Learn Hand Lettering in a Journal: 7-Day Challenge

1. Welcome!!: Hello, lettering brand. I'm Sarah from Ensign Insights and I am so glad you're here. I started hand lettering in 2016 when it was a difficult time when I needed something to help remind me how to be happy. Since then, I've gone all in on hand lettering and I've done many different things with it. But my favorite by far is teaching you how to create hand lettering that feels like your best self. One way that I'm going to show you that is through a hand-lettering journal and how modern journal is just a journal with your lettering. In this class, you're going to create your very own. First, you're going to learn what you need to start your own hand lettering journal and how to use it as a mindfulness practice while also improving your lettering, you'll get ideas for how to stay motivated when you don't have time or don't know what to letter will cover what supplies you need to start your own hand lettering journal. And then I'm going to give you a seven day challenge to actually get you started filling up your journal. In the challenge, you'll get seven guided prompts with simple tutorials to help you learn and practice the basics of hand lettering. And each day will take less than ten minutes because I know how busy life can get. By the end of this class, you'll have a hand-lettering journal, wisdom Vin pages already filled. So you're creating this beautiful lettering, writing words that you want to hear that you want to believe to be true in your life and as your lettering them, they can become true. That's what hand-lettering can do for you. Um, that's what I want to help you with. As for the time commitment, you could watch all of these videos straight through and less than an hour. If you have only ten minutes a day, come back each day to work your way through a hand-lettering a journal is a way to start being gentle with yourself and working with this season of life that you're in right now, don't let time b, the thing stopping you from taking care of yourself and your creativity. If you're ready to start hand lettering in a way that feels like your best self. Let's get started. 2. ✏️Supplies and Class Project: By the end of this class, you'll be completing this class project, which is the seven-day challenge. You will end with your hand lettering journal that will have seven pages of your very own lettering. We will create beautiful pages while practicing the basics of hand lettering. To keep it simple, the only supplies you'll need is a journal and brush pens. I like to keep my set of brush pens and a little pencil pouch so it's easy to take with me anywhere. You also may want a pencil and eraser. I always have mine with me just in case. As for brush pens, use what you have. For this class, you want to have rainbow colors. I'll be using the zebra mild liner brush pens. These are great. They have a large brush tip as well as a fine tip. I will be using both the brush tip and the fine tip in this class. Next, you'll want a journal. I recommend starting with a rodeo notepad because the paper is so smooth, it won't fray your brush pens. And they're pretty easy to find online or at craft and art stores. The one I'll be using has a spiral binding at the top, but there are all types of sizes and bindings. And here's a bonus pen that is optional. I used it in almost every one of my pages just to add extra little details. It's the uni-ball gel impact gold gel pen, and this is my very favorite gold gel pen in the resource section of this class, you'll find this download with the bonus worksheets. It's only available on desktop, not on mobile. This is for if you need a little extra practice with tracing before getting into your journal. I printed these on regular copy paper, so it's not going to be smooth enough to practice with brush pens. You may want tracing paper to be able to practice and not worry about freeing your brush pens. Or you could also get HP premium 32 paper. You can print on this paper and letter with brush pens directly on it. Super smooth. If the journal you have doesn't have smooth paper, you can use Crayola markers. If you can't get Crayola markers where you live, any kid markers with a squishy tip will work. You just have to be able to give it a heavy pressure on the down-strokes and light pressure on the upstrokes. You can use Crayola, broad line or super tips. I also like that because these markers are firm, you can easily get a fine line as if you were using a fine tip pen. I hope that gives you some good options to get started with your hand lettering journal. And next, before getting into the challenge, let's talk about what a helmet and journal even is and what you need to know to start one. 3. What is a Hand Lettering Journal?: What is hand lettering internal. So basically it's just a notebook where you can practice your lettering with no pressure because you can make mistakes. It's your own journal. It's all about you. It's a place to process your emotions, keep track of your memories, and get creative. It's a fun way to create a book of your own lettering. It's also a tangible way to use your stationery supplies and crafting supplies. If you have a bullet journal, if you're familiar with that. Basically this hand-lettering journal is like that, but without the planner and schedule portion. Here are some benefits from homodyne journal. It helps you practice hand-lettering daily. So you're improving with no pressure. So you're free to make mistakes experiment. This is how you learn faster, right? Not only are you practicing hand lettering, you're also practicing mindfulness, which has so many benefits. You get to see your progress in a beautiful book. You'll learn more about yourself, which carries over to feeling more confident in other aspects of your life, helps you process your everyday life and emotions. It's a way to remind yourself how to have fun and be happy. It helps you to be more present and show up as the best version of yourself to more fully enjoy your life. It's a way to record memories you want to look back on. It's definitely self-care as you have time each day to get creative and reflect on the day. It helps in overcoming burnout because it's time to unwind and take care of yourself. Next, let's talk about where the hand-lettering journal came from. 4. My Story: Benefits of a Hand Lettering Journal: Here's the story behind where the hand-lettering journal came from. My story in how it got started. So this is my bullet journal. I started it in 2016 during a really difficult time. I was looking for any way to improve my life. So I started a bullet journal. A few months later, I discovered calligraphy and hand lettering, and my bullet journal became a place to practice my hand lettering. I love that I have this book because I didn't keep all of my single pages of practice over the years, but I did keep this book. It wasn't until a few years later that I created an actual hand-lettering journal. There were a few renditions in-between, like this one from 2020 where I used a watercolor notebook. It wasn't really a journal yet. I didn't even write the dates. This was just my personal book where I could create and I didn't share it with anyone. Then in the following year, 2021, I was so burnt out in my business and in life being a stay at home work from home mom during COVID, I needed a change. I couldn't keep doing what I was doing. So on one of those breakdown rough days, I found this journal at Tuesday morning. So I took it home and I started lettering in it with my Staedtler try plus highlighters. It felt so good. So I decided I was going to commit to littering one page a day for a whole month. I ended up going longer than a month. And even after that, I'd miss a few days here and there, but I lettered as often as I could. I always knew that my journal is going to help me feel better when I was stressed or overwhelmed. And that was the thing I needed. In the past, lettering was always the way that I would de-stress and unwind. Now with an actual journal of my lettering, this was a very tangible way to make it happen. Instead of needing to choose just the right paper and all the right supplies and which ones do I wanna do this time? I just had my journal and my pens. I didn't have to think about anything else when I'm in that mode of burnout, I can't think about anything. So what really helped me was just I've got my journal, I've got my pins and I can create with that. I hadn't felt motivated to even let her at all for awhile. But with this journal, I started practicing daily in a way that felt really exciting because I was filling up this book, beautiful pages. I was creating this beautiful thing outside of myself. And I love flipping back through the pages because I get so many ideas, they get inspired. It's like my own personal Pinterest that I've created. So if you want to use hand lettering in that way, to unwind, to overcome burnout, to be your creative outlet. And literary journal is a great way to do that. So next, let's talk about what supplies you need. 5. Choosing Journal Supplies: What supplies do you need? So all you need is a journal and pens, but how do you choose what kind of journal? There are a few things to consider. First, what kind of pens do you want to be using in your book? For example, I wanted a watercolor journal for this one because I was practicing a lot of watercolor at the time. If you're gonna be using brush pens, what kind of brush pens do you want to use? I got this journal knowing that the paper was a little rough. So I wouldn't be able to use me nicer brush pens since they might fray. I thought that I was going to be using my Crayola markers in this because they don't fray. But I ended up using my Staedtler tripods highlighters and the entire journal. And they also don't phrase, so they're great for this. I could have also done faux calligraphy with a regular pen. So full calligraphy is a great option for you if you don't want to get a super expensive book to start, if you're just kind of dipping your feet in the water and seeing how it feels. If you want to use nicer brush pens, I recommend a Rodia Notepad. There are lots of options with sizes and binding. This one that I have is a web notebook. Alright, here are a few other things to think about when you're choosing a journal. How thick are the pages? If you're using a simple composition notebook like what I started with, are you okay with skipping pages since it'll probably bleed through. I know Archer and all of journals are great because they're paper is really thick, so there's hardly any bleed through. Next, is your notebook easy to let her in? Does it lay flat? Maybe you prefer spiral binding so it can fold over. That's all personal preference. And next, what about the size? Do you like something really small that you can fit in your purse and take with you wherever you go? Or do you prefer something big? Do you want to do really large lettering? And you may want a larger sketchbook. And also, what do you want on the paper? Do you want it to be a lined notebook? Are you okay with lettering over the lines? Do you want it to be a dot grid so you can still have the lines but a little more free? Or do you want it to be completely blank? I think there's no wrong way. It just depends on what you want. This journal has cute designs and quotes in it, which I really enjoyed. Also consider the coloring of the pages. The rodeo web notebook is a cream color. You may prefer a more bright white. My journal with acute designs has some different colored paper throughout. You could also use a journal width, block paper, or craft paper. There are so many options if this feels overwhelming, here is my best advice. Start with what you have. It's okay if you don't have the perfect journal right now, you'll experiment with different things, try it out. You're only going to discover what the perfect journalists for you if you are trying different things. So just get started. 6. When You Don't Have Time: 6 Tips: How do you keep up with the journal on very little time? I think this is the best part about a hand-lettering journal that it can fit into your schedule if you have five-minutes or if you have two hours. So here's six things that can help you when you don't have time to let her, but you want to, number one, choose a journal and pens and stick to that. I've been doing this and it's made a huge difference because I know exactly what pens I'm going to use. I don't have to spend the time deciding because I already decided. Then you can read this side when you're ready for a switch. So when you're short on time, just grab your journal and pens and go number to keep track of the quotes that you want to let her in the future. I always have a running list when I hear something in a song or in a book, I just write it down, I keep track of it. So then when I sitting down and I'm like, oh, I don't know what to letter. I can look at my list and choose one that feels right at the moment. Number three, just let her something simple, whatever is on your mind. What do you need to hear today? How are you feeling? What's the song you're loving? It doesn't have to be a really long elaborate quote, every day. It could even be one word. Keep it simple. Number four, don't put pressure on yourself to letter. If you're not filling it, you miss a day. That's okay. Letter from a place of being inspired, not from a place of feeling guilty. If you don't practice, there's nothing wrong with missing a few days. Letter for you. Number five, use a stencil or stamps to help you go faster. You can also decorate with stickers or washi tape to fill up your page even more. Number six, Let it be imperfect. You don't have to have a masterpiece every single time your letter. That's not the point. That's not how you get lettering that you love either. You have to experiment, you have to fail. It's okay to not love how it turned out. Don't let that stop you from lettering. Focus more on how it's making you feel. Even if you don't like it, you make it the next day, the more you letter, the more you're going to learn. And the more you'll figure out that things that you like and don't like, that's only helping you get better. So let it be imperfect. It's better to take a five-minutes to create something than wait until you have two hours to letter. When you have more time. Definitely spend that time, but you don't have to do that every day. And next, let's talk about how, when and where. 7. How? When? Where?: How do you actually start your hand lettering journal? So you have your notebook and your pens. And then just open up and start lettering, you can commit to everyday if you want. That definitely helped me get started. It also helped me overcome the intense burn out that I was feeling. But you know, your schedule, you know what's going to work for you. Think about when you want to let her do you like lettering in the morning up or would you rather letter in the evening? I normally letter at night right before going to bed. It's like a way to unwind from my day and I feel so refreshed after ready to go to bed and then start a new day. But I could also see how it would be really effective in the morning. But for me personally, my toddler wakes me up in the morning and she does not appreciate I'm entering journal. Next. Where are you going to let her is there a special place that you have in your house that you love? Where do you keep your pens? Do you have a desk that you normally letter? Do you want to let her on the couch while you're watching a show or in bed, or maybe all of the above. But it is nice to find your own little space to have that creative time. And now, what should you let her hear is a running list. When you don't know what to letter words from songs you're loving. Keep a list of quotes and look through that. How are you feeling today? What do you need to hear? What do you wish someone would tell you right now? What is something you're loving and couldn't live without? What are you grateful for? What is inspiring you? What makes you feel like yourself? When do you feel happiest? What do you want to remember from today? What is something that you're looking forward to? What's something that you're proud of yourself for. Words from a book, you're reading, words from a TV show or a movie, what do you want to believe about yourself? There's just something so beautiful about lettering words that you want to be true for yourself. It's just that moment of mindfulness. And in a way it can become true. There's so many things you can let her, I hope that you make it yours and create something unique and feel how amazing that can be in your life. So go ahead, open your journal and get started. 8. ✨Day 1: Basic Strokes: Welcome to day one of our seven-day challenge. Today is all about the basic strokes and we're going to be practicing them with a finished piece. So this is what it's gonna look like in the end. Let's go ahead and get started. So you will need seven colors of pins. If you are doing rainbow colors like me and your journal. And remember there is a page in the bonus worksheets with basic strokes. If you want to practice that first, once you know what the basic strokes are, it is helpful to practice without tracing. So for the first line, we're going to do the upstrokes and downstrokes. And you just want to make sure that your upstrokes are thin and your downstrokes are thick. So you're giving your pen more pressure on the downstroke. The reason why we practice the basic strokes is, first of all, to get more familiar with our pen because all pens are different. Next, because when you're hand-lettering, all of your letters are built up with these strokes. So we're breaking them down here, which is going to help later when we get into the alphabet. And next we'll do the overturn with this one. You just want to make sure you're getting a smooth transition at the top from your thin stroke to your thick stroke. Next we'll do the underturn. And with this one, you just want to make sure that you are lifting the pressure before the bottom of the curve so that you don't get a really thick curve at the bottom. Next we'll do the compound curve. So this one is the underturn, overturn together. So you just want to watch those transitions to make sure you're getting a smooth transition from your thick to thin. And next we're doing the ascending loop. This one you're just practicing moving your pen around itself as you go around that curve and watching that transition from thin to thick. Next we'll do the descending loop. And this one, just like the ascending loop, you are working on. Curving around with your pen. And you want to lift your pens pressure before you hit the very bottom to make sure you don't get that thick bottom. Watching your transition. Next, we're gonna do the oval with this one. You want to start on the right side in the thin part of the oval because it's easier to connect to a thin stroke instead of a thick stroke. And you're just watching your transition from thin to thick, back to them. And make sure you're lifting your pressure before the bottom so you don't get the thick part at the bottom. So to make this finished journal piece, I'm going to write my name down here. You can write whatever word you want. But a name is a good one to start with in your journal. So I'm going to take my gray so that it's different from my colors. And don't worry about your name being perfect. This is your first page of your journal. So the point of a journal is to see where you are right now. There's no judgment. You're going to look back on this and see how far you came. Alright, so this could be my finished page. I am going to take it a step further and come in with my fine tip and add a line in between each of these. I think the lines add just a little bit extra, making it feel like a completed piece. Here is my finished page. I love how this turned out. It's a great way to practice and have a finished piece. If you'd like, feel free to share your day one project. And let's go ahead and go to day two. 9. ✨Day 2: Alphabet: Welcome to the two. Today we're working on the alphabet. And just a reminder, if you would like to use the worksheets to trace first, those are available for you in the resource section. And remember, those are on desktop, not on mobile. Let's get started with your rainbow pins. So I'm just doing the alphabet in rainbow colors and I'm connecting each letter in between. So this is a really helpful practice, even before you know what words you're going to be lettering. Start by lettering the alphabet together and connecting those letters. It will help you to see how far you have to end your letter to be able to connect to the next letter. Because hand-lettering is not like cursive where you never pick up your pen in hand lettering and calligraphy. We are picking up a pen in-between all of the strokes. So that is really helpful to notice. Where do you need to end your letter so that it will be able to connect to the next letter. So you need to extend it out a little bit farther. And you can see where I'm picking up my pen in all of this alphabet. In-between strokes. This will help you to slow down, breathe between strokes as you get ready for the next stroke. This is also in real time. So you can notice that I'm not going really fast. This is not a race. I don't think you would try to make it erase, but I know sometimes I have felt bad in the past for going so slow, but actually that's a good thing. And that's one reason why hand lettering can be so therapeutic. Because we are slowing down or focusing on each stroke instead of trying to get through with it as soon as possible. It's just like in life when we slow down and focus on the details in this present moment, most often things are okay in this moment. And that's what we're doing with lettering or slowing down. We're not worried about the future or the past. We're just in this moment with our pen on the paper focusing on each stroke. And you can do this at any level that you're at because it's going to change as you're growing and changing your alphabet is going to look different. Your style is going to change. Let yourself be right where you are. If that's all you had time for it today, you can stop right there, but I'm going to go an extra step and add these gold lines to my letters. This gold gel pen is my uni-ball gel impact pen. It's my favorite gold pen and I'm just doing a stripe down the downstrokes. It's really simple if you can just find where your downstrokes are, just add that stripe. And it's a nice way to add a few little details. You can do this on words, on alphabets, on whatever your lettering. It's really quick and simple embellishment to add just a little bit extra to your letters. Just like I said before, this is something you can do no matter what level you're at because it's going to look good no matter what your letters look like, it's really simple. So I hope you'll give it a try. Here is my finished alphabet. Feel free to share yours below. And let's go ahead and move on to day three, which is going to be faux calligraphy. 10. ✨Day 3: Faux Calligraphy: Welcome to day three. Today is all about faux calligraphy, which is one of my favorite techniques in hand lettering. This is the page you'll be making. And if you don't know about full calligraphy, there is a little practice page for you in the resource section, and that might be helpful to just see how faux calligraphy works. For today's page, I'm turning my notebook lengthwise and I'm going to start with a pencil and eraser. I am drawing out my faux calligraphy word begin. And I recommend, especially with a larger word like this, to trace it out with a pencil first. And you can see I'm erasing a law. I am changing. This really is just a total sketch. And that is awesome because then I can see exactly how I want it and get it where it needs to be in order to put the pen on the paper. And one thing that I noticed is that there was a lot of whitespace and I wanted to add these little flourishes. And I had the ascending stroke up here and the descending stroke of the G to be able to do that. And then because I was using a pencil, I could erase and draw in that flourished and get it exactly where I wanted it. And so that is another reason to definitely start with a pencil. And then now I'm just going to come in with my pen and go over the pencil and they're just guides. It doesn't have to be exact because we're going to erase it at the end. So don't worry as you're going in with your pen, if it's not exactly on your pencil. One thing about faux calligraphy, so we are just making the downstrokes ourselves instead of having the brush pen giving us the thicker stroke. And one thing you want to work on as you're doing your faux calligraphy is giving the downstrokes about the same thickness. Obviously, you're not using a ruler and measuring it and getting it exactly the same. I mean, I think my e is wider than my downstrokes and that's okay. You just want to get it about the same. You don't want to have some really, really thick ones and really, really thin ones. You want it to be more consistent. And I am leaving them open Because I'm gonna do colors on the inside. Oh, also, I have to mention make sure it's totally dry before you go in with your eraser, because I have messed up many pieces going in with the eraser too soon. So now I'm just going to fill in the downstrokes. You can add whatever patterns or designs inside the downstrokes that you want. That is the really fun part about faux calligraphy. I am just filling it in. I'm doing my rainbow colors and I could use the brush tip of my pen as well. But I'm just doing the fine tip to be able to get the little tiny corners. And also, if you're full calligraphy word is a lot smaller than you are not going to have this thick of a downstroke to be able to play with. So this is a large word. It's really chunky, thick downstrokes. And I love that contrast between the thick and the thin strokes. And that is something that we can control more by just doing faux calligraphy instead of using a brush pen and only being able to do however thick the brush pen can get. Once again, I'm going in with my gold gel pen. It's the best for embellishments. And I'm just going to add little dots and stars in my letters. You can do whatever designs you want. I think the little dots and stars are really cute and go with any type of design. So it was just the plain background of the colors. And then adding the little stars and dots as just that extra little something that it needs. And it helps it feel like a completed piece. So here's how it turned out. I love the look of this. I can't wait to see what you come up with and when you're ready, let's move on to day four. We're going to do a word with shadows. 11. ✨Day 4: Word and Shadow: For day four, we are doing a word with a shadow and filling the page with these fun stripes. And if you want to practice some words, I've given you a few options of words that you can do for this. I am doing the word courage. So first I'm going to fill my page with stripes and I'm using the brush tip on one side. And then the next stripe is the fine tip side of the pen. And I'm just doing rainbow colors all the way down. You don't have to do the two sizes of stripes if you don't want to or don't have the right pens. But I think it looks really cute and adds an extra little touch. I like the look of these kinds of stripes. And you'll notice my rodeo notepad is a dot grid. So it helps me to be able to get these straight lines because I can just follow the dots. It also helps me get the thickness of the bigger stripe with my brush pen. And also this is a great way to practice just giving your brush pen more pressure. Now we're going to add our word. And I left just the middle section blank so that I can do my word here. Don't worry about it being perfect if you need to practice that a little bit before, or if you need to come in with a pencil before, you can do that as well, just remember to let yourself be where you are. You're going to look back at this and see how far you've grown. There's nothing wrong with being a beginner. There's nothing wrong with being in the middle. You're exactly where you need to be. Next, I'm going to add shadows. So the way to add shadows is just to the right and under you just want to think about the light is hitting your word at a certain point. So the shadow would be on the other side of the light. So to the right and under is what I always say. It could be to the left and under or above however you want, but this is just my strategy for shadows to the right and under. And I left this open thinking that was going to be how I wanted it finished. But it turns out I actually decided to color it in, in the end and you will see that in just a minute. But first I wanted to add a few little details to my stripes just to bring in the gold in the shadow of the word into the stripes. And I just did these little speckle lines. I thought they turned out really cute. You definitely don't need that, but once again, it's just cute little way to add something extra. And then here I am filling in the shadows because I wanted to see more of the gold. I felt like it wasn't enough to just leave it open. And this gold is so shiny and you know what? Here's the thing. When you first start out, you think that you need all the pins to be able to make beautiful lettering. But here I am years later with all the pens and I've actually had to start decluttering a lot of my pens because I find that I only use a handful of my pens over and over again. I find the ones that I loved. And then I just use those ones over and over. So don't feel like you have to get all the pens, just find the ones that you love. If you'd like gold, this is a good gold gel pen. So here's how this one turned out. I love this look, It's super simple, but with a lot of little details that make it pop. You can share what you created down below and when you're ready, let's move on to D5. We're gonna do a short quote. 12. ✨Day 5: Short Quote Mixing Fonts: For day five will be doing a short quote and mixing fonts. It's a really simple piece. This is how it looks. And as always, if you need some practice tracing first, you can get that in the resource section. So to start out, I am just drawing my lines so I know exactly where my words are going to go. And I'm doing seven dots down for the first word and six dots down for the second word. I just came up with that. There's no rhyme or reason for it. And then I'm coming in with a print style uppercase for fresh. And I love the way this print style looks with a script style. So if you only know two font styles, these are the two to know because they look really great together. I'm just making sure that all of my letters match at the bottom and the top to keep it consistent. Then as I'm doing the word starts, it's a little more bouncy. So you can see that not all of my letters. And on the baseline, That's how you get it a little bit bouncy. And that's how easy a short little two-word quote can be. Then next I'm going to go in with my fine tip of these pens and I'm doing the rainbow. You could do a larger rainbow if you just wanna do it with brush pens. And I've pretty much centered my rainbow. It's easy to know where to start on the top and the bottom because of the dark grid, I can see that it's in the right spot. And then I am going in with my gold gel pen to do sun rays. So a rainbow and a sun feels like a fresh start to me. So that's why I chose that for this piece. I just love that all of these different pieces that we've been making in this class are just with the same brush pens and the same gold pen. You can do so much with one set of pens. Next, you'll want to erase all of your pencil marks that you made, making sure that it's dry first. And then I'm gonna go in with the details and add a stripe in the down-stroke. That's like what we did in the alphabet. And then I was just going to try something new. And so I did some polka dots for the word starts. There are so many different types of embellishments that you can do. So just have fun with it and play around with it. And here's how it turned out. It's really simple. You got that Goldstein. I can't wait to see what you came up with. And when you're ready, let's go to day six over. We're going to do another variation of a short quote. 13. ✨Day 6: Short Quote and Rainbow: For day six, we're doing another short quote and we're filling the page with a rainbow. And for this one you can choose any word that you want. Again, I have the few words in the practice page. To start out, I am making my rainbow and I'm leaving a section at the bottom blink. So my rainbow is not going all the way down to the bottom. That's where my word is going to be. And I'm using the brush tip side of my pen so that it fills in a little bit more of the rainbow stripes. As I got to the last color, I decided I wanted even more color to fill in more of that space. So I went in with a second round of the rainbow colors. I just wanted it to fill in so that when I do, I am, it can just fit right inside the rainbow that I have. Then you're going to let her the word of your choice and I am doing capable right here. I'm just filling in the space at the bottom of my page. And this is real time. So just remember that it's okay to go slow. This is a really easy, basic style. You don't have to do something fancy when you're getting started. And actually even when you're not just getting started, you never have to do something fancy. Do what makes you feel the best. Next I am doing, I am with the fine tip. You could also do it with the brush tip. I just decided I wanted to try the fine tip and then I didn't like that it was too thin. So I went in with faux calligraphy and added the downstrokes. I mostly just wanted it to fill that space inside the rainbow. And then the word capable could be switched out to be whatever I'm feeling like I need on that day. And finally to finish this piece, I'm adding the gold stars and polka dots to the Rainbow. If you ever have a page that you made and you're like, this isn't quite finished. You can always add some type of little embellishments. And as you can see, gold is my choice of embellishments. But you can find the type of pen that you love to add embellishments. And there are so many different things you can do. I hope you enjoyed this piece. It's something you can do really simply with a short amount of time and it can give you a little boost of whatever you need today. I need to feel capable. I'm excited to see what you created when you're ready. Let's move on. Today's seven, we're going to play with styles. 14. ✨Day 7: Exploring Lettering Styles: You made it today. Seven. I am so proud of you. Thank you for being here with me. Today is all about exploring different lettering styles. There is a worksheet for you to practice if you need a little bit of help. And to get started, I am just going to draw a border on the top and the bottom of my page. I'm doing these rainbow stripes. This is a really cute way to just add a little color. And in my dark grid I counted four dots so that the top and the bottom would be the same size. And you'll see that I didn't add any gold stars on this one, but I probably could come back in with gold stars because That's what I do. That's how I love embellishing and finishing up a page, but you don't have to add embellishments to every paint. I just like to add a lot of colors. And so that's how I am making this page feel more colorful, which makes me happy. It makes me feel more like me. And that's the whole point of your hand lettering journal. It's about you. It's how your lettering feels like you. When you're lettering feels like you. It can be the most therapeutic. It can help you show up as the best version of you in your life. And that's one reason why I love to practice unique styles. You can practice that wherever you are right now. You don't have to have years of experience to play with different styles. When I first started, I think I had only been lettering for two or three months. And I already was just exploring all different types of styles because I loved it. It can really help you see that there isn't just one way to letter. You can make it look good in whatever style, as long as you're intentional with what you're creating, you can make it yours. You can make it beautiful. There are so many different styles you can do, and not everyone likes every single style. And the point is to find what you love. And you might make a bunch of styles that you really don't like. And you have to get through those ones to be able to find the ones that you do. Like, I love creating a piece with all different styles. It's really fun to emphasize a certain word I like to do it with hello in brand new journals saying hello to this new journal. And if you want to learn more about lettering styles, I do have a few other classes that will help you with that. So definitely check those out. And I can't wait to see your styles. We finished day seven, but your notebook is not completed yet. You get to discover what's going to be on the next page. 15. Let's Wrap It Up!: Thank you so much for taking this class. I love to see what you created in the project section and something you made my inspires someone else. If you liked this class, please consider leaving a review. It helps me out and it helps future students. If you're still looking for more lettering resources, you can check out my other Skillshare classes or take a look at my lettering library. It's full of free resources. You can find that on my website and sign insights.com. Thanks again, and I'll talk to you in the project section.