Diva Challenge #344 and sketchbooks

Diva Challenge #344

"Use my Tangle" Monday

featuring After-glo by Carole Ohl

additionally: Aquafleur, Bunzo and Sandswirl

Eco-print tile start

I was happy to see Afterglo turn up on this weeks challenge. It's one of those patterns I thoroughly enjoyed when it first came on my radar awhile ago and then I forgot about it. It's a great fit for my Cosmic Garden series too. 

Laura noted that Vonnie, a member of the Zentangle community recently passed away. Vonnie was an active member of one of my swap groups as well as in the Diva's chat room when Laura was live streaming videos of the challenges. This is for Vonnie.

Here are a few things I did in my DIY art journal this past week;

A trip to Japan Town to Maido my favorite pen store

 and Daiso for a haul of cheap art supplies

This store is Bananas!

Butternut Squash Soup

The kitchen has been sadly inactive of late. In an attempt to get myself motivated for my annual Christmas cookie baking marathon, I spent a day cleaning, re-organizing and cooking.

Simple Pleasures Cafe

Noodling around and feeling the Zen

Aimee sunnin' herself

Thanks so much for stopping by. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me!

Diva Challenge #326, Made by Joey Challenge #175 etc.....

Diva Challenge #326

Guest blogger Elisa Murphy

"Nzeppel Monotangle"

I was done...

then decided I wasn't...
I shouldn't have done that

"Nzeppel" is one of my Top 20 faves so I was anxious to jump right into this one as the perfect motivator to monotangle the crap out of it. I grabbed one of the extra rope string tiles I'd started for the Joey Challenge I guest hosted a couple of weeks ago and got going. Somewhere midway I was not gelling with the tile at all. The sections were too similar and I wasn't getting the contrast I wanted. I sat it aside after I got all the line work down and thought I could fix it in the shading and mucked it up even more. But, that's ok. It's all part of the journey.

I started again.

"Nzeppel" Monotangle

take 2

Made by Joey Challenge #175

Guest blogger Stephanie Jennifer
"Naida"

I've been following Joey's challenges for a couple of years. Very early on in this pursuit I decided to make ATC's my format for these challenges and I've been known to tweak the prompt to fit.

Here's the latest in my Eco-print Series:

I got a little behind with my "92 Days" prompts last week:

I had a little more play with "Peanuckle" after last weeks Diva Challenge. 

It's growing on me;-)

One of the challenges with this project is dealing with the bleed through from some of the various mediums that I use. I learned a long time ago not to be fussy or precious with my art. So instead of limiting my tools to avoid the bleed, I try to embrace it. It's not easy sometimes.

...and on the Travelling Tangles Project front:

I sent this ATC to Sue Bailey in Australia...

...Sue's gorgeous finish

I need to amp up my Betweed game

this is lovely

me: "Aimee! You better not be on Chewy.com again!!!" 🐾💞

Aimee: "What. Ever."

Thanks so much for stopping by. Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me 😉

Made by Joey Challenge #173: My Guest Blogger Challenge

Made by Joey #173

Margaret Bremner's "Rope  String"

Dingbatz'd

This week I'm honored to create a guest blog post for Joey's weekly challenges. She's much deserving of a break after 170+ inspiring posts. Seriously...to do this week after week requires a lot of dedication, discipline and IDEAS! I pondered...and pondered several half-baked ideas to come up with one I thought would be an inspiring challenge to Joey's followers (and to me too).

I am almost always challenged by strings, but I do love getting back to basics by laying some thing down on paper so I have a place to start. I like the structure the string provides and I like the challenge of making that string disappear. The great thing about this particular string is that it works well whether you embrace it or make it go away. 

from my archives

my sketchbook set-up

still a work-in progress...I think;-)

I always have a string page going on in the sketchbook to collect inspiration from my travels around the blogs, Facebook and Pinterest. It's my version of a sampler and this string is a great host for every type of pattern out there, grid, organic, ribbon, vine, fill....whatever and it shades beautifully.

The second part of the challenge was the real challenge for me. Disconnect. Pen, tile, self. That's it.

I spend sooooo much time noodling around the internet looking for inspiration, I forget that I can be my own inspiration. I clicked with this after watching several of Laura's (I am the Diva) live streams. She (as do all of us whether we think we do or not) has an arsenal of patterns she uses most frequently. Laura seemed to ponder "what should I do next?" briefly and decide on something as simple as say...Tipple. I came to the conclusion that if one masters, perhaps 20 patterns tops, that's all you need in 90% of the drawing you do so you can call upon them by instinct. 

Mastering a pattern is a challenge too. It includes taking the time to explore as many variations you can of a pattern in a monotangle by varying size and line weight to create contrast. I ALWAYS cringe when I'm called upon to do one, but they usually end up being super fun in the end.

Printemps

I did this tile awhile back and didn't notate the prompt but I think it was for a Square One Purely Zentangle weekly challenge. It illustrates a concept that was drilled into me in art school "Contrast Equals Interest". I'm also a big fan of "the elegance of limitation"-Rick Roberts. I used to describe it as not crippling yourself with choices but Rick's words are so much more Zen;-)

Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you have fun with this challenge. I would love to hear your thoughts;-)

Diva Challenge #322, Made by Joey #171 and other stuff...

Diva Challenge #322
"Aquafleur"

I managed to pop into Laura's stream Sunday night while I was on a break at work and got the gist of this. Aquafleur is one of those patterns I don't use unless I'm challenged to. I have a hard time figuring out what to do with it. I have to say that I enjoyed drawing this and I love the dimensional quality of the wrapping ribbon effect. It could so with some further exploration.

Made by Joey Challenge #171

Finish My Tile Alphabet Series: "Z"

featuring: Zonked
additionally: Zazzy

And there it is... A-Z done! What a fun series. These are bijou tiles I originally intended to use as page headers in my pattern collection binder. I've since re-organized it by pattern type so for the time being, they're a neat page in my book.

It's a String Thing Challenge #200

"C-perfs" on a C-perf string 

Adele Bruno celebrates 200 weekly challenges this week. What an accomplishment! Adele's challenges are unique in my small group of weekly blog challenges. Rather than submitting via link,  she receives the weekly submissions via e-mail and then posts the weekly gallery on her blog, so there's always that element of anticipation and reward to see how others resolve the sometimes extremely challenging challenges. Working within the confines of a string doesn't appeal to everyone and there's what I call "fitting square pegs into round holes" when the selected patterns don't seem to want to play nicely with the string at first. There's much satisfaction in making it work

Each week Adele comes up with a string/pattern combo and then generously comments on each submission. That's a lot of work and dedication! I'm guest blogging on Joey's Challenge on July 10 and I twirled around several half-baked ideas to come up with one challenge. To do it every week? Yikes! so Kudos to you Adele! And Laura! And Joey! All of you rock!

These are the Travelling Tangles I completed in the last week.

my finish to...

...the first of 3 lovely starters

by Jem Miller travelling all the way from West Sussex in the UK

my finish...

...to the 2nd of Jem's lovely starters

my finish...

...to the last of  Jem's 3 amazing beginnings

It's hard to believe I've been involved with this amazing group for a year now and it never ceases to inspire me. Between personal swaps, the random partnering for the monthly themed swaps and Jem's generosity for sending me multiple tiles with each exchange, I have completed more tiles from her than anyone. Every one of them pushes me out of my comfort zone. We have completely different styles and her line work is so precise and fluid and her backgrounds are amazing. Jem has a great blog called The Ragged Ray. Check it out if you haven't already

my finish...

...to this flowery beginning by Lin Laidler

I love it when folks send me official tiles to work on. I don't have the bandwidth or budget to get my mitts on these tiles so it's always such a treat to put my pen to them.  I always complete my travellers in the order I receive them so it was serendipitous to relax with Lin's tile in the end.

My "92 Days" project of daily drawing prompts from the Facebook group, Tangled and Journaled, Too!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me!

me: hey I'm working here

aimee: I think not

Diva Challenge #321, Made by Joey Challenge #170 and other artsy stuff..

Diva Challenge # 321

Non-dominant hand & Auras

My initial reaction to these left hand challenges is always "oh crap!", but usually, fairly quickly, followed by a sigh of relief. Letting go of perceived perfection with slow, steady focus on each stroke is extremely calming. The additional emphasis on aura'd patterns was actually a natural progression from previous challenges. During the last couple of Sunday streams, Laura was drawing Opus in one and Dansk in another, mentioning the keys to successful aura-ing. Even spacing, focus and my Aha! moment: Go Slow! So, of course, I started those subsequent challenges in that vein and then veered off course from time to time.

This challenge was just the thing to rein me back into the zen. For me, this was merely an exercise. I decided to go to my pattern collection and pulled out several of my favorite aura patterns and a couple of less familiar ones. I used Margaret Bremner's "Flying Birds" string and mapped out what I'd put where. I started with my mac 'n cheese "Crescent Moon". The last thing I did was "Verve". Those longer lines were the most difficult part and wonkiest...and...I love this tile! It looked a bit like a tree so I decided to stop and leave those wedges empty. The shading helped a lot.  Great challenge!

Tile Mapping (I just made this up-I think)
trying something new

Made by Joey #170

Finish my Tile Alphabet Series: "Y"

featuring: Yuma

additionally: Yah

The next to last Alphabet challenge by Joey. I have to say my set is quite spectacular. I'll post the whole she-bang next week. These were supposed to be headers for my pattern collection pages, but a few weeks ago I decided to re-organize it by pattern type:

Re-organization...for now

Travelling Tangles I finished last week:

My finish...

...to this sweet start by June Dal

travelling from Hawaii

My finish...

...to another of June's beginnings

My "92 Days" Project-daily drawing prompts from the Facebook group Tangled and Journaled, too!
Week 3:

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your thoughtful and generous comments delight and inspire me.

Kitty-pic of the week