Diva Challenge #286, Made by Joey Challenge #131 and a few Travelling Tangles

 Challenge #286: The Diva & Scooby says "Let's Get Straight to it"

Straight line patterns: Zedbra, Z-trik, Knightsbridge and Ziabolic

The Diva's challenge is to use only patterns with straight lines or adapt a curved pattern to straight lines. I completed the line work on this last night and did the shading this morning at the cafe. Scooby  Doo was sitting at my counter spot. He was willing to share.

Made by Joey Challenge #131: Finish My Tangle Series

Joey's start was a  diagonal strip of "Diva Dance"

Colored ATC using art tissue transfer

I finished this along with my pint of coffee. Scooby approved.

I'm trying to get caught up with a my ever growing stack Travelling Tangles. I've been getting loads of Happy Mail. It was a gorgeous weekend to take my kit out for a walk.

My finish...

...to Sue Clark's lovely starter tile from Colorado

My finish...

...to Sue's gorgeous Bijou start

My finish...

...to Heidi Whitney's elegant start

My finish...

...to Lin Laidler's colorful start

My finish...

...to Lin 's companion piece.

Thank you so much for visiting my blog. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me!

String Challenge #163 and some Travelling Tangles

String Challenge #163

Adele's string with Flukes, Andromeda and  Cruffle

I love the weekly challenges...even if I don't "love" the challenge. This one was a beast. I'm not gonna lie. The polar opposite of  the Diva Challenge. I was just not gelling with how this was developing. I started without a "plan", just a zen-ful idea of what might fit where. I abandoned this about midway through, moved onto another start in the sketchbook, thinking it would be more Zen to just keep it simple. It wasn't, so I came back to this. because I try to go with my first attempt for better or worse as it's all part of the journey...bumps and all.

I persevered. I was not pleased with the way the patterns were relating to each other. I thought shading would help. It didn't. But, you know what? that's okay. Moving on...

...this was a big week for my Travelling Tangles. I went a little crazy with my swap commitments  so I've been happily working my way through an ever dwindling (yay!) stack of Happy Mail:-)

First up are my finishes:

Kat van Rooyen sent me this from West Virginia

I finished it with my latest obsession...Tripoli in a swirl formation.

This came from Katy Abbott in Ohio

I had a lot of fun finishing this. I rarely use "Drupe" and I don't know why;-)

Christel Foncke in Belgium sent this a few weeks ago.

(The finished leaf is featured in last weeks post)

Just a little bit...I didn't want to cover the texture

These were my starts so beautifully finished:

Margaret Bremner's amazing finish to my relatively simple (unshaded) start

This is just too cool. I forgot to sign the art and Margaret designed a "Chop" (an artistic symbol of your initials) for me that mirrored her own;-) 

I sent these to Anita Westin in Sweden...

...she finished my Sandswirl/Trio start with Joki

I love this combo of spiral patterns. She really transformed the piece.

I sent these to Heidi Whitney in Utah

I love Heidi's finish!

Heidi submitted this as her Diva entry for this week. I have to say that I'm very humbled, thankful and not just a little bit relieved that Heidi felt that this experience fit the bill of "Relaxed". I fear sometimes that my colors and shading technique might cause my swap mates stress.

...and this other piece! All I can say is Wow!

I sent these to Sue Clark in Colorado

Sue's fabulous finshes!

Thanks so much for visiting and sticking with me on this long post. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me.

Diva Challenge #285, Joey Challenge #131 and a few Travelling Tangles

Diva Challenge #285: "Relax"

Laura poses a very interesting question and challenge:

Is our work different when we're just drawing for the sole purpose of relaxation.

The challenge is to relax...embrace the zen and not think so much. Do not plan. No worries or thoughts toward composition or what patterns go with what. No thoughts toward a finished piece you're thinking will be shared on social media. Excellent!

As is habit (especially on Mondays I don't have to work until 2), I'm up waaayyyy earlier than I need to be. Within 15 minutes I'm around the corner at my local cafe on my first pint of coffee, netbook open, wi-fi'd up, sketchbook out, along with my little sack of pens and pencils and a little box of tiles/ATC's ready to go where the challenges take me.

After I read the challenge, thought for about 5 minutes. I shut everything down, opened the sketchbook and started with my simple template and a string I drew with a blue Prismacolor pencil

I started with Crazy Huggins. I'd had a quick glimpse at Sue Clarks blog "Tangled Ink Art" this morning, where she'd been playing around beautifully with "Crazy H". I'd noodled around with it awhile back so that's where I started. I also worked in a new pattern I've been wanting to try called "Joki" by Kim Aarts-Bruins. I really enjoyed drawing this. Every stroke. I spent the entire morning in my comfort zone. I completed all of the line work (along with my coffee) then, as soon as I pondered shading, I got tense. So I stopped. I thought: "I'll stop and finish it later"...then that didn't seem to gel with the intent. So. I'm calling it finished...for now;-)

Joey Challenge #131
Finish My Tile Series: Buttercup

Joey started off with the angular Buttercup corner in a grid formation. I broke some off into the sea of Nipa.

Here are some recent Travelling Tangle fun:
This Autumn beauty traveled from Christel Fonke in Belgium:

Christel used a Gelli Plate technique that I'm not familiar with and I loved how this looked just on its own. After a lengthy stare down, a pint of coffee and a procrastinating  an inspirational journey through Zentangle Mosaic I decided to add a simple frame:

I created 5 tiles for the themed September Autumn Swap at the Travelling Tangles Project. When I posted them on the FB page I got a lot of wait list requests. I was also happy to see so many familiar "faces" from Diva and Joey challenges getting into the action. I committed to a LOT of exchanges so I'm really excited for the coming weeks to see what the the mailbox has in store. Stay tuned:-)

This is how Barb Magravanis finished the "Maisie" start I sent her:

I sent this to Anita Westin in Sweden. I started with Squib (heavily inpired by Michele Beauchamp):

Here's her fantastic finish:

I love the way she used the color to determine the string. That rolling paper bit is so clever. It reminds me of an antique map. I never would have seen that in a million years.
Check out my post from this past Saturday to see my It's a String Thing Challenge and yet more Travelling Tangles;-)

Thanks so much for visiting my blog. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me!

String Challenge #162 and Traveling Tangles

 

Adele Bruno's String Challenge #162

Adele's string/Patterns: ING,  Bubbles and Hollibaugh

I felt like this was one for the sketchbook as I can't say that I'm the biggest fan of ING. I had a go at it a few Diva challenges back. I like the idea of it. It's easy to draw and I like the opportunity to play with triangles but, I can never quite gel with its finished composition on the tile. I thought I'd be tricky with this and Hollibaugh ING and try a curvy ING. Neither of which really worked to my liking but I can't say I'm displeased with the finished piece either. I do like the finished page though. I repeated Adele's string on the 2nd "tile" and continued on with some more Tripoli fun.

These are the latest Travelling Tangles:

The two tiles on top are from Toby Schwartz in Pennsylvania (I posted the finished leaf zendala last week) and the one on the bottom is from Kat van Rooyen in West Virginia.
Here's the how I finished the renaissance tile:

I had a very different idea in my head when I started this. I started with the black pearls and then Crescent moon. I was going to do Featherfall to sort of mirror Toby's Verdigogh. I don't use Featherfall often so I need to muster up a little courage before I jump into that one. Then out of no where, Tripoli jumped on the page instead. After this weeks Diva challenge I've been a little obsessed with it, trying to embrace it into my "Mac 'n Cheese" club (it's definitely getting there). Pokeleaf was my desperate attempt to squeak in an organic pattern so as to not leave Verdigogh out on a limb. It wasn't so bad. I wanted to shade more but the thought of trying to drop shadow Verdigogh almost made my head explode so I opted for stippling. All in all a very pleasing tile in the end, but it was a rough road getting there.

This is my finish to Kat van Rooyen's pretty Autumn start:

I totally lifted this version of "Squib" from one of Michele Beauchamp's tiles I saw on the Zentangle Mosaic app. I love how she does it like a butterfly. "Squib" is from Zentangle HQ but I don't think it's published anywhere. I saw it a while back on Antonine's blog where she referenced it by name. It took me awhile before I recognized it as the same pattern that Michele uses a lot in her work. I love it!

This next tile came from Barb Mavraganis, in Pennsylvania:

I finished it (my 3rd Traveling Tangle of the day) and celebrated with a Happy Hour Mimosa.

Oh there's that darn Tripoli again;-) We are becoming friends.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me!

Diva Challenge #284, Made by Joey #130 and a few Travelling Tangles

Diva Challenge #284

Tripoli Monotangle

aaaaahhhh....uuuurrrggghh! Tripoli. I do love Tripoli. I love it when done by the capable hands of others. I don't know why such a simple pattern vexes me so. It all starts off well, but for me it goes off-the-rails quickly. That's why I kept this one small. It worked;-) I made a ton of ATC's using this awesome coloring technique by Susan Rink Olsen, and used the colors as a suggestion of a string. I've been collecting triangle fragment fills in my sketchbook and intend to have another go at this. someday.

Made by Joey #130 

Finish my Tile: Tipple corners

Joey started this weeks tile:

I'm back to the ATC's this week.

I got overly ambitious with my Traveling Tangle commitments so I've gotta get caught up. I was so happy to see some Diva regulars over at The Travelling Tangles Project this week, so I was anxious to get some exchanges going.
Anyhoo...first up was this gorgeous bundle of fun from Anne Marks in Australia. She sent me a lovely laminated bookmark. I love this idea. I'm gonna steal it;-)

Here's how I finished it. I had to ponder this for quite a while before I had the courage to take my pen to it. I see this a lot in the comments over at the TTP. Fear of ruining someone else's art. I went through a stack of my favorite tiles until I found something I thought would compliment Anne's line work. This was inspired by a piece I'd done several months ago, prompted by another Aussie, Helen Williams at A Little Lime. I love how this turned out. We can be our own inspiration!

This next beauty graced my mailbox a few days ago from Toby Schwartz in Illinois. The prompt was an Autumn inspired piece. I can't tell you how thrilled I was to open my mailbox the day I received this:

Here's my finish. This was such a joy to complete. I love Sandswirl. I could draw it forever.

If you're not yet tired of looking at my Travelling Tangles, check out my post from this weekend. It includes my collaborations with the amazing Margaret Bremner and the lovely Simone Menzel. My String Challenge entry is there too.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me.