Challenge ~ SOCC

This week is "Use My Tangle" week at the Diva's Zentangle Challenge.  And the random winner is CZT, Erin Olson and her delightful tangle SOCC.  I highly recommend reading the great story of this tangle, here on her blog if you haven't seen it yet. It speaks to some of my favorite qualities in the Zentangle community.

This is the first time I tried SOCC and I really like it for the contrast and dimension of the tangle.  SOCC is a keeper, for sure. Since we had our first snow this week, I decided to prop the tile on the piano for a different background/frame, just for fun.

Thanks Erin and Diva.  It is a pleasure to hop back into the weekly challenge.  Keep tangling everyone!

Art Teachers Embrace Zentangle!

OK, I admit it.  I took the summer off.  Went to the beach many times, and enjoyed family, friends, and the spectacular weather here in Little Rhody, the Ocean State.  I was so relaxed, I didn't even keep up with the weekly Diva Challenge.  But summer always flies by and this one did too.  Back to reality and fall routines.  And, for many, back to school!

This past week I was able to share Zentangle in a workshop for 8 AWESOME art teachers in Barrington.  Let's just say they took to Zentangle like ducks to water!  We  talked about the relaxed focus that is achieved by tangling, and quickly got right into the Zentangle zone by learning several tangle patterns and creating 2 tiles.  This was a wonderfully creative, enthusiastic, and open-minded group of teachers who clearly have so much to offer their students.  They really seemed to relish the opportunity to take a pause and relax and create and learn a new art form.  

The following mosaics are from this workshop and show what they did.  If you look carefully you may notice that the second mosaic has an extra tile included "just to even things out".  It was such a pleasure teaching this group.

Challenge ~ Home

Home is where the heart is.  Or, sometimes, home is where the luna moth is!  The Diva's challenge inspires us to use the "home" prompt this week and I decided to create a piece of Zentangle inspired art (ZIA) by tangling on a photo image of this spectacular luna moth that has just taken up residence in our garage!  We feel so honored to have him as a guest.  It was tricky to work on the glossy photo paper with the pen, but what the heck.  The simple tangled background is merely there as a platform to highlight this natural beauty.  If you'd like to learn more about luna moths go here.  Enjoy!

Challenge ~ String Theory v. X: Eccentric Circles

N'Zeppel (random) Pendrills, Pepper, Knightsbridge, Huggins, Crescent Moon (variation)

What fun! This week's Diva challenge is all about creating a Zentangle using a string made up of eccentric circles.  You can check out the specifics here.  I admit, I am always instantly attracted to a challenge that allows the chance to choose whichever tangles you like.  Although I neglected to shoot an image of the tile with just the string, it's easy to see the two sets of eccentric circles that made up the string.  Have a great week, tanglers!

Challenge ~ Bridgen

I had a great time with this Diva Challenge, following my string with Bridgen, and then just going on and on with Bridgen until I was "done".  Then it felt right to fill in alternating sections ala Knightsbridge.  And, finally, I decided to try color in the sections.  My first attempt with this method, and I used the technique described by a fantastic tangler, LeeAnn, also known as Ledenzer, and described here.  The whole process was really fun.  Have a great week everybody.

Challenge ~ Crescent Moon

Crescent Moon is one of my favorite tangles.  It was probably the first tangle I learned when I took a Zentangle class and very often a tangle I teach in my introductory Zentangle classes.  It doesn't require lots of concentration and has a great playful look to it.  It is the Diva's theme for her weekly challenge and my two entries are below.  As I was copying the link to the challenge I just realized that it was supposed to be a monotangle.  Oh well, I am posting anyway because Crescent Moon and tangleations of it are featured prominently in both tiles!

Challenge ~ Pea-nuckle

Howdy all!  Diva challenged us this week to have a whirl at Molly Hollibaugh's brandy new tangle "Pea-nuckle".(Directions here) Molly is Zentangle Product Manager and a supremely creative tangler as well. She taught one of my favorite sessions at CZT training. I purposely left myself lots of space for the new tangle so I could get into the swing of it as best I could.  Once I was done with my (wonky) variation of Pea-nuckle and was mentally ticking off which tangle I wanted to use to complete the tile, the answer suddenly came to me:  Hollibaugh! So here's to Molly and her wonderful day-in, day-out contributions to Zentangle!

Just for fun I am also sharing my first attempt at a Zendala.  It is unshaded and it may stay that way.  Also, sharing an offbeat tile I just tangled that was just so enjoyable to make.