What To Do with Old Sharpies—Waste Not, Want Not!
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I hate throwing out pens and markers, so I save my dried out Sharpies to do quick sketches with in my sketchbook.
The rough dry sharpie nibs make unique marks you can’t normally get from a marker.
Seahorses are a great shape to sketch and their rough exo-skeleton bodies are perfect for the Sharpie.
Also: The Latin name for seahorse is Hippocampus which means “Horse Caterpillar”. Just in case you were wondering.
What to Do With Old Sharpie Pens?
Try out your old dried up pens (make sure they’re not too dead and they still make a mark) and see what kind of interesting marks you can make. Maybe it’s just dots as you dab on the paper, or lines that die out halfway through. Old pens have a lot more character than new ones.
It’s exciting not to know exactly what you’re going to get. (It’s possible I sometimes leave lids off my Sharpies on purpose…my kindergarten teachers would be soooo disappointed!)
MASTERS OF DISGUISE
My fav seahorses are the sea dragons that look like they’re made out of seaweed! Their coloring looks spot on and their camouflage is amazing. Hard to pick out of the corals and weeds in the aquarium.
SEAHORSES — SEEN ONE, SEEN THEM ALL?
There are 40 different species of seahorses. They eat even more often than most of us, snacking 30–40 times a day.
What will you make?
Get creative and use a variety of different dried out markers (if you have that many) on one pic. Try different brands of markers. Some will do great at spots as you bang it against the paper, others make neat lines that fade out. You can try using the edges and tips of the pens. I’ve also tried soaking the pens first in water, vinegar, or other interesting liquids. Just don’t throw them out until you’re sure they’re dead!
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