Wedding Wednesday How To: Calligraphy

For our wedding, I'm not planning a whole lot of DIY projects.  To be honest, between the personalized looks I've found from vendors on Etsy and Minted, I don't feel the need to stress myself out!  I will be doing a bit of painting and designing, but my main "wedding project" is calligraphy.  I've always wanted to learn and this is as good a time as any, right?  I've been working at it for about a month now, so I thought I would share my top 10 tips with you:

1. Buy multiple calligraphy pens.  I bought this Staedtler pen set and this Zig Memory System pen.  Both items cost a total of $17 and I'm glad I had more than one with which choice to practice and write.

2. Always keep your pen at 45 degree angle. Duh - right?! 3. Watch this: I stumbled upon a great YouTube series by Overnight Artist.  She is really helpful for the basic calligraphy I'm trying to do.  Here is the video with which I started.  Additionally, here is her calligraphy playlist where you can find more basic strokes, letters, and some more advanced lessons.  I watched all 10 parts of her "Calligraphy Lesson How To" and it was definitely a great starting point! 4. Practice.  Like I said with #1, I did the same practice with both pens to see which type of pen I liked better.  

5. Practice with extra paper underneath.  Sorry, table!  Calligraphy pens are thicker than regular pens, so, especially at the beginning when I was pushing the pen into the paper really hard, I was easily going through two sheets of paper. 6. Break your pens in.  Like I said, I was practicing with both, and saw noticeable differences with how the pens flowed after a sheet or so of practicing.  They both needed time to get the ink flowing so the pens didn't bind up and get stuck on the paper when I made each stroke.  

7. Get tons of ideas.  I also purchased this calligraphy "adult coloring book."  At only $4, it was fun to see different ideas and make a lettering style of my own from a few different fonts.  My style is somewhere in between these two fonts I've found:

8. Create your own alphabet.  Practice a few, combine them together, and make it your own. 9.  Write out your alphabet and stick to it ...at least for that project.  I want both the Ayala and Watson families to have similar-looking invitations.  Then, once you're done with one project, practice some more and switch it up. 

10. Have fun with it!  Make sure your personal penmanship and own style shine though.

Here's what we did: Meg and Mike's Wedding: The Proposal Will You Be Our Flower Girl? Will You Be My Bridesmaid? October Wedding List Update Will You Be His Groomsman? Will You Be Our Ring Bearer? "Save the Date" Magnets Engagement Photo Shoot February Wedding List Update ABCs of Our Wedding Wedding Workouts Pre-Wedding Marriage Counseling Etsy Wedding Shop Review: Passion & Love
Linking up for a couple of Wedding Wednesdays with Mary and Meredith&Jordon!