National Handwriting Day

Penguin by Zoë Friend

January 23 is National Handwriting Day.*  Is there anyone out there who DOESN'T long for better handwriting?!  I know I do, and as a professional calligrapher, I write for a living.  Here are four easy steps to take that can instantly improve your penmanship:

• Get your elbow on the table.  Don't write standing up or lying down.  
• Put two sheets of paper under the paper you are writing on.  
• Upgrade your pen: from ballpoint to rollerball, from rollerball to thin marker, from marker to fountain pen, from fountain pen to calligraphy pen.  
• Write on better paper. 

If you also take half a minute to warm up, your pen will write better lines and your muscles will make better letters.
Write, by hand, to someone who would like to hear from you.  You'll be glad you did.  As Ralph Waldo Emerson put it, "...in a letter, We have not better things to say, But surely say them better." 

__________________________
*National Handwriting Day is on the birthday of John Hancock, who signed the Declaration of Independence with special emphasis.

Write a better envelope

Here is a gizmo that will take over the job of guiding the lines of a hand-addressed envelope.  It lends itself to several different uses.
Size it up or down to suit the pen size, the letter size, and the envelope size.  

• Print it out on standard paper; cut it to fit inside your unlined envelope so it shows faintly through. 
• Print it out onto transparent acetate; lay it and the envelope on a light table.  
• Print it out onto stiff paper; cut slots; use it to rule pencil lines on each envelope; erase them once the ink is dry. 

  

  With thanks to Katrina Berry

You can lay out the address with each line starting just under the one before, or you can use the slanted lines to start each new line a little to the right of the one before.

Straight lines don't necessarily mean strait-laced designs.  

If you don't have to worry about lining up your address, you can give all your attention to making the envelope a one-of-a-kind work of art.  Here are two from my archives [not my current address, by now].  For ideas about gussying up your design, go to The Washington Calligrapher's Guild, which offers the winners from their yearly contest "Graceful Envelope" contest.  http://www.calligraphersguild.org/envelope.html

Day 14, Countdown to February 14, Special delivery

If you haven't mailed your love letter, you can deliver it by hand to somewhere it can't be missed.  Mail it ahead of time, slide it under the door, place it on the pillow, or slip it into a surprising spot such as a lunch box, keyboard, or dashboard.  Use what you know: if he reads his email before everything else, prop it on his computer keyboard; if she checks her bangs in the rear-view mirror, place it there.