Jonqal/Opus

This week the challenge is to use just two tangles in our zentangle this week.  Just using two tangles isn't hard for me, I don't think so anyway, but using Opus is.  I don't usually use this tangle and I'm not really sure why.  It looks like I have some more practice ahead of me for Opus.  Some of you have such beautiful Opus.  Mine is a bit plain, but as I said, I have some practice ahead of me.

I do like the interplay with these two tangles.  The flow of the Opus is a nice counterpoint to the rigid Jonqal.

Thanks to everyone for the really great comments on last week's challenge.  My 4 year old had a great time playing with it.

Hope you are having a great week.

Hoo are Yooo?

I have an online friend who is redoing a room in her house in all black and white.  She has picked lovely things to go in it but when I saw it, I knew that I needed to make a zentangle for her.  That room is made for a zentangle.  Maybe one day I'll make my own black and white room too.  She also loves owls so guess what her ZIA is?

The bedding she chose for the room has a lovely graphic stripe accent so I pulled that in for the background.  I think that I made a new pattern for the outside of the owl.  I haven't seen it anywhere else.  I wanted something that would look "feathery".  I still need to draw it up and think of a name.  It is really quite simple.

This one is an 8X8 square on watercolor paper and done with micron pens.

Pinwheels for Peace

Today is the International Day of Peace!  Get out there and spread the peace because we sure could use it.

In honor of this day and the Pinwheels for Peace project, The Diva has challenged us all to create our own pinwheel.  I was afraid that I was going to miss the deadline but I got in just under the wire!  This was a fun and new way to create some zentangle.  I chose to actually create a pinwheel and I found myself thinking more about what patterns to put together and how they would translate to a 3D page.

I ended up cutting a square of watercolor paper to tangle on.  I am happy to report that my pinwheel even spins!  I took it outside on this cloudy day to try and get a photo and the pinwheel kept spinning in the breeze.  I just wish I had an outside pinwheel to tangle now.



Finished and all put together!




The inside.




Outside flaps



Love is All You Need

The challenge from the Diva this week was about love.  Love overcoming Hate.  Something that I wish that could prevail more often in this world.  Some days it seems like people work so hard to hate and tear each other down.  Imagine what the human race could do if all that energy was used to find common ground and build one another up.  I should think that what we could do as a people would be pretty amazing indeed.

This challenge found me with a lack of imagination but I did try.  My first tile didn't come out as I had imagined it would.  About halfway through I almost abandoned it but kept going.

Love, Love, Love, Love

In the end I liked parts of the tile but as a whole I wasn't happy with it so I tried again.

This time I drew out the word love and went from there.  It might be a bit busy, but I do like it better.  In this one the shading makes all the difference.  Before the shading, the word and the background was all a jumble to my eye.  As soon as I started adding the pencil for shading however, they started to break apart.



L-O-V-E

The V is inspired by the Missoni for Target ads that are all over the place.  I confess that I don't get all the excitement, but the pattern is certainly hard to ignore.



New Books!

I just got me newest Zentangle books! I got an Amazon gift card for my birthday and used it on some new books to feed my addiction.

I can't wait to get into them and see what new things I can learn.

I got the new edition of AlphaTangle by Sandy Steen Bartholomew, Zen Mandalas by Suzanne McNeill and Zenspirations by Joanne Fink. After just a peek in each book I can see there is a lot for me to learn and tons of inspiration!

Sorry that I have not provided any links for you but I'm using the blogger app and haven't figured out if I can do that here yet. Just look for the books on Amazon though. You'll find them without any problem. :)

Happy Birthday Friend!

This year I turn 40 as do many of my friends.  To mark the occasion many of us have thrown ourselves a birthday party.  I love it.  It has been great to be with my wonderful friends and to celebrate this milestone with each other.  I also love that almost all of them will be 40 before me.  ;)

For my friend Steph's birthday, I decided that I would make her a Zentangle.  I chose to do one in a 5X7 size.  I waited until the last minute and wanted to use a standard size to make the VERY last minute framing go smoothly.  I totally lucked out on the framing as they not only had one I liked, but Michael's was having a BOGO sale on the frame that I liked.  I should have bought more as when I went back the sale was over.  Oh well, I'll have to keep an eye out for next time they have one.  I know know what frames to pick up.

Happy Birthday Steph!  I love you my awesome friend!

Steph's tangle unframed



All framed up.  The edges were lost as I didn't leave enough room but, I don't think that it looks too bad.



Better Than a Pair of Ducks

This week the challenge from The Diva and Maria of Zentangle is to create a tile using only one tangle: Paradox.  What I love most about Paradox is that it looks so very complicated when you see it, but actually creating Paradox it really quite simple.  Hey! I bet that is why the tangle is called Paradox.  (Wow, am I quick.)  I have tried a tile or two using just Paradox before and while I've been perfectly happy with them, I wanted to try something new.  I had wondered what they triangles of Paradox would look like when attaching the points in the center, like a Trivial Pursuit game piece,  but have not tried it before.  So, when I saw this weeks challenge, I decided to go for it.

I started with the main grouping in the center and then added those at the edge.  After I got them all filled in, I liked the tile well enough, but thought there was far too much empty space.  I thought about just blacking out the white but then I changed my mind.  I was afraid that the Paradox would get lost.  I decided to add another triangle to the "circles" to connect them all together.  I like how it turned out.  It sort of looks like a complicated piece of jewelry.

I have another tile that I started before this one but I didn't like where it was going.  If I finish it, I'll post it here later.