Hello my friends!

This week I thought I’d share my first hand lettering post of 2023. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us is a quote from J.R.R Tolkien’s Fellowship of the Ring. Professor Tolkien’s books are an endless supply of wise and beautiful phrases, that I really love turning into art.

**spoilers ahead** 

This particular line is said by Gandalf the Grey while the fellowship are in Moria in the movies, but actually it takes place in Chapter 2 of FOTR: The Shadows of the past in a conversation between the wizard and Frodo Baggins before Sam gets caught eavesdropping and the hobbits leave the Shire.

**okay no more spoilers**

I’ve always been a huge Tolkien fan (I read the trilogy when I was still in primary school) and have a bookcase dedicated to all things Middle Earth – I even genuinely enjoyed Rings of Power, which seemed to upset an awful lot of people because it didn’t marry up to the original trilogy, even though the Hobbit movies didn’t do that either (I like those too btw).

December 2023 will celebrate 20 years since Return of the King arrived in cinema, which means I’ve spent more than two decades in love with Middle Earth! (I even wrote a few fanfics awhile back and have always enjoyed creating LOTR themed art!!)

I used my arteza water brush pens and a really fine paint brush to create this piece with grey for the lettering and then framed the words with green leaves and flowers. I think in places I must have had too much water on my brush because it bled on the paper, but I’m a great believer in not hiding mistakes in art.

That’s it for this week…I hope you like it! I really suggest everyone should have a go at hand lettering, even if you don’t think your hand writing is up to much as its really satisfying!! Do you have a favourite book quote? I hope you enjoyed this weeks post…next week I’m planning to show you my new World Turtle illustration. 

Thank you so much for reading and I wish you a prosperous week ahead!

ps. Namárië

psps. Namárië is elvish for goodbye!

pspsps. These aren’t my best photos, but its been raining all week, as soon as its sunny I might just take them again!!