The October Ink Drop and some bonus birthday inks!

The Autumn Leaves came early this year. Last year this set showed up in November. I like these fall-feeling sets because they're always pretty exciting colors. I love some oranges, reds, and browns. Access to these kinds of colors is part of the reason that I got into fountain pens.

I've had a couple of this set (Antietam and Golden Brown), but it appears that I never blogged about Golden Brown. I don't know why that is. I've been wanting to try out Qin Shi Huang for a while, and I can finally check that off of my list. Now I just have to get a black light so that I can try out the fluorescence it is supposed to have. Check out the close-ups below.

I also recently got some inks for my birthday. My Mom and Dad both know my passion for pens and ink, so they both sent me pen-things this year. Dad made me the pen case I showed a few days ago, and Mom sent me some special inks that I wouldn't have gotten my hands on otherwise.

There's a store in Houston, TX called Dromgoole's. They're a great store without much of a web-presence, but you should definitely go there if you're in the Houston area. They've got 5 exclusive inks from Noodler's, and I've got 3/5 of them now. Audrey is currently using the Pecan ink in her Monteverde Artists and I've got the Black Bat in my Lamy. Both of these are going to be in my rotation for a while, I think. I can't speak on the Pecan too much, but the Black Bat is the best black ink I've ever used. At least, that's what I think after about a day using it.

The third ink is a PR Supershow ink, and it looks like it will be a good one. It reminds me of Lamy Turquoise, but I haven't had a chance to use it yet. I only had a couple of pens available to fill with inks.

Thanks, Mom! (She reads the blog, but she almost never comments. Maybe this'll draw her out of the woodwork.)

All of these inks are swatched on some Anderson Pen Company Perfect Pads paper. The text is written with Sailor's Jentle Sky High.