Tag Archives: Troublemaker

Fountain Pens

October Pen/Ink Palette: Spoopy Monsters, Review!

10 pens lined up side by side. There are a variety of types. There is a grey one, then white, then swirly purple, darker purple, lighter purple, light green, green and purple swirled, orange, red, and last a yellow.
Spoopy Monster Pens! From left to right, Skeleton, Ghost, Witch, Purple People Eater, Frank the Demonic Octopus, zombie, Frankenstein’s Monster, Pumpkin Head, Vampire, Werewolf.

I really like this theme! I did end up swapping out two pens because Mad Science Pen Company made them with the EXACT names of two of my monsters, and I NEEDED them. Ahem.
Solid palette this month. I think my favorites are definitely split between the Mad Science Pen Company pens and the Sailor pens. But it’s pretty close.

Four Sailor Pro Gear Slim pens, laid out horizontally with their caps off and nibs pointed to the left. The top one is sparkly blue, then a blue-purple, a darker purple and a sparkly purple.
Yep, had 4 entire Sailor pens in my palette this month.

I really like the MF nibs from Sailor and the shape and balance of the Pro Gear Slims. They feel effortless. Pretty pen colors too. And the inks behaved nicely as well.

A purple swirly pen laid out horizontally, with the cap off, nib pointed out the left.
Mad Science Pen Company, Hooded Ranger, Proton

Mad Science Pen Company was someone I’d had my eye on from Instagram for a while. What first hooked me was the ”hooded” aspect. I’d never seen something like that before and I ended up really enjoying the aesthetic. And then I missed a pen that had an awesome color – something lime green, if I am remembering correctly. And so it began – I needed one of these pens. And when the Hooded Ranger popped up in that lovely purple, I snatched it up. I really like the balance of these as well, and the decision to pick up the Ghost and Frankenstein was EASY. So Easy. Look at these!

Two pens laid out vertically side by side. The one on the left is a swirly white, the edge of the cap has a swoopy edge instead of a straight edge, kind of looks like a ghost. The one on the right is a green and dark purple swirly, the top of the cap is a little more squared off than this model usually is, and the cap isn’t a straight line, but sort of angled.
Ghost and Frankenstein, by Mad Science Pen Company.

Now for the rest of these! Check out thoughts below:

  1. Skeleton: Ohto – Tasche FF 10T (?) / Diamine Inkvent 2021 – Ash 
    – solid ink, decent writing experience, tiiiiiny pen
  2. Ghost: Mad Science Pen Company, Modified Clingman – Ghost (F) / Vinta Inks, Fairytale Collection – Clouds of Grey
    – switched to Mad Science Pen Company pen on the eleventh. I love this ink, the shimmer is gorgeous. LOVE this pen, writes well, good weight. The nib got a little clogged once or twice, but it cleaned up okay. Also? When this shimmer gets on stuff, it STAYS.
  3. Witch: Mad Science Pen Company, Hooded Ranger – Proton (F) / Wearingeul, Yi Sang Series – Soyeongwije 
    – Gorgeous dark purple ink, shimmer comes thru beautifully. Nib gets clogged – this is not the nib I got delivered with this pen. It took a bit to get unclogged. Gorgeous pen!
  4. Purple People Eater: Sailor Limited Edition Pro Gear Slim Sapporo – Demonstrator Wisteria Purple (MF) / PenBBS – #095 Lin Huiyin 
    – LOVE this pen model, works deliciously. Does not like to be left uncapped – takes a second to start flowing again. Subtle purple ink, really solid performance.
  5. Frank, the Demonic Octopus: Sailor Professional Gear Slim, Manyo – Dianthus (MF) / Diamine Inkvent 2021- Nightshade 
    – Yep, several pens inked that are the same model, BECAUSE I love it. Tada. I love this ink. It is blue, is it purple? Why not both!
  6. Zombie: Esterbrook JR Picket Paradise – Key Lime (F) / Wearingeul Flowing Leaves
    – Continued from September. Love the pen performance. I did hit a clog or two, rinsed it and realized it had run out of ink the first time haha. Beautiful ink, shimmer comes thru great, fun shade.
  7. Frankenstein: Mad Science Pen Company, Modified Ranger – Frankenstein (F) / Kyo No Oto – Moegiiro 
    – Switched to the Mad Science Pen Company pen on the 11th. Beautiful pen, love it, good nib performance. Fun ink color, dark with light popping thru in shading, performs great.
  8. Pumpkin Head: Kaweco AL Sport Limited Edition – Orange (F) / Troublemaker – Mango
    – This nib is still a little wonky, feels like I need to hold it at a low angle to get ink to flow. This ink is super shady – in a good way – and I love it, the dark pops thru in the shade.
  9. Vampire: Monteverde Strata – Red (F)  / Diamine 2021 Inkvent Vintage Copper
    – Sometimes ink does not flow great, but pulled from Sept, writing well enough. I love this ink, the end.
  10. Werewolf: Esterbook JR Pocket Paradise Pocket Pen – Yellow (1.1m Stub) / Van Dieman, Midnight Collection – Howl at the Moon
    – This nib is FUN, and the ink is readable! I like how the dark comes thru, shimmer shows up pretty.
“October Palette Pen Test” in a dark purple ink. On the following lines “the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” Is written in 10 different color inks. Two grey, three purple, two green, one orange, one red, and one yellow.
October Palette Pen Test!
Monthly Pen/Ink Journal, with the ten combos sampled out. The text is the brand and name of each pen and ink, which you can find in the list above. The comments on how each pen/ink performed is captured in the same list above.
October Monthly Pen/Ink Journal!

I was impressed with these. Couple of wonky ones but not bad enough that I couldn’t use them. Very pleased!

Fountain Pens

October Pen/Ink Palette: Monsters/Spoop

A purple notebook and pen holder. There are 10 pens on the left, 9 of them in loops, 1 loose. From top to bottom, a light silver, a darker grey, a blue, purple, white swirl, a dark purple, a light blue/purple, a light green, a dark green, an orange, a red, and a yellow. Above the notebook/pen case is a 3 pen pen case, with the Forever Purple and Blue pens, and the Magic Green pen. On the right of the notebook/pen holder is a purple notebook with two stickers on it. In the top left corner the sticker is 4 ghosts looking out of a front door and a welcome mat. In the bottom right hand corner is a green octopus with a red knit hat and a blue flannel coat. He has a fountain pen in two tentacles, a pumpkin in another, and a coffee cup in another. He is sitting in a pile of autumn leaves.
These are the pens and Captain Log I will be using for October!

Yeah, the theme for this month is definitely not hard to puzzle out – Halloween is in October, Monsters and Spoopy things are Halloween related, therefore! Yeah, it’s not hard. I actually ended up picking out the inks themselves and then relating them to “monsters” – although that word was definitely stretched to fit in several cases…

I concentrated on Purple, Greens, and Oranges, specifically in a saturated fashion. After a WHOLE MONTH with only my one usual Forever Purple in September, I was very excited to play with purples again! Which, ahem, has nothing to do with why I picked purples, I mean, purples are totally a Halloween color, right? Right.

I am using a lot of shimmer, and a lot of inks from my August Daily Samples – Wearingeul – and I am very excited. So, let’s take a look at what “spoopy monsters” I used to justify the colors I picked!

On the left side is a grey ink paired with a silver pen, a silver ink paired with a dark grey pen, a sparkle purple ink paired with a purple and white swirly pen, a dark purple ink with a dark purple pen, and a blue ish ink paired with a blueish pen. On the righ side is a sparkly green ink paired with a light green pen, a light green ink paired with a dark green pen, a bright orange ink paired with a bright orange pen, a dark orange ink paired with a sparkly red pen, and a yellow ink paired with a yellow pen.
All 10 ink sample cards paired with 10 fountain pens.
  1. Skeleton: Ohto – Tasche FF 10T (?) / Diamine Inkvent 2021 – Ash 
  2. Ghost: Pelikan M205 – Moonstone (EF) / Vinta Inks, Fairytale Collection – Clouds of Grey
  3. Witch: Mad Science Pen Company, Hooded Ranger – Proton (F) / Wearingeul, Yi Sang Series – Soyeongwije 
  4. Purple People Eater: Sailor Limited Edition Pro Gear Slim Sapporo – Demonstrator Wisteria Purple (MF) / PenBBS – #095 Lin Huiyin 
  5. Frank, the Demonic Octopus: Sailor Professional Gear Slim, Manyo – Dianthus (MF) / Diamine Inkvent 2021- Nightshade 
  6. Zombie: Esterbrook JR Picket Paradise – Key Lime (F) / Wearingeul Flowing Leaves
  7. Frankenstein: Kaweco AL Sport Aurora Limited (F) / Kyo No Oto – Moegiiro 
  8. Pumpkin Head: Kaweco AL Sport Limited Edition – Orange (F) / Troublemaker – Mango
  9. Vampire: Monteverde Strata – Red (F)  / Diamine 2021 Inkvent Vintage Copper
  10. Werewolf: Esterbook JR Pocket Paradise Pocket Pen – Yellow (1.1m Stub) / Van Dieman, Midnight Collection – Howl at the Moon

(Also the two forever pens and the magic pen – but technically they are not part of this palette, so! I will not be including them in this list.) 

I am very excited about the purple Wearingeul ink and the Vinta. Those look very promising in this dip test:

Each line is written in a different color. Each line reads the “monster” it is inspired by, and the phrase “the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” I will describe the color of the ink and then the “monster” it was inspired by. . Dark Blue: “Oct “Monster” Pen Palette Dip Test” Dark grey: “Skeleton,” Ash Light Grey: “Ghost” Clouds of Grey Dark purple with shimmer: “Witch” Soyeongwije Purple: “Purple People Eater” #095 Lin Huiyin Blueish: “Frank, the Demonic Octopus” Nightshade Green: “Zombie” Flowing Leaves Light Green: “Frankenstein” Moegiiro Orange: “Pumpkin Head” Mango Red: “Vampire” Vintage Copper Yellow: “Werewolf” Howl at the Moon
October Monster INK Palette – it should say! Since I used a metal dip pen to sample each one.

Howl at the Moon seemed like an ink that is to pale to use very much when I first sampled it back in December, but now I have started using stub nibs and I want to see how well the ink shows up from a broader nib! And I got the Troublemaker ink in the September Ink Flight and I fell instantly in love, so barely looked at other oranges when I was picking those out haha. Oh! And Frank, the Demonic Octopus is a reference to a creature my Game Master for a game of Dungeons and Dragons introduced, we fought, and my character – an ambulatory wheelchair using Wizard Librarian, who casts spells with a fountain pen and ink – got a bottle of demonic octopus ink. 🙂 Really I am excited about all of these inks, but thought calling out those specifics would be fun. 

Fountain Pens

September Subscriptions Samples Review – (Ink Flight) Troublemaker, (Truphae) Private Reserve

I have added Ink Flight subscriptions to my monthly fun! I had to, there are 7 samples per month, so of course I needed it. I also noticed they have some other fun stuff, like stickers or puzzles, and I thought heck why not. Trying new inks is a greatly pleasing and calming for me. 

Anyway! 

Lime green tray with seven vials of ink arranged around the paper with Ink Flight’s logo, September 2022, and text related to the Troublemaker’s inks.
My first Ink Flight! Also, that tray? Husband designed and printed it. He’s pretty cool!

September Ink Flight Sample Subscription was for Troublemaker inks – which I haven’t tried yet, but now I want to get a bunch more! I enjoyed these inks a lot, they stayed on the metal nib, and applied to the paper pleasingly. There are several multi-chromatic inks, which are becoming my favorite thing these days, and the shimmer inks looked well distributed. 

7 ink vials frame a sticker of an octopus in a knit hat and flannel coat, holding a pen, pumpkin, and a cup. There is a long narrow piece of paper listing all of the inks. Below that is a clear plastic bag with empty ink cartridges and a syringe labeled Private Reserve Ink. In the bottom left hand corner is a sheet of stickers that look like different kinds of pens.
Okay, look at that sticker, how cute is that??? And suspiciously well timed refillable cartridge kit…

There was also an adorable sticker of an octopus wearing flannel and a knit hat, holding a pen and tea – clearly intended for my October Captain’s Log. The cartridge kit is something I am very excited about because I was thinking about getting into refillable cartridges so I can use some tinier pens and here comes this kit! And the pen stickers are shiny, which is delightful. I really enjoy the descriptions Ink Flight sends with the inks because I’ve been learning a lot from how folks with more experience describe inks. 

4 journal pages overlapping so each page can be seen enough to see the color. There is a maroon, a yellowish green, an orange, and a blue. The blue one is the only page mostly visible. There is an ink bottle stamp colored in with blue ink. The same blue ink was used to make triangle and circle shapes, some continuous s shapes, and straight lines. The text says “Troublemaker, Abalone, multichromatic, iro-utsushi, map”
First time I’ve tried Troublemaker inks and it was a lovely experience! Nenite, Tuslob Buwa, Mango, and Abalone.

Now for the inks!

Troublemaker:

Nenita, Ended up sort of a maroon color but the green sheen on top made it more brown than anything else.  

Tuslob Buwa, Goose poop. I think I have three different samples in this shade now…ew? 

Mango, I really liked the color and the way it shades when written, I’ll be using this one in my October Pen/Ink Palette! (Monster theme, this one is for Pumpkin Head!)

Abalone, This is a really pretty blue, very much in the denim realm, but I would call this one a soft denim, it’s supposed to be multi-chromatic, but I wasn’t getting any of the lavender to come thru – maybe I need a different paper!

3 overlapping pages, a grey, a dark green, and a blueish purple. The page with the grey ink is the most visible. There is an ink stamp colored in with grey ink. To the left of that is a pool of the same ink, but greens and pinks can be seen. There are triangle and circle shapes, continuous s shapes, and straight lines. The only text that can be seen read “fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
Moon River, Polar Lights, and Foxglove

Moon River, I’d call this one a sort of grey ish lavender, doesn’t come across in the picture very well but it’s a really interesting multi-chromatic shading ink. I do like my weird grey inks.

Polar Lights, Sort of a super dark avocado green, looks black, but has a light blue shimmer that looks really neat in pools. Might be fun in a broader nib. The description says it’s a purple black ink and I super disagree! 😂

Foxglove, Fun shading lavender, light but should be fairly readable. I see pinks and blues in the multi-chromatic bits and these make me want to try a multi-shader palette some month! Maybe February…

A lime green vial tray with 5 ink vials. Each one contains a brightly colored ink. An empty plastic bag with a label is resting in front of the vials. Each line is written in that color ink. It reads “Private Reserve Inks, 1 Neon Fuschia, 2 Neon Orange, 3 Neon Yello, 4 Neon Green, and 5 Neon Blue.
Truphae! Third Private Reserve subscription!

My Truphae Sample Subscription this month was of Private Reserve Neon inks. I think this is the third pack of Private Reserve inks I’ve gotten from Truphae so far. I’ll need to go back and piece things together, but I’ve sampled an Infinity pack and a Silvers pack prior to this, for sure. Anyway! Neons aren’t my usual thing, but I think I would like to try these out on a fountain pen friendly black paper at some point. 

A red sparkly pen with silver hardware.
Look at the pretty peeeeeeen!

The subscription I have from Truphae includes a pen, and this month I got a Monteverde Strata, Red with a Fine nib. I got it in time to use for my September Pen/Ink Palette. I will talk more about that combo in the Palette post, but the reason I wanted to use it was the sparkly red finish, the weight felt nice in my hands, and I have had good experiences so far with Monteverde pens. It worked out well, and I’ll be using it in October as well! 

3 overlapping pages, a bright pink, a bright yellow and a bright blue. The pink is the only one visible. A stamp of an ink bottle, with pink ink colored in, a pool of the same color ink, triangle, continuous s shapes, and straight lines. The text reads “9.18 SeptTruphae”
Neon Fuschia, Neon Yellow, Neon Blue.

Now for the inks!

Private Reserve:

Neon Fuschia, this ended up being suuuuper pink, which is not my favorite color haha.

Neon Yellow, so bright, so unreadable! Curious how readable it would be on a black paper… 

Neon Blue, as usual, this one was the darkest of the bunch. Not sure I would call it neon per se, but it is on the brighter side. 

2 overlapping pages, a washed out orange, and a bright green. The fully visible page is of the green ink. The ink bottle stamp is colored in with the green ink, also a pool of green. Triangle, circle, continous s shapes, and straight lines. The text reads “Private Reserve, Neon Green, standard, iro-utsushi, mdp”
Neon Orange, Neon Green

Neon Orange, very light, almost seems washed out, not as vibrant as the pink or yellow. 

Neon Green, Not sure I would call this one neon either, but it is bright. 

Over all, not sure I’ll end up using any of these anytime soon, but they will probably end up useful at some point! Now, where can I find nice and fountain pen friendly black paper…hmmm… 

And that’s September!