Merry Christmas to all my Zentangle Friends

Merry Christmas, may you each have a blessed and wonderful day celebrating our savior's birth!   

Red Thread - Challenge 49

Knightsbridge, Purk, Shattuck, Vortex, and Cootie from "Zentangle for Kids"

 "An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet regardless of time, place or circumstance. The thread may stretch or tangle, but it will never break." -Chinese proverb

This weeks challenge is to draw our string in "red" to support the Red Thread Promise.  The tiles will be put together for a poster that will be sold to support this organization that globally helps Children with medical issues.  I enjoyed this challenge and am happy that it has a deeper purpose that will help others.

Challenge 47 Lest we Forget

Today is Remembrance Day when we pause to remember and give thanks to those who have given of themselves to keep our country free.  Our challenge this week was to be inspired by the famous poem "In Flanders Field", and use poppies as part of the theme.

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Let us never forget the sacrifices that have been made, and are continuing to be made to protect our freedom.

The Diva's Give-away Celebration

Don't miss out, the Diva has had 200,000 hits on her blog and is celebrating by offering three awesome prize packages on her blog.  It all ends November 30th.  Do check it out! Just hit the link below!

Diva's Give away Celebration  

It's Pumpkin Time for Challenge 46

It's that time of the year when pumpkins are popping up everywhere.  I made this one to show our Zentangle Club and also to be my entry for this week's Diva's challenge.  It's not very spooky, but it sure was fun.  The first two views are of my pumpkin but the final view is of a pumpkin that my student, Nancy Smith made after seeing mine.  I'm very impressed with the great job she did!

 

View 1 of my pumpkin

 

View 2 of my pumpkin

 

Nancy's pumpkin - in all it's awesomeness!

Happy Hour Tangle

This "happy Hour" tangle is fun and easy to do.  All you need is a pen, a glass of wine and a napkin.  Start with a sip of wine, then put your glass down on the napkin.  Start tracing the bottom of the wine glass onto the napkin, drawing a small segment of the circle, then add a semi circle every so often.  It is quite relaxing. When you complete the circle it is time to take another sip and move your wine glass to a new location on the napkin.  Using the same process as before, start where the wine glass intersects with your first tracing so that the second circle appears to be behind the first.  Repeat until your napkin has several such circles on it. Now its time to fill in all the spaces created with your favorite tangles.    Are we relaxed yet?   Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial.

October's Zentangle Club

We made pumpkin tiles just in time for Halloween!  Come join us in November when we will have a Christmas theme to our project, and learn two new tangles.

Challenge 42 "Hope"

 

Hope is like a flower, it blooms in the light of the Son.  

For me, my hope comes from my faith in God, so on this challenge I wanted to represent that hope in some way. This Joyful peony seemed to say what words can not. 


I have been fascinated with Japanese Crests and have started a ZIA series based on them.  Most crests have a graceful elegant mood to them that is so much a part of the Japanese culture.   This particular one is of a Peony and symbolizes joyous life and prosperity. 


After scanning my black and white zia, I played with it a little on my photo software and added a blush of color to it.

Challenge 41 "Opus and Jonqal"

This is another one of those challenges pairing two tangles that are very different from each other.  Jonqal is bold with straight lines and Opus is soft, curly and gentle.  Well they can co-exist and actually compliment each other in the same zentangle.

Thank you Laura for yet another great challenge.  I love the challenges where we all use the same tangles and explore the possibilities each one holds

Challenge 40 "World Peace Day"

The challenge this week was to do a pinwheel for peace to celebrate World Peace Day. [Sept. 21].  I'm just a day late, but then it's never too late for peace.  I added some olive branches to my pinwheel in hopes that they would help the world achieve peace.  Maybe if all people would do zentangles then peace would come one person at a time. It never hurts to dream.

 

Challenge 38 "pair o ducks"

The challenge this week was called "pair o Ducks" to make a pun on the tangle "paradox", one of my favorites.  It was a thrill to be able to participate this time after an 11 week dry spell.  Sometimes life just gets in the way of what you want to be doing.  I'm attaching the non-shaded version too, so you can see the difference that shading makes. 

Zentangle on the high seas

Been missing me?... I've been away taking a wonderful cruise to Alaska.  Of course I brought my zentangle supplies with me and met several people on the cruise that were interested in learning more about Zentangle.

Since it is my passion to pass this on to others I offered a short intro class to a few people on the cruise.  What a great way to pass the time while the ship is sailing.  It was a free class, but seriously what a really great venue offering zentangle on a cruise ship.  My students were from Canada and the UK, and were a variety of ages.  All seemed to have a good time. Here are a few pictures from the class.

We worked on card tables in the game room




Working two tables was a bit of a challenge, but ended up being fine. I had almost enough pens with me for everyone.
The end result was wonderful!

Challenge 27 - Duo aka-Dex is from Mars, Verdigogh from Venus

Dex plus Verdigogh = Double Trouble.  I think in this case opposites do not actually attract, more like co-exist. This was a difficult challenge for me as I rarely draw either of these tangles, however when one steps out of their comfort zone they are rewarded with some knowledge.  I learned a lot from this challenge and also had some fun in the process.  The background was painted first with water color  and left to thoroughly dry before I even started. No string was used, I just attacked the verdigogh  thinking it would be fun to have it radiate out from the center. Then used Dex as a background.  It was very hard for me to get the scale of the dex to be uniform. It was fun to play a little with adding color, so all in all I enjoyed this challenge.  Thanks Laura .

Challenge 26 - String Theory - Spiral

 What great fun the challenge was this week.  We had to use a string that was a spiral, and this was rather new to me.  I found it gave surprising results as I worked "coaster" around one spiral.
I'm calling this one "string of pearls"  It is 8x10 on vellum finished bristle board.  Colored with Bic fine tipped markers.


I thought you might want to see the in progress photos I took, while doing my challenge this time.

This is before shading

    This is after shading.

I had some fun playing with my photo editing software and got these two images.

 This has an effect called "swirl",
Rather appropriate for this challenge.

This has an effect called "mirror"

They both are made from the original black and white ZIA.
One could spend hours just playing with our drawings.

Thank you Laura for another wonderful challenge.

Challenge 25 - zendala

This week's challenge is to use a mandala template created by Genevieve Crabe.  Since I love making mandalas this was a natural challenge for me.  The only thing that got in the way was a visit from by beautiful granddaughters and Vacation Bible school, but finally last night and this morning I was able to work on it.

I scanned it in Black and White before adding some color.  It's been a lot of fun seeing the vast variations that everyone has created on this challenge - really awesome work by all.

Thanks Laura and Genevieve!

 

Challenge 23 - Same String

Wow, the Diva has been so kind to us, giving a string to use in this weeks challenge!  It's going to be so much fun seeing how everyone puts their own personality into their challenge tile.  It's interesting how the ones so far have been all so different, and each person has a different opinion as to what side is up.  Don't you just love it! I found this challenge relaxing and just what creating a zentangle should be!  Thanks Laura!
Tangles used:Knase, coaster,nzepple,purk, cubine and paradox

Challenge 22 - String by Spouse

 

This week we had to have someone else draw a string for our Challenge tile. I have to thank my dear husband for a very nice string to work with on this one. He actually gave me two to work with, so hopefully will have another one completed before the week is over.  Thanks Laura for another great challenge .

Zentangled Graduation Portraits

 

Two of my Granddaughters are graduating from High School this June.  I used photos they posted on Face Book to help me make these portraits.  I took quite a bit of liberties with their hair.  I hope they like their gift of a zentangled portrait.

Challenge 21 - Oof (with a goof)

 

I learned lots of lessons on this challenge.  The first was never to try a new tangle without the instructions close by. after I finished my string I started to draw the new tangle "oof", but I soon realized that I didn't have it quite right.  What I drew was "goof" - as you can see in the orange and purple.  So I went and got the instructions and managed to draw "oof" somewhat properly.  The second lesson I learned was that when you make a mistake - it really is an opportunity. I kind of like my goof. Lesson three came when I colored this ZIA.  I found when you color with prismacolor pencils then go over it with a Bic mark-it, you get a nice smooth blend of color.  I had a lot of fun with this one.  Thank you Laura for another great challenge, and Thank you Maria for a very cool tangle.

Challenge 20 - Royal Wedding

 

Just like Cinderella, the princess has left a shoe behind.

How much like a fairy tale was this wonderful royal wedding of William and Kate.  I enjoyed the glitz and the pageantry of the whole event.  All the marvelous detail was amazing and inspirational to my Zentangle heart.  Fascinated by the tile floor at Westminster Abbey I thought I would focus on that as my entry to the Diva’s Challenge this week.  Research was required as there was so much to choose from.

 

 

It was during my search for tile that I found the beautiful shoes that Princess Kate was wearing.  (they were not seen during the ceremony).  As with so much of the wedding, there was detail that was overlooked in the coverage.  I stand in awe of the depth of detail this wedding represented, one look at the wedding cake will blow your mind!

This challenge was a joy and also a real challenge – so many wonderful ideas that I’m sure I will be using my gems from this research for a long time to come.

Challenge 19 - more Morris

White on Black...oh my.  This is a challenge.  I reached for some clay board I'd been saving to try out some tangles on, and this seemed like the appropriate time to do it.  Well, it's not any where near as easy to work with as good ole black ink on white Zentangle tiles.  There was a cool feeling as the stylus sank into the clay and started to make a mark, but it did have a mind of it's own.  This doesn't look very Morris, but it was fun to give it a try.   I added a little "bling" with silver and gold gel pens.  I'll have to have another go at this one.

Challenge 18 - Eggs for Easter

Twin Eggs for Easter,
It would be appropriate to start off with a confession... I started this challenge using a free coloring page off the internet as my "string".  Running low on time and inspiration, I allowed myself this little short cut, it was fun making the two eggs just alike when I added the tangles to them.  Actually coloring pages are a great resource for doing representational strings.  I have used them for doing classes with young children and found they offer an added dimension of interest. I hope you all have a very Happy Easter.   

Challenge 17 - 15 mins (plus)

Today I'm packing for a trip and a 15 minute challenge sounded perfect.  I got all settled on the screen porch, listened to the birds... set the timer and started to tangle.
A few chirps later the buzzer went off!  What??? I'm only 90% done! And I haven't done ANY shading.  I should have listened to Laura's advise and chosen beginner tangles.  I did start with Floorz, but paradox, inapod, ixorus were all calling to me.  Needless to say I went over the 15mins, but I had a great zen time.

Introducing Zentangle to Sumter High School

It was my pleasure today to introduce Zentangle to the Honors Art Club at Sumter High School.  What a great group of artists!  They all enjoyed the demo and each made an ATC to take home with them.  We all had a great time. 

Challenge 16 - Mooka

It is always so much fun to work with a new tangle.  This one really moves quickly and presents a lot of tempting variations.  I am so happy the Diva chose this as our weekly challenge, perfect excuse to play!

Challenge 15 - Curves

This week's challenge was to use those curves!  What a break after using only straight lines last week.  I thought I was doing well with my curves, but realized a few straight lines snuck in.
Oh,well it looks rather curvy.

Of other interest, we went to the wood show in Charlotte last weekend and this inlaid box caught my eye, so I thought I would share with ya'll.

New rising star on the zentangle scene - Gina Hines

I would like to introduce a friend of mine, Gina Hines.  She heard about Zentangles and was captivated by the concept and she is on a roll!  Take a look at some of her fabulous work:

More can be seen at her blog: http://doodle-bug77.blogspot.com/

Paradox in a Box

This is take two on the Diva's weekly Zentangle Challenge, drawing a zentangle with only straight lines.  I decided to embrace the concept and started with "cubine" as my string.  Only using 2 tangles "paradox" and "hybrid" this tile is called "paradox in a box".  It all seemed to fit.

Weekly Challenge 14- I walk the Line

The diva is making us "walk the line" on this challenge.  We have to use only straight lines for our string and our tangles. Hollibaugh seems like a perfect choice to use as a string, and of course Paradox comes to mind as a tangle to use in this challenge.  It was really hard not to throw a curve in here and there, but I resisted.  It is fun seeing what other have chosen to do as well.  Thanks Laura for another great challenge.

Weekly Challenge No. 13 - Drawing with the non-dominant hand

This was WAY outside my comfort Zone.... drawing with my left hand, as I am a right handed person.  I drew every aspect of this with my left hand, string - tangles - shading.  I almost messed up when I caught myself trying to slip the pen back into my right hand.  The "Zen" was not in this one - it did take every ounce of my concentration and I did learn that turning your tile to favor your natural inclination was most helpful.  Curved lines were so difficult!!!  This is the best Left Hand Tile I'll ever make as it is my first and last! LOL.   The Diva really put us though our paces on this Challenge.