Use My Tangle!

I can't express how honored and excited I was when I checked The Diva's challenge today. Laura has chosen my tangle pattern Huggy Bear for this month's Use My Tangle challenge.  I have such respect and awe for Laura's work.  Thank you Laura for this.

I was actually thinking that I would skip the challenge this week.  I am looking at a busy week as spring break begins on Friday.  We are heading out to do some camping and that means a week of planning and packing.  There is also a wedding ZIA that I am racing to finish before the big day.  Of course once I saw the challenge I had to get right down to it.  I chose tangles that would be quick for me to do.  I wanted to get his posted quickly so I can concentrate on seeing all of the faboulos tiles you all make!

In addition to Huggy Bear, I used Gingham, Oof, and Beeline.  I also kept the shading to a minimum. 

Thanks again Laura for this opportunity.  Your tile is wonderful and I ADORE how you used Huggy Bear.  What a fun way to vary it.  I can't wait to see what everyone does!

Kiss My Grids!

The challenge this week from The Diva is to create our tangle using only grid patterns.  I love the grid patterns.  Grids help me to stay evenly spaced.  I like even patterns.  I think it is because the freehand patterns tend to intimidate me a bit.

Every time I think of the name of this challenge, I can hear the actress on "Alice" saying "Kiss my grits!"  Then I am thinking of grits and want to make some.  I know that grits aren't for everyone but they are certainly for me.  I grew up in Tennessee and a full breakfast is not complete without them.  When we were on vacation I had Grits and Fried Green Tomato Napoleon with fresh Gulf Shrimp.  SO GOOD!  Anyone who doesn't like grits, I think it is because you have not had good ones.  Cheese grits are divine and all grits should be creamy and loaded with butter. :)

So, on to the grids.  I'm getting hungry here.  My first go at the challenge I did on the back of a note card.  A friend recently got married and brought me her old note cards to tangle on.  I have been using them for doodles and practice but thought I'd see how they work on a "real" tangle.  The paper did well.  There may be more this size in the future.  Using the theme of the challenge for inspiration, I used a mouth as a string.  Then the idea of grits are there in the gingham pattern.  I think of gingham as a "southern" pattern.  I used my own Huggybear pattern in the background. I skipped the little white dots this time.

I wanted to do a tangle for this challenge that was different , so I tried again.  This time I used 3.5" square of watercolor paper and gridded the whole thing.  I wasn't sure what to do for a string so I just looped around and ended up with this popcorn looking shape.  I used Eye-Wa for the background and a dressed up Bales as the center.  Bales looks like Puff though.  I have been wanting to learn Puff but the center squares keep me away so maybe I'll try Bales this way when I want to make Puff.  I hope you enjoy them.  I can't wait to see more of what you all have done!

String Theory v. IV - Diva's Challenge 29

Happy 4th of July to all you Americans out there!  Happy new challenge Monday to everyone else!

This week I got to do the challenge in wonderful quiet as my Husband and sons headed off this morning to go camping.  It's amazing how much quicker I can get this done without being pulled to do something else every 15 minutes or so.  :)  Because they are off camping, Husband took my camera so please forgive the poor quality of the photos.  Yea for iPhone cameras though!

I thought the idea of using an actual string to make the string for the challenge this week was a super idea.  I may have to try this on larger pieces.  I am always perplexed when doing a large ZIA on the best way to divide up the space.  Using an actual string will be a nice way to solve that I think. 



 I used my son's yoyo as my string.  It already had a weight attached. 

I laid down the yoyo as I knew that I wanted part of the circle in the tangle but not all of it (the yoyo is a bit large) so I set it in the corner and draped the string on the tile.  This is the first draping and I thought it looked good, so I went with it.










Next, I traced around the edge of the yoyo and followed the string around with the pencil.



 I used the die to pick my tangles this time.  Lucky for me, the die chose some of my favorites.  :)  Blogger is giving me a hard time this morning and uploading this tile on it's side.  I know there really is no top of bottom, but I like this tile with the tipple in the bottom left corner.

So, thanks to the Diva for another great challenge and thanks to my family for going camping.