Pattern Mixer - a new challenge

Anya Lothrop has started a new set of challenges for us! Once a month she will choose two patterns for you to tangle together. This month the patterns are Mooka and Rixty. I had just bought new sketch books with medium toned papers, one in gray and one in tan so just had to use them for this challenge. I had a great time stealing moments away from the busyness of preparing for the holidays to find an oasis of calm to work on these.

I had to laugh when I finally peeked at Anya's example because I had done almost exactly the same thing she did. I swear I didn't look first! I did this one in ballpoint pen because that is what I had in my purse when I started it. I really like the mid-toned paper because you can add both shadow and highlight.

This one is done mainly in brown and sepia micron pen with colored pencils used for shadow and highlight. Tipple managed to worm his way into this piece as he often does. I had a blast doing these and can't wait to go see what everyone else has done.

Have a safe and happy New Year!

Simplicity - A Diva's Weekly Challenge

For the final challenge of 2014 The Diva has challenged us to Keep It Simple Silly. In other words, simplify, simplify, simplify. This was also the theme of the very first Diva Challenge. I wasn't playing with this four years ago when that first challenge was set, but I did go and look at it about a month ago. I had an idea which I played around with in my sketchbook. I thought about doing simple continuous line patterns like Echoism and Eke.

Last week I sat down to do the tile and it did not even approach simplicity! It felt disjointed and like there were too many ideas. I got out my Inktense pencils and added some color to give it a little unity and thought it helped but was not fully satisfied with the tile.

Tangles Used: Eke, Echoism, Tat, and Growth

So I was quite pleased to give the challenge another go. This time I used fewer ideas and feel I found the simplicity I was looking for.

Tangles Used: Echoism and Tipple

May you and yours have a simply wonderful holiday season!

Zentangle on Acrylic

Over the weekend I finished up a project that I have been toying with for a while. In her book One Zentangle a Day Beckah Krahula has a project using clayboard and resin to make a layered tangle that is then made into a necklace. I didn't want to invest in all the materials and was going to skip it but then I found these acrylic shapes at Michael's by the Mod Podge company. I figured if you could decoupage on them you could tangle on them!

Materials Used: Podgeable Acrylic Shapes, Identi pen, Sharpies, Elmers Clear Gel Glue, old paint brush, and a bottle cap for a glue pot

The acrylic shapes come 18 to a package with 3 of each size/shape combination. One of the 3 has a loop on top so you can hang your completed piece as an ornament or jewelry. So the basic concept is to tangle on three layers of acrylic and then assemble them with glue.

I first tried tangling on the smallest square and painted the back with silver paint. I put the first layers together with decoupage but found that it didn't dry as clear as I wanted so switched to the Elmers clear gel glue for the rest of the project. I also abandoned painting the backs since I plan on hanging them as ornaments so don't want to have a plain back if I can avoid it.

Attempt #1

The top layer is a flower motif, the middle layer is Fescu, and the bottom layer is a leaf. I felt like the tangles on the three layers overlapped too much but that the method had potential so I continued with my experiments.

Attempt #2

With this piece I had more room to work with and thought I found a better balance of tangles. Tangles top to bottom are Poke Root, Flux, and Nekton.

Attempt #3

Here I decided to add some color. I used Sharpies and found they worked very well. Tangles top to bottom are Vitruvius and Tipple, Flux, Mssst

Attempt #4

On my final pass I tangled on the 3 remaining shapes. On the left I used Arukas. The middle layer has all the arcs and I alternated putting the arms on the top and bottom layer. The middle tangle was less successful. It is Bales and I decided to color the leaf parts green and then on the middle layer I put in red dots. But the registration wasn't so great so I colored the entire layer red which makes it had to see the top layer. The bottom layer is Florz. Next time I think I would glue the two layers together. Then when they were dry tangle on the top of the first layer and the back of the second layer and all will be registered correctly. The piece on the right I am quite happy with. The flower motif with some dots are on the top layer, leafy motif on the middle layer, and Mssst on the bottom layer.

I'm going to hang mine on the tree now. Let me know if you try this. I'd love to see pictures of what you come up with.

Arukas - A Diva's Weekly Challenge

The Diva is back and blogging now that her family has had a chance to recover. Her challenge this week is to use the new official tangle Arukas in your piece. Someone had used this in their piece last week and I had really admired it. I had looked at the step-out but hadn't had a chance to play so this was a timely and fun challenge. I chose to do mine as a monotangle.

Tangle Used: Arukas

Welcome back Diva. You were missed! And thank you to the fellow bloggers who stepped in to fill the void. You all did a fabulous job.

Third and Final Exchange of 2014

Today was a luncheon for my ANG group. Among the many fun activities we had an ornament exchange. And yes, once again, I finished mine very last minute. It would have been done last night but I didn't have the correct glue so I had to wait until Michael's opened this morning and make a trip to the store before I could finish it. It is definitely cute though!

Birds & Berries Thimble Purse by Brenda Gervais

Santa's sleigh was a little delayed so I will get mine on Wednesday. I'm looking forward to it!

Ornament Exchange #2

Last night was the last meeting of the year for my EGA chapter. We have an ornament exchange every year and I always look forward to seeing all the lovely stitched ornaments. I did allow myself a bit more time than the exchange last month but I still finished my ornament the morning of the exchange.

Of course the point of an exchange is that you get something too. So here is the lovely that I received

Well, one more exchange so I guess I better get back to my stitching!

All Dolled Up - A Diva's Weekly Challenge

This week's challenge by guest blogger Emily Classon was to use dolls as an inspiration for our tangle. Emily's examples are really beautiful but since neither my interior nor exterior child ever really played with dolls I was having trouble finding inspiration. I looked at lots of images of paper dolls but wasn't really feeling it. I had a vague idea of using a simple outline of paper dolls laid out in a circle with their heads touching

so thought I would try to use KrazyDad's kaleidoscope to create it. I never really found a way to get it laid out to create that result but along the way I began to see some very nice zendalas forming

The result of the image above after playing

and then I thought of the pun and that was it. I was hooked. So without further ado I give you this week's zen-doll-a <cumulative groan>

Tangles Used: Nzeppel and Tagh