the middle piece in this photo; it holds ink for fountain pens and can be filled with any ink of your choice.

Since the pen does not have the capillary action of a fountain pen, I fill the converter by dipping it into an ink bottle directly.  Since I use permanent, non-water-soluble ink, I always fill the pen half way.  Permanent ink left in a pen can clog it up pretty badly.  By filling it halfway, I can use up the ink before that happens.  Every now and then, I clean up the pen thoroughly with water between uses.

Once the converter is filled and attached to the pen, I push the ink to the brush tip by turning the screw of the converter gently until I see ink tinting the brush tip.  Once that happens, I prime the tip by drawing lines until I get a set of smooth lines starting from thin to thick.  Then I know it is ready for use.

I created lines of varying thickness for the trees and then used the same pen for shading.  Once I finished drawing the picture, I used watercolor for the background.  I kept it super simple by using just two colors.  

I really love this pen.  It is one of my staples for not only drawing in journals, but for writing too!  If you do calligraphy, I highly recommend it for that as well.

Here is a very quick painting I did of the Girl and Her Cat standing at the edge of a forest.  It’s a misty day and they love playing in the forest with leaves and butterflies on such days.

A Book from the Time in the Forest

We love visiting the redwood trees in the north of California during the winter months.  This is a very narrow and twisty road at Redwood National Park.  We drive up there during the early evening hours and stay until the darkness completely envelopes us.   The looming darkness makes these towering trees look even taller.  Perfect for story time!  Sometimes we listen to audiobooks; sometimes we read sitting in the car. 

For a book for my husband’s birthday present, and I drew this tiny, tiny picture with our car on that road.

After that I started working on the book itself.   Book cloths are paper lined so the glue does not seep into the cloth.   I made the book cloth for this book myself using cotton quilting fabric that I had at hand.   I left an inset in the cover for the picture.  I also added little matching black and silver bands at each end of the book aligned with the spine.  Finally I affixed the picture on the cover inside the inset.

I wanted to make something for him with our shared times in mind.  The drawing and the book felt right.  I should mention that I finished the book way after his birthday.   He was surprised, and very happy too.  That made my day!  Since then, I get requests every now and then to make books for his notes and I am happy to oblige.

While I am looking forward to being outside again, I am using this time to work and spend time with the kitties in my atelier.  I hope your summer days are going well.

Until next time,
-Soma