Diva Challenge #244 ~ Tripoli Triptastic!

Well, seems like Sunday is likely to be my new day to post. Seems like no matter how hard I try, it's usually Sunday that I make it here *giggle*. Oh well, at least I am getting here again. *grin*

First off, thank you for your kind comments on last week's attempts. It was really quite fun and I am going to have to get more motivated again to do many more. I need to apologize though, for my lack of comments made. I have looked at all of the submissions every week, and to tell the truth, I mostly don't comment because my hands hurt a great deal of the time. But I look and love each and every one of the submissions that are made. So I will try to get around earlier next week and hopefully will be able to comment more.

I need to really get going on the few Christmas cards I plan on making. Most of the handmade ones will be going to New Zealand to the Kiwi family. One of these days, I really do want to try to make it down to see where hubby grew up. I have been working on preliminary work on a few cards already but they aren't ready for publication yet.

But ... here is my submission for this week. Tripoli is not one of my favorites, but that may be because I just haven't worked with it enough. I never know what to do with it, so I normally don't bother. But following Laura's lead, I decided to try working with pink, since that just happens to be my favorite color (or at least one of them). I'm not real pleased with this effort, but it actually does have many nice features, so here it is. Any and all comments appreciated, as usual.

If you would like to see the rest of the submissions for this challenge, head on over to the Diva's Place (CLICK HERE) to see all the artist submissions. And it's really quite fun, so join in if you are so inclined.

Diva Challenge #243 ~ Just a tiny taste!

Soooo....the Diva wants us to try to do "just a tiny taste" of a tangle and leave the majority of the tile blank. I actually thought that this would be pretty easy, since I can normally come up with my major focus for a tile early and then wonder what to fill it with. But I found that it wasn't really easy to just leave it blank. It felt unfinished for the most part, but I kept trying anyway. And...miracle of miracles, I actually am getting it posted before midnight on Sunday *giggle*. Well, here they are and not too bad for the most part, so take a quick look please and any feedback is appreciated, whether it is good OR bad. Any and all criticism is always appreciated.

Tile 1:
I love the look of white on black; however, I don't have any black tiles, but I do have a lot of darker colors of cardstock that I used to use for scrapbooking, so here I have used a dark blue with my white gelly roll and a chalk pencil to highlight a bit.

White gelly roll on dark blue cardstock with chalk pencil to highlight.

Tile 2:

I honestly don't know what I was thinking with this one...at any rate it is NOT my favorite. Nothing else to say.

Black and brown microns with colored pencil and graphite
pencil to add shading.

Tile 3:

I had sketched this design a while back in my sketchbook and decided to play with it on a tile. I just thought it was a lot of fun, but that was before hubby and son saw it. They told me that I drew a very nice psychedelic banana and that it must be homage to the 70's that I seem to have a problem remembering. I told them it WAS NOT a banana, but I suspect that I will never hear the end of it now.

Black Micron with graphite shading

Tile 4:

It's a tossup between tile 1 and this one as to which is my favorite this week. My hubby is from New Zealand and the All Blacks are doing rather well, so I was looking at some of the Maori tattoos that some of the All Blacks and others were sporting. Since his family that is still back in New Zealand are such supporters of the rugby team, I thought I would try a ZIA inspired by Maori tattoos.  Hope you like it!

Brown micron on tan scrapbook paper using graphite pencil
and colored pencil to shade and white colored pencil
to highlight. This one was kind of fun!

So there it is, and I hope you enjoy. This really was much more difficult than I imagined it would be. And yes, I did go through some of the previous entries for inspiration....it helps me. So now I will have tomorrow and tonight to go through and comment on the submissions for this week.  If you haven't taken the time to look at all the wonderful submissions, then take a look and see the submissions for this week. You can see what's up over at the Diva's (CLICK HERE) and if you like a challenge, maybe you might consider joining in the fun. Have a great day and enjoy! 

Comments are always appreciated and make me happy.  Thank you!

Diva Challenge #242 ~ Gourdgeous!

Well, after Rick and Maria announced this tangle, I kept looking at it trying to decide what exactly I could do with it. To tell the truth, it honestly didn't look like something I would like to play with much. So I sat down and practiced and practiced and practiced ... and I still didn't really like it. So I played with it some more.  Here are a few of my trials with it ... they aren't bad, but it just didn't feel right to me.

Just one page of many that I tried of gourdgeous...I just
couldn't make it feel like it was mine!

So, I finally decided to just jump in and try something ... anything ... to see if I could truly like this tangle. I do love that it flows nicely (at least a few of them did). Hubby decided that they looked more like an onion until I showed him what it looked like when Maria drew it...lol. But I grabbed one of my small sketchpads and decided to see what I could do with the brown pen. It looked better to me and by the time I got it shaded and tinted, I really felt like this tangle and I could be friends.  Take a look below!

I like the way that this one turned out. I used an 005 and 01
sepia Micron, Prismacolor pencils, graphite pencil, and tried
a Tombow light grey marker for the first time. It actually does
look a bit better in person, since my camera is not a real
good one and I took the picture under flourescent light, not
daylight. But I am definitely please with this one.

I am happy that I actually managed to get this posted before midnight tonight, so now I hope to go back through all the submissions this week and leave some comments. I have looked at some of them and now I want to go and see the rest of them. 

Thank you for stopping by, and as always, any comments, feedback, criticism, or even just a "hi" is appreciated. If you want to see the rest of the submissions for the Diva's Challenge for this week, head on over to her blog (click here) and check out all the other artist's work. Perhaps you will join us soon and let us see what you do too *grin*  Thanks again for stopping.

Diva Challenge #241 ~ Stones and Ceremony

When I read that the challenge this week  had to do with stones, I remembered back to my childhood to a close friend that had a huge backyard, the back half of which was full or rocks and apple trees. We used to play with the rocks and stones for hours, making up new games and just appreciating how different they all were. This particular friend was very smart and was my first boyfriend (at age 5 no less!), so we had rock fairs in which he would decide what color and shapes we had to look for and then we would have a contest and he would award prizes. When it came to my turn to decide how we were going to play with the stones and rocks, we would make villages of stone and have all kinds of rock and stone builds set up. It was a glorious time and I never did outgrow my love for nature and stone builds. I love to take the stones in our backyard even now and try to pile them up to see if I can make something worthwhile. Not much stands anymore, but it was fun.

So when I read that guest blogger Paula Bramante wanted us to pay homage to stone cairns and ceremony, I thought of my little zen garden that I used to have at work and decided to try representing that. I'm not sure that it represented it all that well, but I quite like this piece and probably will end up framing it. This piece was originally started for something else, but I had set it aside in the hope that I would finish it at some other time. Well, it called to me to put my little zen garden inside the space in the center and I really kind of like the way it turned out.  Here it is!

"Zen Garden"
4" circular tile, black and sepia microns, graphite pencil,
light gray and light brown markers
Tangles used: Florz, Dragonair, Flux, Printemps, and
a few others I can't remember

As always, I appreciate you stopping by and visiting my blog and leaving comments if you are so inclined. I must apologize for my lack of comments posted to others' blogs lately, as I am having problems with my hands and can't really type real fast or very well lately. Please know that I have seen each and every submission that has been posted and they are ALL wonderfully done. If you haven't seen the other artists' work, check out the Diva's Blog and see all the beautiful work done for these challenges. Hope to be more interactive with all the blogs in the weeks to come. But know that I love ALL the work I have seen!

Diva Challenge #240 ~ Happy Fall

I'm a bit late posting this one...but Happy Belated Birthday Artoo! I actually did several versions of leaves to try to represent fall, but none of them managed to get finished. I kept having to stop because my hands were not liking the fall weather. Yes, we finally managed to get fall here and the temperatures have been beautiful....even the cats loved being outside. This is my oldest cat and he refused to pose for me, but at least it shows the beautiful colors that were outside on the grapevine that my neighbor so graciously grows alone my fence.

Mistoffellees enjoying the fall weather...
he's our 15 year old boy.

But I finally finished my tile and liked it so well that I decided to make it into a card to send my mother-in-law for this month's letter.  Hope you like it too!

Fall Card ~ October 2015

I used some die cuts that I had in my scrapbooking materials from a long time ago and traced them onto my tile. I used micron pens in both black and sepia to do the tangles and colors and then used some chalk for some the highlighting on the front pumpkin. Shading was done with graphite pencil for the most part. The shading around the edge of the leaves and pumpkins is done with a light gray marker. I then mounted the tile on a background piece of paper and cut a decorative edge on the corners before mounting it on a card. Then I just taped a couple of die cuts to the card to complete it. I had fun doing this one.

Thanks for stopping by and, as always, any and all comments are much appreciated. I'm afraid that I need to apologize for not leaving comments for the last few weeks. My hands have not been working well at all recently. I have actually seen all the submissions here, but I haven't been able to do a lot of writing lately. At any rate, I love seeing all the beautiful work that is being done here. 

If you want to see the other submissions, please head on over to the Diva's Place to see what is going on. Maybe you can join us there too.

I'm back! Diva Challenge #239 "Munchin Play"

Well, this long hiatus wasn't really planned or expected, but between computer problems, internet wireless issues, and hands and back not working, it's been since August that I have posted anything here or published anything in the Diva's challenge. I have been working on some tangling, but not as much as I would like since it was hurting to actually hold the pen. But I did keep up with the challenges and try many of them. I will be locating my drawings (scattered in a couple of rooms at the moment, but still accomplished) and uploading them a few at a time with my challenges. I think that the computer and internet problems shouldn't be bothering me again for at least a little while, so I just need to worry about the hands :)

Anyway, here is my white on black (except that it's midnight blue) tile and I was quite pleased with the way it turned out. I have a lot of scrapbooking cardstock from a previous life as a scrapbooker and card maker, so I have been using some of that stash for my Zentangle work. I had actually done a couple of munchin tiles that I really liked, but the other paper had too much texture to take a good picture. It was a light sepia tone with a leather texture and was beautiful with the sepia pen that I tangled with. If I can get hubby's scanner to work and it looks better, I'll post it next week. Anyway, I have talked too much already, so here is my challenge piece.

Munchin Play
3.5" Midnight Blue Tile, White Gelly Roll pen, and General
White Chalk Pencil
Tangles: Munchin, Flux, Zinger, Fescu, with Tipple

Challenge #233 ~ Zenith
3.5 Tile, Sepia and Black Micron pens, Spectrum Noir
Marker and Sepia Prismacolor Pencil for shading.
Tangles: Mooka, Zinger, Zenith

Challenge #235 ~ String Theory-Stripes
3.5" Tile, Black and Sepia microns, graphite for shading
Tangles: Phicops, Flux, Hybrid, and just something
I was playing with after reading one of Rick and
Maria's blogs about one of their trips

Stripes #2
3.5" Tile, Black Micron Pen, Graphite Pencil for
Shading
Tangles: Shattuck, Crescent Moon, and I'm not real
sure what is in the lower corner

And here is the last one for this week.  When I find some more that haven't been posted yet, I will add them as well

Challenge #234 ~ CanT
3.5" Tile, Black Micron pen, Blue Derwent Inktense pencil
Tangles: CanT, Maryhill, Paradox

Ok, that's it for me for this week, so hopefully the weather won't get too chilly (lol...it's been around 80F here for the last week - record setting warmth for us when I really wish it was fall) so that I can keep up with the challenges again.

I will likely spend the day tomorrow checking out all the other wonderful submissions to the challenge this week, so why don't you do the same if you haven't already and check it out at the Diva's Place and come join us one of these weeks. Any and all comments are welcome.  Tangle on!

Diva Challenge #231 ~ "Undulations"

This week has been a rather interesting week for us. The wildfires in the Western US have made the outside air almost intolerable to breathe. While there are no fires *yet* here in Utah that I have heard of, the fires in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, as well as California all seem to be blowing their smoke our way and it has been getting stuck in the valley where we live. Even the cats don't seem to want to go outside in this stuff. But the National Weather Service keeps telling us that it should be getting better soon. At least lets hope so. So as a consequence of all this horrible air (I have asthma), I have actually been inside most of the week and getting some things done in the house and garage.....I even managed to throw away some boxes of stuff that I don't need! AND I found some more of my beautiful paper stash. I was a stamper and scrapbooker before I discovered Zentangle and have tons of beautiful paper and art supplies. I am just starting to get back in to experimenting with some of my stuff and hope to post some of my experiments soon.  So I took some of this paper and cut it into tiles of various sizes to tangle on because I love the colors.

After reading the challenge this week on the Diva's blogspot, I was ready! Our guest blogger this week, Sharla Hicks, challenged us to use an old favorite undulating C or S curve tangle and work in a series OR find a new one and begin a new series.  I love all of the undulating curve, but never really worked with them much knowingly. But I just really like to use curvy, organic tangles, so I just chose  to let my pen take me where it would. I have been sketching all week, but I have a couple of tiles that I want to post now. I have several more in various stages of being finished and will post those as I finish them.  So here they are and I hope you like them!

3.5" tile, Micron pen Sepia, Black, white chalk
Inktense pencils

This one is a bit bigger, since I wanted to try working a bit bigger because I really like working with these fluid, undulating tangles. I'm not sure if I like this very well, but it turned out ok.

4" tile, Micron pen black, white chalk, graphite
pencil for shading

I hope you can check out all of the wonderful challenge pieces that have been shown this week and if you want to try one yourself, you can find it all at The Diva's blog for inspiration and beautiful pieces.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to get around to all of the blogs sometime in the next week or so. Have a beautiful day!

Diva Challenge #230 ~ ZenDivaDala (& I'm Late Again)

Yes, it's me and I'm late again as per usual. No excuses, just fingers wouldn't work and then I was having all kinds of problems doing a zendala using a template. Erin Olson of  The Bright Owl  fame has designed a zendala template for us for the challenge this week and provided us with a link to 3 different sizes to print off and play with. Well, I printed off all 3 sizes and decided on the standard tile size thinking that it would be the most comfortable format for me. I honestly did try several times to make something decent with this template, but I wasn't very pleased with either of the ones that I actually finished. But.....I will present them here for your perusal anyway.

This one was my first attempt and I swear that there really were tangles in those spaces that just look like messy lines (oh yes, my hands and fingers were not doing the greatest), but my hubby generously said that he really kinda liked this one. I would love to get him to try some of these because he is a painter of miniature wargaming figures and has probably the steadiest hand I have ever seen. But he really isn't interested :(.  Anyway, here it is.....

Media: 3.5" square paper, Micron Pen Black, and pencil
for shading

I like this second one a bit better, and I think I may actually try again some time in the near future to use a zendala template. My son liked this one much better too. And yes, I always ask them for their opinions since they usually offer me good advice.

Media: 3.5" square, Black and Sepia Micron pens,
Pencil for shading

I can tell I need a lot more practice on using templates.  Here is a zendala that I worked for quite awhile on that was just drawn as I went. I think it probably took me a good 12 hours when all was said and done and I haven't shaded it yet as I was waiting to make copies of it so I could decide whether or not I wanted to color it. I really like the detail in this one and even though it was fussy and meticulous, it was at the same time very relaxing for me to do.

Size:  6 x 6 inches, Micron black pen only

Even though this is not strictly zentangles, it IS a ZIA and I now have ink, so I can make copies and attempt to color it. Wish me luck....LOL

I also have some tiles that I finished up for some of the challenges that I missed, but this post has been going on long enough, I think and I am getting tired. I'll post them next week sometime.

As always, thank you for visiting my blog and any and all comments are always read and very much appreciated. I have been lax, I'm afraid, on getting comments posted on the submissions lately. I have been looking at all of the wonderful work being done and I will try to do better next week on leaving comments. If you want to take a look at all of the submissions to this challenge, just go to the I am the Diva blog (CLICK HERE) and check out all of the artists submissions. Once again, thank you for stopping by!

Diva Challenge # 229 ~ Negative Space (Sandy Hunter)

It's good to be back and able to do a bit of drawing again....feeling much better and learning to take it easy on my hands to be able to do a bit more. This weeks challenge came from 'Guest Diva' Sandy Hunter, CZT, a very accomplished tangler in my opinion. Her challenge was to shift the focus to the negative space in our tile. When I read the challenge, I was watching one of my most favorite operas . . . the 25th Anniversary Celebration of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Phantom of the Opera" from the Royal Albert Hall, so of course that influenced my piece.  I hope you like it as much as I enjoyed tangling it. I am planning to do another one, a bit larger to hang in the house because I liked it so well.

"The Phantom"
Media: 3.5" tile, Black and Sepia Micron, Pencil, White
Gelly Roll pen for highlights
Tangles: Putki, Meringue, Abundies, Tipple and
1 or 2 others that I don't recall

I may play with the shading on the negative space as well, but all in all, I quite like this and hope that you are too.  Thanks for checking out my submission this week and as always, any and all comments are welcomed. I have been watching all the submissions over the past few weeks, but haven't been able to leave comments because of very sore hands, but I will try my best to get comments out this week. I'm so glad to be back playing again!

If you want to play too, then check out all the submissions at the Diva's website (click here) and hope to see you all joining us there!

Diva Challenge #226 ~ Simplicity

This week Laura (the Diva) had a guest blogger while she takes a well deserved rest. Our hostess for this challenge was Katie Crommett, who has challenged us to simplify. In her words

Your first step is to breathe. Reconnect to the vital activity we do all day, keeping us alive, whether or not we’re aware of it. Place your hands on your paper or tile and take a minute or two with your eyes closed. (Really -- go ahead and close them. I'll still be here when you open them.) Now that your eyes are open, I'm going to give you simple directions/tips for the challenge, but take this where you feel you want to go. Keep your tangling space manageable. If you don't have an official Zentangle tile, you can cut a piece of paper into 3.5" x 3.5." Pick two or three tangles, at the maxium. After you draw each tangle, be conscious of when you've reached your point of "enoughness." White space is your friend. Or, even, it's more than a friend. And that's it. Simple.

So here is my somewhat late challenge tile and yes, it is difficult for me to make a "simple" tile.

Simplicity
Tangles used: Abundies, Murmylies
Media: 3.5" square, black micron, and pencil

I have a few more that I have been working on, but I wanted just to get this one up this week. Hopefully, I will be back and joining the challenges again very soon. In the meantime, please take a look at the Diva's website (CLICK HERE) to see what everyone did with this challenge. And, as usual, comments are always appreciated. Thank you :)

Diva Challenge #220 ~ UMT - All Boxed Up!

I'm a bit late getting my tile posted this week and I didn't even make it around to all the submissions last week, but I really did try. My hands were giving me fits again and typing just wasn't in the cards for me. This week has been not quite as bad, but it has taken me forever to get my tile done. But, I did actually look at all of the submissions last week and they were ALL beautiful. And, once again, thank you for your gracious and kind remarks on my blog. It's always to see that people are visiting here.

It's been another fairly hard week this week, not necessarily for my hands, although they have had their share of hurting, but mostly because my son is having a hard time. As those who have read here before know, he is an adult autistic who was only diagnosed recently. His birthday is coming up and the autism for him translates his excitement into debilitating anxiety. All the time he was growing up, I never understood why he was never excited by things that were coming up and the new doctor he is seeing has tried to explain to me that people that are autistic experience emotions differently than some people, so I have been trying to ease him out of the extreme anxiety this week. I did manage to get him to try drawing and he drew a very nicely done picture and asked me to show him how to do a little shading. He definitely has a talent for drawing, so I hope that I can get him to try it some more, because it did tend to relax him for the hour he sat here with me. Who knows, I may be able to get him to try a bit of tangling. Cross your fingers with me to hope it helps calm him down.

But drawing and tangling DO calm me down, so this week, we are to use a tangle selected by the Diva from submissions to her by tangle designers. This week, it was "All Boxed Up" by Alice Hendon, CZT. Step-outs can be found here  It's really a pretty tangle and even though I'm not a huge fan of straight lines, I found this very interesting to do. For some reason, after loads of practice drawings, I decided I wanted to draw it in a circle, and it actually looked pretty good, but then as I looked at it, I decided I would try a zendala (silly me!) I have been trying to do some of these because I think they look awesome. But I know that I tend to put way too much detail in things and I just know that I would overdo it. But that being said, I did it anyway. I like the way it turned out, although my hubby doesn't like the paper I did it on. I cut some of my stash of scrapbooking cardstock into a 5" x 5" square because I knew I wanted to make it bigger than a normal tile, partly because my hands are still hurting but at least it's bearable now.

So I hope you like my take on All Boxed Up this week.  I just designed the center and then in the first round used Maryhill, followed by two rounds of All Boxed Up and then finished up with just some random shapes. Enjoy!

Diva Challenge #220 - UMT "All Boxed Up"
Media: Scrapbook Cardstock 5" x 5", black Micron pen,
Sepia Micron Pen, Pencil for shading
Tangles: Maryhill, All Boxed Up, and various shapes

For those of you who haven't seen the rest of the submissions this week, please go check out the Diva's blog (click here) and see the awesome artwork this week on other blogs. This challenge is very well represented by lots of tanglers who do amazing work. If you find you have time, why not join us and share your work with us there. As always, I appreciate your visiting my blog and do appreciate any and all comments. Thank you for visiting!

Diva Challenge #219 ~ Straight Lines *EEK!!!*

EEEK!!! That's what I said when I read that the challenge this week was all about straight lines. I don't like straight lines, probably because I can't make mine very straight and I tend to try to be a perfectionist. So I have been trying hard to come up with something that I remotely like and I think I may have 1. This first one isn't it however.

Diva 219 - Tile 1

This one was the first one and definitely didn't work for me, especially after I tried to use a Spectrum Noir to add some shading. I had thought it was going to turn out pretty good, because I liked some of the tangles I was using, but in the end, I had to try again.  So here's attempt #2....

Diva 219 - Tile 2

This one didn't have the kind of *oomph* that I was looking for, so I just kind of haphazardly shaded it and called it done.  Strike two!

Diva 219 - Tile 3

Actually, I quite like this one and it is probably my actual submission...lol. Hubby thought it needed something else added to the background, my son and I thought that any more would ruin it, so I left it as is.

Diva 219 - Tile 4

This one turned out fairly nice, I think. I didn't want definite edges, so I tried to stipple the ends out to fade it, Not sure it turned out the way I envisioned it, but it is still pretty good. I may have to actually work on this one or redo it and shade it, but i kind of like it this way with only the minimal shading on the lines in the background.

So that's it for today, but I learned a lot about me and lines. I definitely prefer organic or curvy shapes, but there is a lot to be said for straight lines too. For one thing, after I got into the rhythm of drawing the lines, it was quite relaxing...something I never thought I would say about drawing straight lines. And also, it's not always necessary to fill all your space or shade everything. So I guess it was a good week.

Thank you all for your wonderful comments last week, they are much appreciated. There are so many wonderful artists here and I appreciate comments from all of you. There is so much to be learned from each other here and I'm glad I found this place on the web. Thank you for stopping by and all comments are very much welcomed. If you would like to see the other submissions for the challenge this week, stop by the Diva's place (click here) and check them out. Better yet, come and play with us and show your own artwork. Thanks again for stopping by :)

White on Black or Found.....Diva Challenge 218

First off, as always, thank you all so very much for your very kind comments. It means a lot to me to have people visit my blog. This is such a fabulous group to be involved with and I always learn something from everyone's posts.

So....this week, the Diva challenged us to use white on black tiles or tangle on a found object. I don't have any black tiles, but I "found" some black scrapbooking paper in my stash, so I guess it covers both criteria, right? I cut it into 3.5" squares and sat looking at it. I couldn't for the life of me get any kind of idea to gel in this thick skull of mine. So, I started to look through all my sketchpads and sketchbooks and half-baked tiles that were started and never finished (I have a LOT of those) and decided to try an idea that I was working on with a spiral design sort of.  The pen I used is the Sakura Gelly Roll and on the paper I was using, it was perfect as long as I didn't try to draw too fast. So this first one was an experiment and although I loved it, I had absolutely NO idea how to highlight this. Couldn't shade, because it already was a shade. So I left it as is. Here it is for your perusal....

 Although this isn't exactly a zentangle tile, I think it can qualify as a ZIA (Zentangled Inspired Artwork). I don't actually know if I used any actual tangles at all, since I just let my pen do the walking on this one and I just went along for the ride.








I decided that I had best try an actual Zentangle, so I thought about some simple tangles that might be

suitable for white on black. It seems to me that since the pen puts down a much thicker line, it would be much easier to use much less complicated tangles. So for this one, I used Ing, Fescu, Zinger, Flux, Mooka, Dragonair, Tipple, and Luv-A, as well as a quilting design that I liked called feathered clam. I only put one of those in there because it just seemed to fit in the space *grin*.





The highlights in this tile were made using a white Conte Pastel pencil and blending it with a very small tool that I actually don't know what it is called. I had these from years ago when I was using pastels to color in stamped images on cards that I was making. They are very tiny, but are almost like using a cotton swab to delicately blend the color. I like the way they worked out and this is a picture of the tools that I used.

So that's it for this week, but I think I really enjoyed working with the black and may have to try it some more. If you want to see what other people in this challenge did with this, just head on over the the Diva's website (click here) and check them out. It's a fun group of people and I always learn from them, so if you want to play with us, give it a try!

As always, comments are always appreciated and I am trying to check out the other blogs to see what has been done. It takes me forever to type some days due to arthritic fingers, so if I don't leave a comments, I will try to get to you next week.  Happy Tangling!

Diva Challenge #217 ~ Dex vs. Bunzo - 35?

The Diva had another challenging week, but still managed to get a challenge posted for us again. I don't know how she does it sometimes! Her youngest was again in the hospital but thankfully was out in time for Mother's Day so they could all have a great day. Her challenge this week is to do a duo-tangle using Dex and Bunzo only. The 35 comes from the fact that Dex has 3 letters and Bunzo has 5, which coincidentally makes it appear as 35, which is also how old the Diva is this week.  So, Laura, here is my Duo-tangle and Happy Birthday to you!

Challenge 217 - Dex and Bunzo
Media: 3.5" sq tile, Black Micron 01, pencil to shade
Tangles: Bunzo, Dex

This is the first time I have ever done Dex, but it is a fun gridded pattern to do, and Bunzo has always been one of my favorite tangles ever since I saw it the first time. So this isn't anything spectacular this time, but just a nice laid back little tangle that was very relaxing to do. Hope you like it!

Thank you all so very much for your wonderful comments last week....I do appreciate your comments and read them all every week. Happy Belated Mother's Day to everyone out there, be you a biological mom, a step mom, a dad acting as a mom, a furbaby mom, or anyone that just relates to loving having someone to take care of. 

If you are interested in joining our tangle adventures, just head over the the Diva's blog (click here) and check out all the wonderful artwork being shared. Who knows, maybe you will be inspired to join us! :)

As always, comments are always appreciated and I definitely appreciate your stopping by!

Diva Challenge #216 ~ UMT Brella

First off, thank you all again for your kind comments last week. They are always appreciated.

We had a pretty good week last week although it was a little tough on my son. He is on disability for many things, but had to go through a mandatory evaluation which is something we do periodically. This time he was extremely anxious about it because they didn't give him much notice about the appointment. The therapist he spoke with understood and apologized about the lack of notification for him, but also spent a good deal of time talking with him. My son suffers from depression, extreme anxiety and social phobias, as well as a lot of pain, due in part to an auto accident we were in. But he does well in helping here around home and I very much appreciate him. When the therapist was talking with him, she asked if he had ever had a definitive diagnosis for his Autism/Aspergers and we told her that both his therapist and doctor had said that he is most likely on the scale somewhere. Well, she got busy and got her evaluation tests out and FINALLY confirmed what we had assumed for a very long time - he is autistic. Now that he is 30 years old, it's good to have a firm diagnosis. And she thinks that if we can understand it and how to deal with it, it will lessen some of his other problems. So it was a very good week for us!

The Diva, Laura Harms, had a great week also in that her youngest is showing progress in being able to eat solid food. Congratulations to Laura on that highlight for her week. Little landmarks are so wonderful when we are trying to make progress. Her challenge this week was a UMT, as is normal for the first challenge of the month. This month our UMT is Brella by Bunny Wright and since Star Wars is a big deal in the Diva's household, she chose to use a Star Wars theme for Star Wars Day - "May the 4th be with you". We are pretty much geeks in this house too, although my son is by far the biggest geek in the house and so I attempted to do something Star Wars too. I actually had this done on Monday, but have been busy running errands until today, so I couldn't get a picture of it until now. I chose to do the Rebel Alliance sigil - I know, not very creative, but I really haven't been feeling very creative lately. It was very relaxing for me to do it though, so I guess it was mission accomplished.  See what you think...

May the 4th be with you!
Media: 3.5" x 3.5" tile, Black Micron pen, pencil
Tangles: Brella, StarMap

Very simple, but very enjoyable to do also.

As always, any and all comments are appreciated. If you would like to see the other submissions for this challenge, head on over the the Diva's place (click here) and check out all the awesome artwork there. Enjoy!

Labyrinths are Among Us~ Diva Challenge #215

First off, let me say that I'm sorry I didn't get around to all the blogs last week. My hands were giving me fits (arthritis and fibromyalgia) so I was basically staying away from the keyboard because it hurt to type, but I have peeked in to some from last week and I am going to be working on some of the challenges I have missed. That being said, let's move on to this week's challenge. When I woke up Monday and saw that the challenge was to draw a labyrinth, all I felt was sheer panic! To begin with, I had no idea what a bonafide labyrinth looked like, but the Diva helped us out there by sending us to a couple of websites. I looked at those and kind of got familiar with what a labyrinth should look like, but somehow I wanted something different. So...as my husband often says to me...I went into full research mode and spent a few days on Google and Google Images just looking around. Thank you, Diva, for such a challenge! I found out so much about labyrinths and the reasons for them, that it made it all so very interesting. Like she said in her post (paraphrasing here), mazes and labyrinths are not the same thing at all. I find after looking at everything, I definitely prefer labyrinths. I must have gone through all the scratch paper in the house trying to decide exactly how I wanted my labyrinth to look, but finally settled on a design that I absolutely love. This is what I would like a labyrinth to look like if I were able to build one in my back yard (I can't, my yard is barely wide enough for a picnic table).

Diva Challenge 215 ~ Labyrinth
Media:
4" x 4" tile, Micron (black and brown), pencil for
shading, green and blue watercolor pencils, white colored
pencil for highlighting and white gelly roll for orb dots
Tangles used:
Miander, Ovy tangellation, Flux, Fescu, Zinger (1)

When I started with the Miander on the path, I cursed myself for choosing that particular tangle and especially for making it so small, but I love the way it turned out and found that it was very relaxing to tangle it. In looking back at it, I find that the places that I was really in tune with the pen are the smallest design areas and the larger ones are more just trying to cover space. But I really do like the way it turned out. In fact, so much so that I will probably make another one and make it larger and frame it. Thank you once again, Laura, for your wonderful challenges!

If you would like to see the responses to this challenge and check out the Diva's blog for other challenges that she has issued, go to the Diva's Challenge blog (click here) and check it out.

And remember, any and all comments are welcomed and appreciated ... always!

Traced Objects!

Once again, thank you for all of your comments ... I am sure that everyone loves to read comments. For me, it's a confirmation that someone is actually looking at what I am doing. Just a little egocentric, I know, but it's all good. After all, how can we grow if people don't offer advice and comments?

This has been kind of a crazy week, what with the temperature here in Salt Lake around 70F on Sunday and snowing all day today. Must be because in the US, taxes are due today! It was a bit strange though, because we got more snow today than we got in all of January, February, and March of this year. But this has been a strange year and Salt Lake only got a little more than 3 inches of snow in those months and I woke up to about 5 inches of snow this morning. I really didn't mind since it meant that the wind finally calmed down. It broke one of my bird feeders and the birds were mad at me, I'm sure.  Anyway, here are the snow pictures, they are unbelievable to me!

But, on to our Diva's Challenge for this week. We were challenged to use a stencil, or trace around objects to form our string and tangle away! I have a big collection of wonderful stencils that are in a notebook *somewhere*, but of course they must be in the proverbial safe place because I couldn't find them anywhere. So I grabbed a few things around the house and used them. Here are the objects and the string I created:

Here are the objects I used ... my corner rounder, my bone folder, and a printer connection....

to come up with this string. This is the second string I created with these objects and they are in *approximately* the same place as the ones on my challenge piece since I forgot to take a picture before I started tangling. That's why the string on the right side looks wonky...I erased it to try to make it look like the original.

So now you know what the string looks like, here is the actual first tile. First off though, I must tell you that I quite often ask my son's opinion and he suggested adding color to this. I wasn't sure, but in the end I think it worked out beautifully. What do you think?

Diva Challenge #213~Traced Object String
Media: 3.5 x 3.5 tile, Black Micron Pen, Sepia Micron Pen,
Green Micron Pen, Red Micron Pen, Blue Micron Pen,
Yellow Creative Memories Pen, Brown Creative Memories
Pen (used for shading on Flux)
Tangles used: Flux, Farling, Akuras, PinBawl, Tipple

Thank you for bearing with my stories and thank you for taking a look at my blog. Since I have this second tile with a string already drawn, don't be surprised if I add another tile this week.

As always, please take a look at all the beautiful submissions over at the Diva's Place (click here) and if you are so inclined, join the fun there one of these first weeks. Thank you for any comments you may wish to make as I LOVE to read comments!

Diva Challenge #212 ~ UMT - Fanz

First of all, thank you for your kind comments on my challenge last week. They mean a lot to me and I appreciate them all.

And yet again, I am posting at a late date in the week ... it has been an off week here at home. Rather hectic with kids mostly. Just a case of taking far too long to get necessary things done and an upset son that was afraid that something had happened to us. Sometimes his autism makes him afraid of things going on and he had somewhat of a meltdown. Things are almost back to normal, so hopefully I can get my challenge posted earlier next week and also get some of my other other ZIAs posted. But I talk too much, so let's get on to the good stuff.....ZENTANGLE!

Our challenge this week was a UMT and our tangle to use was Fanz by Susan Goetter. It's a rather fun tangle, but I must admit that it took me a few nights to get the rhythm of the auras right, but I was rather pleased with it. I showed my tile to both hubby and son and they both had different ideas about which was was up, so I am presenting you here with both of them and you can decide for yourself.

This one is shown the way hubby likes it...says it reminds him of a tree of sorts. I guess I can see it, but he wasn't sure what the Narwal were then...lol

This one is shown the way my son likes it...says it reminds him of Willy Wonka's chocolate waterfall and the chocolate river with candies all around.








I just think it's fun and I didn't have any idea of where the pen would take me.  What is your favorite?

The tangles I used are Fanz, Narwal, Nipa, and Printemps with a bit of tipple here and there as well. Anyway, it was a fun one for me and I think I'm going to have to play with Fanz a bit more. It looks like loads of fun.

There are more interpretations of the challenge over at the Diva's website (click here), so go take a look and maybe you will join in the fun! Thank you for visiting my blog and comments are always welcomed and appreciated.

Diva Challenge #211 ~ Flux

Well, this week, the Diva was unable to post her challenge as her youngest son is not doing well and was in the hospital. So we thought that there was no challenge this week.....however, Rick and Maria posted step-outs for Flux, which is one of their original tangles and they realized that they had never taught it with step-outs for us yet. Flux has always been one of my favorite tangles, so imagine my surprise when I found out there are 2 versions of it. I had only known of the version that Rick uses, but apparently the one that Maria did was first and I had never known that. I guess probably because I don't know a CZT yet, so I just watch the internet. Anyway, it is definitely one of my favorites and so I did one today (April 2, 2015) on a blue tile for my son. Today is World Autism Day and the color representing that is blue, so this one is for him. After I took this picture, I added some white highlighting to it, so I will take another picture tomorrow and post it as well.  Hope you like it!

World Autism Day - Apr 2, 2015
Media: 3.5" x 3.5" blue tile, Black Micron, Blue Micron
Blue Derwent Watercolour Pencil
Tangles: Flux (both versions), Uni, Printemps, Pearls,
PinBawl, and Florz

Same tile with white highlights added....better picture too :)

Thank you for stopping by and if you want to see the rest of the submissions, go to the Diva's Challenge Page (click here) to see the beautiful work done.

Diva Challenge #210~Spiralstring - That's the Thing!

Once again, thank you for your comments, it is much appreciated.

Sketchbook Spiralstring
Tangles: Flux, Printemps, Tipple, Bunzo, Cruffle, Fescu

Our Diva challenge this week was to use a spiral for our string and tangle away! I never realized just how difficult that would be; it's very definitely a challenge. I wasn't at all sure how to go about it, so I did this first one in one of my sketchbooks to see if I actually could do a spiral string. It's not too bad, but I could see where some changes needed to be made, and I decided to post my first one.

Challenge #210 ~Spiralstring
Media: Micron Pens - Black, Brown, Sepia, Pencil, and Dove Blender
Tangles Used: Flux, Printemps, Cruffle, Fescu

I liked the way this looked, but I really wanted it on a normal tile, so here is my official offering. I do like the way it turned out. Unfortunately, there is also a kitty hair or two on here too...lol. They manage to get into everything! But I love them anyway....

Diva Challenge #210~Spiralstring
Media: Tile, Black Micron Pen, Pencil, Green Watercolor Pencil
Monotangle: Amphora

This one was a practice of Amphora, which is a new to me tangle and I thought it might look good as a spiral...what do you think?

So my blog entry is short and sweet tonight, but late as usual. I really am going to have to get my pictures taken earlier so I can get my post up sooner.  But I always seem to manage to get them up on Friday or Saturday. *shrug* Go figure...lol.

Well, I hope to go check out a few more of the challenge pieces...I cheated this week and looked at a lot of them before I got mine posted. And checked out some of the previous year's entries as well. There is just so much talent out there. If you want to check out some of the beautiful work done for this challenge, head on over to the Diva's place (CLICK HERE) and if you are so inclined, come and play with us and show yours off too.  As always, comments are highly appreciated. Thank you for looking.

Diva Challenge #209 ~ Green it Up!

Well, here it is almost the end of the week ... again. I really have had this done for a couple of days, but was running here and there and when I had time to take pictures, it was after dark and the pictures really don't come out well, so I managed to take pictures this morning BEFORE I started wandering thither and yon.  Anyway, this week's challenge at the DIVA'S PLACE was to green it up for both Spring being on it's way and of course, St. Patty's Day. I only managed to do one green piece this week, but it was kind of a busy one and my hands weren't working for a couple of them too, so I basically took it easy.

 But first, I want to introduce you to our oldest kitty, Mistoffellees, but we call him Puppy Cat usually.  He turned 15 on Sunday and he is a pretty special old boy. We got him at about 6 months of age, back in October of 2000 because the people that had him had just had a baby and the baby was terribly allergic to the cat. That's what his name was....Cat. Anyway, I brought him home and we named him after Magical Mister Mistoffellees from the musical "Cats", because it just seemed to fit. He got the name Puppy Cat because he is really a big cat, at his highest weight, he was about 20 pounds, but his tail is about the size around of a lab's tail. And he is polydactal on ALL of his paws. All in all, he has 24 toes and 25 claws. When I watch him now, I often wonder at how much it must have hurt him to walk, because some of his toes are bent under under his regular ones.  Anyway, here's to my Puppy Cat...Happy Birthday Mistoffellees!

This is Puppy Cat posing happily on his birthday  for me.  I love his "eyeliner" around his eyes. This boy is a beautiful tuxedo kitty 

Here's a closeup of one of his front paws showing his multitude of toes and claws. He is such a sweetie! 

But that was at the first of the week, and I was playing with a bit of tangling, so here's a couple I finished before I went to work on the challenge.

 I had actually finished this tile mostly at our local group meeting of the Intermountain Tanglers, which David Hunter and Heidi Sue started here in the Salt Lake area. One of our members had brought some hand dyed paper tiles for us to play with and I had never done the tangle Niuroda before, so I played with it at our meeting. David scanned the tile but it looked differently than this on our group website. I brought it home and decided that it wasn't finished, so I added a bit to it and now I DO consider it done. It reminds me of a jellyfish but now I really do like the tangle. I'll have to play more.






I decided that I should get used to using strings because I very rarely use them and chose one to play with. I like the way it turned out and so I shaded it. But when I got finished shading it, I didn't like the effect, so I had just found my Dove Blender that I used to use with my colored pencils with my rubber stamping and used it over the pencil shading and loved the way it smoothed out the shading. What do you think?

Going Green
Media:  3.5" x 3.5" tile, Black Micron 01, Various Green Derwent
Watercolor Pencils, and Water, Gold Pitt Pen
Tangles: Shattuck, Hybred, Mooka, Wud, Sh'rock

..... and Finally...here is my challenge piece for this week. I am guessing that my wee little lephrecaun lost his hat in the Sh'rocks and Mookas, and must have turned a couple of the rocks into gold.  If you hurry, maybe you will find them before he comes back to collect them!  Happy tangling all!




And it you want to see all the rest of the challenge pieces for this week, just head to the Diva's blog (click here) and see what everyone had to offer. Would love to hear comments, as always, since feedback is always good and helps me grow!