Shop Updates

Just a quick update to let you all know what’s going on here! Short answer: this and that and I’m on the bed with ice cream and the dog keeping my feet warm, while Jon is hard at work, keeping the ship afloat.

Here are a few shop updates:

1. We got in Field Notes! Everything has been re-stocked, including the fall’s Shenandoah and the summer’s Workshop Companion, and we also got in the winter special edition of Snowblind.
2. We’re expected more Superior Labor pen rolls soon! Maybe by the end of next week!! But with Canadian customs, maybe the week after. I’m particularly excited because we’re expected a new colour in the pen roll, and I’ve been working hard on convincing Jon that I have enough pens to require two rolls.
3. We’ve got some new Pilot stuff, along with a bunch of other new products, that we’ve been sitting on for a while, and we’re hoping to get them online soon. Maybe this weekend! Check our Just In section over the next few days.
4. We’re still shipping ink, and that includes Diamine! You know us, we like to live life on the edge; that is to say, we tend to wait until we hear stories of broken bottles before we pull them from online ordering, which is a bit dodgy because by the time we hear back, we’ve already got shipments out in the wild. But so far, so good, so we’re going to keep on keepin’ on.
5. New dates for our calligraphy classes are up and listed!

Other items of note:

1. Your best time to visit us is on Friday, when the soup of the day is Clam Chowder at Shirley’s First Break, which you definitely have to try at least once. Shirley’s is a take-out diner on Carlaw Avenue in the same building as us – look for the red sign. However, Thursdays is tacos, so, tough call.
2. My lifelong crush on Oprah (Ugh! Wealthy and fabulous!) has culminated in discovering that she is on Instagram. She has a farm, and a whole lot of crazy followers, judging by the comments. I’m just a regular follower, if you were concerned 😉
3. Caleb sleeps in bed with us, and I’ve been cleverly keeping things like my notebook and cellphone ‘out of his reach’ by sliding them under the pillows, but I’ve discovered that he now also stores things, like his toothbrush and Super’s toys, under the pillows too.

That’s about it for now! I had a great time at our last Letter Writing Club this past weekend, and I’m already looking forward to our next. I started and finished an entire letter! Which may not sound like a lot to you, but I usually only manage to get the first paragraph done at these events.

We’ve got a few projects coming along, and I’ve got a few blog posts rumbling in my notebook pages. With this cold weather and wind and snow I’ve been trying to keep indoors, although Caleb still seems to enjoy romping around the park. You’d think that would mean I’d be a bit more active on the blog, but actually I’ve been spending most of my free time trying to wrestle Caleb into his winter gear.

Pilot Falcon Fountain Pens in the Shop!

Since we’ve moved, I have not been able to find my old copy of George Orwell essays book, but look what I just found instead!

We’ve got a few exciting projects and things in the works planned out for the next few months, and this is the first of them! We’re now carrying the Pilot Falcon fountain pen. I know, I know: good grief, finally.

For a long time now we’ve been asked about some of the higher level Pilot pens, and we’ve had them in our sights for about just as long. With Pilot, it sometimes takes us a bit longer to move on projects because of the long ship time from Japan (3 months!), which means a bit of planning and organization on my end (you can guess if that’s my strong suit…).

For the last little while, we’ve had new pens trickling in, some to try out, and some in good stock so we can start showing them off in the shop and online. I love soft nibs and line variation, so you could say that I’m particularly happy to welcome this pen, the Pilot Falcon to our Wonder Pens family, and in particular, my own nuclear family of personal pens.

Reflections on Another Year as a Pen Clerk – 2015

It’s the end of 2015, and wud’ja believe it, we’re still here. And I’m still rambling.

Here are my top five craziest moments of this past year:

1. When we’d moved all of our stuff from the old shop, and our contractor stood there trying to stick a piece of rebar between units, and told us that the units don’t connect. (They do, he was just sawing in the wrong spot. Thanks for that heart attack, Nick.)
2. When Caleb totalled my Parker Lucky Curve nib. There were tears, and they were all mine as Caleb gleefully ran off to destroy something else. The pen is now back with patron saint of pens, Jeffry.
3. My first day with the Hobonichi (December 16), and Caleb dropping a glob of butter on my leather cover.
4. Caleb dropping & breaking a bottle of Noodler’s Shah’s Rose (pre-plastic bottle era), and flinging it across the packing area.
5. That first night here in the new shop and apartment, with pizza and cracking open one of the last bottles of champagne from our wedding.

In actual fact, these are just five crazy moments that I pulled out from no where, because this has been an insane year of crazy moments, so many I can’t even believe everything that’s happened.