A Moose, a Bunny, and a Challenge (Diva's #156)

Diva's Challenge #156 - "Curvy Gridlock"

If you feel like you can't draw a straight line, this is the challenge for you :)  The idea is that you don't need to be able to draw a straight line to be able to create grid tangles.  So... the challenge is to use grid tangles in curvy lines.  Here is my tile:

MOOSE

One of my kids likes everything moose :).  So, I decided to make him a card for his birthday with a moose.  Well... I got a bit carried away and it ended up being a lot larger than card-size, but I had a lot of fun.  I'm not confident enough to do it with tangles yet.

BUNNY

My 3-year-old niece just became a big sister, so I decided to crochet her a bunny I saw in a book and absolutely loved.  It took me a little while with a lot of doing and undoing (as I am a crochet beginner), but I finished it and it is on its way to Portugal for my little niece to enjoy.  I will post another one I just finished this week for another little one.

Diva's Challenge #155 "A Little White Space"

This week's challenge is to leave a little white space in your Zentangle Inspired Art, instead of covering the whole string with tangles. 

The first few tiles I tried were absolutely packed with tangles, then I left a little white space in one of my tiles and loved the look.

Give it a try if you haven't already!  Here are my tiles for this week:

For some reason I was having trouble with my strings this week; they just would not cooperate!  Oh well... hopefully that will pass :)

I have been playing with block carving and decided to try one of the grid tangles: Well.  I then printed the carved block on ATCs, and finished each one differently.

I think I will have fun with these :)

Hearts

Since my youngest son was born on February 14th, Valentine's day became Jeremiah's birthday from then on.  Still, I do like hearts and to create art with hearts in different shapes and sizes.

This one was created for this week's Diva Challenge: #154 "Valentangle".

I have also been experimenting with using tea bags in my art, so I created these in the last couple of weeks.  They were painted with watercolors (left), and inktense (right).

And here are some more experiments on white paper:

I've also been carving little hearts on erasers.  I will post them here once I create something with them :)

The Diva's Zentangle Weekly Challenge #153

Jailed Johnny - by Sadelle Wiltshire, CZT

Since I want to keep learning new tangles and keep drawing and relaxing with Zentangle, I decided to try to participate in the Diva's weekly challenges.  You can find her blog here (or click on the Zentangle Challenge button on the right side of my blog).

This week's tangle is called Jailed Johnny and it was created by Sadelle Wiltshire.  You can see the instructions here if you want to try it yourself.

This is my entry (you can see the tangle in the center and around the top left corner):

Every time I learn a new tangle I write down the stepouts and keep them together so I don't have to search for them again.  It is a way to practice a tangle and also a reference anytime I want to use it and forget exactly how it is done.

What I also like is the display of tangles I have on my cork board.  When I draw a blank on what pattern to use because I want a certain value or shape, I look at my display and choose.  Each little square has the name and creator in the back so I can refer back to the stepouts if I need to.  I'm sure this collection will grow, but not my space, so I will have to switch them on and off as I start using them more and more.

Zentangle Workshop - Week 13 (Last One!)

This is our last week!  Still, we learned more tangles, more tangleations, and a few projects with Zentangle Inspired Art.

This tile include the official Zentangle tangle Zander (left), Sticker (top right - a pokeroot tangleation), and Warmth (bottom - I don't know whose tangle this is, if you do, please let me know).  On the top left you will see my tangle in its most recent form.  I don't have a name for it yet.

For a project, I created these mountains with tangles.  What is special about them is that they connect on all 4 sides so you can have a continuous pattern - as you can see in the bottom picture.  I then put is on Spoonflower and had them print a swatch of fabric with this pattern.  I received it yesterday, and it is very cool looking!

My second project was a tangled soap dispenser.  I sanded it lightly and glued used teabags to it.  Once dry, I tangled all over it with a black Sakura Glaze pen and added some shading with black watercolor.  Once dry I gave it 3 coats of varnish.  Turned a boring soap dispenser into a not-so-boring one :)

I thoroughly enjoyed this workshop and learned so much!  I will definitely keep tangling as it is so much fun and relaxing.  I hope you enjoyed my creations and give it a try.

My next workshop with the ArtistsOfTheRoundTable Yahoo group will be on Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's book "Carve Stamp Play" starting in March.  I'm looking forward to it! 

Zentangle Workshop - Week 12

This week we worked on Zendalas.  How I love them!!!  I had a lot of fun creating my own mandala designs and then filling them with tangles.  I could easily get hooked on this!!

The design for this one was created mainly with straight lines.  After the tangles were added, I painted it with Inktense.  Here are the versions before and after being painted.

The design for this one was created mainly with rounded lines.  Like the blue one, the tangles were added and then the mandala painted with watercolor pencils.

I already created two more designs, but have not tangled them yet.  I hope you enjoy creating these as much as I do!

Zentangle Workshop - Week 11

Getting another look at all the Zentangle Inspired Art we have created since the beginning!  Here is my mosaic:

 
We then played around with strings, and tried to create new ones.

Then we tried to create our own tangles, and I came up with the two below.  I have since simplified the one on top.  I need to check to make sure they haven't been created by someone else before.  I will then post the steps to create them both.

Mimicking an Illuminated Letter; this one was created with Sakura pens on black paper.  The W (Tipple tangle) was created with Silver, and the grid (Florz tangle) was created with Gold Pink, so the piece is very shimmery.

Two Zentangle tiles using the same string, but done two different ways:  one just touching the edges, the other "filled in":

Zentangle Workshop - Week 10

More new tangles this week; I hope you enjoy them.

Pokeleaf, Growth (Beckah Krahula's tangle - I did not illustrate it below)), Meer, Enyshou (the broom-like pattern on the top right), and Reef (Judy Lehman - on the bottom, between the two channels of Meer):

Eke (right), an Eke tangleation (top), and Sez (bottom left):

And then some more Zentangle Inspired Art in color; this one painted with water-soluble wax crayons... (included the new Pokeleaf and Eke tangleation)

 and this one with H2O's (shimmering watercolors); it includes new tangles Pokeleaf, Eke, and Sez.

It's been really fun to add color to tangles, I hope you give it a try.

Zentangle Workshop - Week 9

This week we learned some more tangles.  As you've seen from last week's post, we're starting to learn some tangles created by other people (not official Zentangle tangles).  I will add the creator's name when it is not an official Zentangle tangle.

Also, this week, we started playing with color and different techniques as you can see from the pictures.

One of the techniques we tried was Faux Batik.  You draw your tangles on watercolor paper with a white Sakura Glaze pen.  Once dry, you paint your tile with watercolors.  The white Glaze pen acts as a resist.

1. Glaze pen and watercolors  2. Outlined tangles with black pen  3.  Added shading with colored pencils

I love this technique, so I created a couple more tiles

Here is a tile painted with Inktense with some of the new tangles and tangleations: Flux tangleations (the leaves in green), and Kathy's Dilemma (the triangle-like pattern on the right).

We also learned about a new enhancer called Perfs (small circles around the edge of a pattern), Striping (bottom left), Taghpodz (Angie Vangalis' tangleation of Tagh - bottom right), and a Pepper tangleation (the cone-like-flowers/plants on the right)

This tile was created by adding watercolors to paper randomly, then using the separation of the different colors on the paper instead of drawing a string.  You can see other examples of Perfs as well.

I hope you enjoyed these new techniques and tangles.

Zentangle Workshop - Week 8

This week we learned a bunch of new tangles.  I hope you enjoy them.

Jetties, Sampson (the pattern on the bottom right below), and 'Nzeppel:

and on colored paper (it seems that from the new tangles, I only used 'Nzeppel below) 

Paradox, and Betweed:

Tagh and Tat (Beckah Krahula's tangle - the leaf-like pattern on the left):

Sometimes when you're done with a tile, it reminds you of something.  This particular one reminds me of a crab every time I look at it!

Enjoy the new tangles, and keep drawing!

Zentangle Workshop - Week 7

No new patterns this week: it was a break, so we just practiced and uploaded a mosaic of some of the tiles and ATCs we have done so far.

Zentangle tiles:

ATCs (Artist Trading Cards):

Fun, fun!!

Zentangle Workshop - Week 6

On week 6 we learned a lot of new tangles!  Get ready!

Pepper, Ynix (the leaf-like pattern below), and Squid on colored paper:

Vitruvius, Courant, and Sedgling:
None of these have instructions on the web, so I will tell you which ones they are in the tile below.  Vitruvius is the one on the left with circles and squares.  Courant is the maze-like in the middle.  And Sedgling is the plant/tree- like pattern on the top right.

Gneiss (the star-like pattern in the middle of the tile below), Cadent, and Huggins:

Rain, Cubine, Beeline, and enhancer Drewdrops (the dew drop on the Beeline tangle on the bottom left - I haven't gotten the hang of it yet):

That's it!  I hope you enjoy these tangles.