Fun With Color

This week I caught up on a few more of the tiles I have left to do from the book One Zentangle A Day (OZAD). I actually finished all the days a while back but am going back and picking up a few ZIAs that I hadn't done. This is really a great book and I have very much enjoyed working through it. The slideshow on the right side of this blog is my OZAD album.

This first exercise was to use alcohol-based pens to create a ZIA. I also used some water-based brush pens and an inktense pencil to round out the (rather limited) palette of my PrismaColor Premier collection. It was a fun project and I look forward to using these pens again.

Tangles Used: Hollibaugh, Crescent Moon, Nzeppel, PomX2, Bateek, and Festune

This second exercise was to use Inktense pencils and to shade using the complimentary color. I love my Intense pencils and really enjoyed using complimentary color to create depth. A new tool in my toolbox!

Tangles Used: Nzeppel and Tagh

This tile I did just for fun! Well, actually I was going to use it for one of the OZAD ZIAs but decided I liked it in black and white. I was doing this while listening to my son on the radio (he is a news anchor on a radio station in Taipei) and had a really great time doing it.

Tangles Used: Nzeppel, Taghpodz, and Florz

Last, but certainly not least is the Diva's Weekly Challenge. This was a fun DuoTangle challenge using two tangles that are new to me, Chebucto and Copada. I considered using watercolors to paint this as the Copada portion of the tangle made me think of rippling water but ultimately decided just to shade it with an ArtGraf Stick.

Tangles Used: Chebucto and Copada

Hoping you are all safe and warm!

Moebius Syndrome Awareness Day 2015

The Muster Mixer Challenge this month is to combine the two patterns Balloya and Arukas. Balloya was new to me but after some practice in my sketchbook I combined them in a way that made me happy. There was no string used here. Just the initial triangles used as seeds and kept tangling until it felt done!

Tangles Used: Balloya and Arukas

And this week's Diva Challenge is to raise awareness for Moebius Syndrome, a disorder which only affects one in a million and has touched the Diva's family. Moebius Syndrome Awareness Day (MSAD) is Friday, January 24th. The Diva gave us a string we could use that is a drawing of the logo for the Moebius Syndrome Foundation and told us that the color for MSAD is purple. I have always been fascinated by the Möbius Strip which is what the logo is based on so I got to work quickly on creating this tile. I was originally going to choose tangles beginning with the letters M, S, A, and D but the simplicity gods intervened and so I have only used M and A. They intervened again when I was coloring the piece. I was going to color half the ribbon with metallic pencil ( part of a set given to me for Christmas) and the other half with a watercolor pen. But after putting in the pencil I could see that was enough. So I added a bit of shading and it is done. I guess the lesson this week is sometimes less is more!

Tangles Used: Meer and Ahh

200th Diva Challenge

This week's Diva Challenge is her 200th challenge. To celebrate this milestone the challenge was to use the whole tile (no border) while making a monotangle using your go-to tangle. My go-to is Tipple or at least anything with orbs in it such as Purk or Onamato. You can check out a bunch of great orb tangles on TanglePatterns and see what a variety you can achieve with the humble orb. The final requirement of the challenge was to include the number 200 somewhere on the tile. And a few lucky tanglers will win a prize package. So make sure you join in the fun too!

A friend gave me my first box of official Zentangle tiles for Christmas so I thought such a huge milestone should be celebrated by using an official tile. I decided to stay true to the monotangle part of the challenge and not use anything but Tipple. So let's pop the cork and celebrate!

Tangle Used: Tipple

2014 Goes Out With a Bang, Or Why I Hate Palm Trees

Yup! That is one of our cars! Three years of drought plus 2 weeks of rain plus one wind storm equals lots of downed trees. Including one of our neighbor's palm trees. I know many of you may have a fond place in your hearts for palm trees. I do not. They provide no shade, are high maintenance, and wreak havoc when it's windy.  Fortunately in this case once the city crew got it off the car enough to move it we couldn't find any damage at all!

On to more artistic endeavors, I had fun making some tangled ornaments on acrylic. Here is my favorite but you can see the rest here.

My daughter wanted one of my pieces for Christmas. I had first thought of doing an ensemble for her but my husband suggested that he could laser etch one of my pieces on a box and then stain it. I choose the zen-Doll-a from challenge 196 and we wound up making two of them, one for my daughter and one for my friend.

For the first time in several years both kids were home for the holidays. My son was here for two weeks and my daughter got a four day weekend so we had a great time. It was really hard saying good-bye to my son when he left to go back to Taiwan and I was feeling very tearful. But as we were walking back to the car we passed a really cool exhibit being put on by the SF MOMA called When Art Rocked. I found the curator's website so you can read all about it. It was just what I needed at the time. When I got home I did a tile using only patterns by Taiwanese artists that I found on TanglePatterns as a way to feel closer to him.

Tangles Used: Oolo, Japan Diamond, Seedings, and PomX2

And last but not least we arrive at the Weekly Diva Challenge. This week is a UMT (Use My Tangle) Challenge using Hitched by HeidiSue. I did loads of things in my notebook with this fun tangle but ultimately made a zendala.

Tangles Used: Hitched, Vitruvius, Curl, and Facets

Here's to a fabulous 2015! May the winds of change blow gently through your palm fronds ;)