Ok so I am having a bit of fun with the titles of my posts, bonus points to those that can guess the theme.

* pen making

I wanted to see if I could make a pen using the technique of adding extra pieces on the ends of the caps and barrels of the pens in a contrasting colour to the main pen. Think like the pelican m400 but without the gold embellishments. Unfortunately as I was using off cuts the pieces were not exactly ideal. I managed to get a

[serviceable barrel]

(https://i.imgur.com/K17xCr8.jpg) out of it though, so its not an entire loss. The cap piece I was using was quite thin though so when I drilled it out the walls were less than a 1mm thick and the drilling created a small fracture. This was not noticed until I [tested the thread](https://i.imgur.com/zfr1ZFB.jpg) of the cap to the barrel. This wasn’t a total loss though. It has given me the lower end of the tolerance for that material wall thickness. Next time I will order a matching blank and try the experiment in full, the ebonite I was going to use for the section and end pieces is not going anywhere.

Our schedule around the house has taken a bit of a hit. Thursdays is now my wife and mine alternate gaming night, she takes one week I take the next while the other is on kid duty. Thing is that if I am at home with the kids alone pen making goes out the window. With this in mind I have to change my work schedule on the pen making so I am still getting used to it. Family comes first and well I need to get some solid work times down. At the moment I can only guarantee 30 minutes before work on Thursdays and Fridays, as the kids are ready for school and nursery at that point. I am hoping things will get better.

Anyway I am sure as hell you don’t want to hear about that kind of stuff. I have been putting my head down and designing pens then redesigning my website. I managed to polish up [the pen with holes](https://i.imgur.com/cWw07Ru.jpg) that I did last week as well as the blue pen for a client. I was given some advice on instagram on my photos too. A darker background brings out the colour more. Here is an example of a [light background](https://i.imgur.com/G7fIpmi.jpg) and a [dark background](https://i.imgur.com/hijjcsV.jpg). The design work is coming on well. I have pretty much filled the designs for the names I have chosen in the three different types of mythology. I just need to make the pens so I have examples of them for my website. This one is

[the latest]

(https://i.imgur.com/cGQtJky.jpg), it has an end which tapers towards the middle on [opposing sides](https://i.imgur.com/OXQReSO.jpg) and then the end of the cap is filed to a square. It will look better when it is shaded and polished.

That really is it for the pen making this week. Due to the design and website work there hasn’t been much on the pen making guide, however the pen for it has been completed and I will post the results of that with the guide.

That is it for this week. Have a good weekend.