How I Discovered the Pentel Sparkle Pop Pens
If you have ever attended a class that I have taught, you know that I love my “happy pens”. I have probably used over 10 sets of them in the past couple of years.
I first learned of them when I got started lettering someone mentioned how amazing the Pentel Dual Metallic Hybrid pens were. The ink contained two colors of glitter so that the ink looked different on light and dark colored paper.
I was intrigued and started hunting for them. They were not on Amazon. They were not at the craft stores. I finally found some on eBay. And not in a bunch of stores on eBay. In ONE store.
So, I ordered some. I paid almost $20 for 8 pens. Yes. It was a lot for gel pens! And when I got them in. I was in LOVE! You can now purchase these on Amazon.
I continued to order them from eBay and then I saw a new Pentel pen that looked a bit thicker in the barrel, but the description was the same as the Dual Metallic Hybrids.
Yes, the “new” Pentel Sparkle Pop pens were the old Dual Metallic Hybrids in a new form factor and new package. You can always find them on Amazon and most of the time they are in the $13-16 range.
Why I Love the Sparkle Pop Pens
This is my color swatch of the Sparkle Pop pens. The line is a 1.0 mm bold line, so they are really great to color with. I like to use them for lettering on dark colored greeting cards.
The ink flows smoothly and fills in nicely. I have not had one of these dry out or have a scratchy flow to the ink. It almost has a printed “foil” look to it.
NOTES:
- The pink looks similar on both the white and black paper.
- The orange and gold look similar on the black. There is a slight difference between the black and white paper.
- Green and blue almost reverse their colors. The green looks like blue on the black paper and the blue looks a bit green on the black paper.
- The purple doesn’t show up very well on the black. I don’t mind because I use so much of it on white paper that it is the pen that always runs out first. 🙂
- The red/black ink is my favorite. It looks so beautiful on all colors of paper.
- The silver and the gold are the two pens that only have one color of glitter in them. This silver is my favorite glitter pen on black or dark paper. It looks great on Christmas cards that I create on dark green paper.
One Day at A Time Mandala Colored with Sparkle Pop Pens
I am working on this mandala with the Sparkle Pop pens. You can see how smooth the ink is on this page.
I use them in my journaling when I want to doodle things around the sides of the page or for headings. The 1.0 mm line is too thick for my handwriting (which is large) because it takes up a lot of room then!
I have tried a lot of other gel glitter pens to find out if there are others that I like as much. So far, the Gelly Roll Stardust are my second favorite.
Most of the others that I have tried, do not have the smooth ink flow and the colors are not as vibrant. I will write a separate to post to show the swatches of the other pens so that you can easily see the difference.
I love that these pens work great in both the Embrace Your Journey coloring book and on the downloadable mandalas.
HaPpY DoOdLinG!
