Moebius Syndrome Awareness With the Diva, #300

 It's week 300 with the Diva Challenge!

And a special achievement requires some

special recognition!

Laura's cutie pie little son Artoo is a

champion and survivor with

Moebius Syndrome. 

Extremely rare, 

Moebius affects the cranial nerves

and is present at birth.

It has been a joy watching Artoo

and his brother Chewie grow up.

Artoo is part of our zentangle family

and we salute him this week!

Sending him and the family loads of hugs

and well wishes and love!

To check out all the Moebius art,

click this link.

Mickey Tangling

This past week I spent some time in

a hotel room in Florida.

I had taken this thank you card with me,

thinking I would tangle it.

Each time I spend a few days in a Disney

World resort, they send me a

thank you card

with Mickey sketched on it in blue.

I figured it was perfect for drawing on!

When I posted my tangled Mickey in my Facebook group Zentangle All Around, I had a couple people ask me to make a template, so here it is - a Mickey template. It's ready for you to tangle. Have fun!

A String Symphony #10

 String #10?, you say.

And today's the 28th?, you say. 

Yes, I am abysmally behind. Nothing new there. But the beauty that I built into this String Symphony is simply this - you can NOT be behind. Work on whichever day you wish, whenever you wish, just keep tangling along when you have the time.
The thought is by me providing one string for each day of the year, at the end of 2016 we will have 366 lovely pieces of art. AND if we keep them in a binder, or a journal,  or a file box  - we will be able to travel through a progression of our tangleabilities  and watch our style and capabilities expand  as we simply relaxed each day and let the zen part of zentangle occur.
Want to join us? Easy peasy. Head on over here to Zentangle All Around, send me a join request, and get started.

Diagonal²

Today in Maine it is supposed to be a high of 14 degrees, with a low of 9. Snow is imminent, if not already happening. If you follow my Facebook page, know that there will definitely be snow shots showing up there and on instagram. For sure. Hahaha!
This ATC was colored with brusho color crystals, I love those!  They work so well! That grid pattern is called Diagonal². I put this tangle together for a showcase on Facebook. I will release a step out for it soon.

Tangling With Mickey

One of our recent stack and tangle prompts was to use found papers.  To find a paper that you could tangle on and turn into a piece of art. 
It just so happens I checked into a Disney World resort that day and had a packet of information available to me.  I found this sheet of paper,  a bit water-rimmed and stained from someone before me's drink. Shame on you, housekeeping, for leaving me someone else's coaster as part of my introduction to Disney World. Anyway, I liked this sheet of stained paper because of the photo that was on it - Mickey and some awesome cast members. The rest of the page had information about staff and safety tips. 
I divided my drawing area into segments,  then started filling them in with tangles. I did a little shading - which didn't work well on this slick paper -  and called it done.
Tangling with Mickey. Apropos title, I think. 

Floral Step Outs, A New Tangle

Here are step outs to another tangle I've been drawing for a couple years.

I've just named it Floral.

No fancy name. 

Floral is super easy to draw. I've used it many times! Either the full flower as you see it here. Or . . . 

. . . a half flower like you see here.

Using color will change the way it looks.

I imagine it will look like different flowers depending on the colors you use.

I am not really up on my flower nomenclature.

Hehehehehe!

Regardless how you tangle it,

regardless what color you make it, 

Floral looks spring-y and summery! 

Feel free to pin the step outs. 

I would love to see what you draw with Floral!

I just realized those steps in the first drawing are a bit tiny. Hahaha! You can see these better!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms,  all the wish-they-were-moms, all the other-moms, all the soon-to-be moms, and all the dads acting as moms. It's your day to celebrate the joy that only a mom knows. To celebrate family. To celebrate that special love. To celebrate you. Cause you, Mom, are worth it!

Faith

One more example of stacked, tangled, and lettered. I used another scrap of scrapbook paper to tangle this on. I really like the pink flower pops showing through the tangle design. An excellent use for all those bits of scrapbook paper I never use anymore. Love it! And the words - speak for themselves.

Test Driving My Wall Book

 My friend Jane gave our art journal group the challenge of stacking.

Stacking tangles,

stacking text,

stacking text and tangles,

stacking colors with any of the above.

Jane showed some examples of stacking,

and in a couple pictures she showed drawings she had made in her wall book.

I thought, I have a wall book that I rarely use.

So I pulled it out and tangled the stacks you see above

 in the page on the right.

It started out as a blank brick wall. 

(This is an actual two-page spread in the book.)

 I started at the bottom and worked my way up.

I love the way it turned out.

Looks like that art could be real graffiti.

(Fourth tangle up from the bottom,

is one I made up for this page.

I'm calling it Box It Up.

I'll post step-outs for it in tomorrow's post.)

In case you wondered, and even if you didn't, hahaha!

from the bottom up, the tangles are:

shattuck, copada, curlz (one I came up with at CZT training,) 

box it up, variation of crescent moon, flying geese, rain, 

curvy variation of shattuck, twing, laced, and footlites.

Here is the wall book, which I have been calling by the 

wrong name for the past couple weeks! 

I got mine at Amazon,

(I mean, really, is there any where else?)

Walls Notebook by Sherwood Forlee.

 I enjoyed that stacking stuff so much I decided to do a second page. 

I decided to go with graffiti circles and tangles that draw the eye to that post rising from top to bottom of the page.

And here is the completed page. 
Tangles from bottom to top: shattuck (yes, I love this one,) puf, shattuck  (see what I mean?), rain, box it up, and flying geese again.
And remember, anywhere you see pink words, that means it's a link.  Click on it and you will be taken to step-outs for that tangle. Cause pink = link. In every picture I draw, I include my chop. My signature. At least I try to. You see it just under this post. My initials with the leaf - for The Creator's Leaf. I don't always date the drawing - on the drawing itself - it's usually on the back. For this page, though, I included it on the front. Can you find it? And my chop? (It's kind of obvious.)
P.S. ~ time for you to try out this whole stacking thing. No rules, except you pile it up. Words, tangles, colors, elements. Whatever media you want to use. It's stacking time!

Accent on the Pink

I love the accents made with the pinks! I could be all about the pink! Or teal, or purple, depending on what day of the week it is.

I am getting ready for another ATC swap. The theme for this one is black with one accent color. Of course, I chose pink to be my accent color.

Once again, I drew this on a sheet of 11" x 14" Bristol smooth surface paper from Strathmore. For the pink accents, I used At You Spica Pens (2 shades of pink), a pink copic marker, and some pink watercolor.

I really love the colors! Lower left you see the tangle Sindoo by Sharon Robinson, England. That strip on the lower right is Ragz from CZT Christina Vandervlist. That long skinny one with the openings is Beanpodz from Neil Burley. I love the spiral in the middle - that's my favorite part!

Sliding across from lower left to upper right is Liberty 100 from ~ once again ~ Neil Burley. Mix in a little Kuke from Katy Abbott, some zander, some bunzo,  a variation of tagh, and something I totally made up - those circle thingies. 

I love finery! It is one of the 'official' zentangle® patterns. 

At the top right is Stella, I don't think the step-outs of that one's been released yet. Then I tried a little Undling (yes! it worked), which is Susie Achter's new tangle. In the middle are those cute little circles I made up, along with Sandy Hunter's Cruffle. I think the two work pretty well together!

Yes, I really do like these two together! Anyway, these are some closeups of the detail work! I cut this sheet down into 16 ATCs that I will mail out to sixteen different people in the new swap that starts on the 1st!

I am really having a ball drawing large scale this way! Next up? A 53-deck of card ATCs for a swap amongst the CZTs. I can not wait!

Trying to Find the Groove

Yesterday I showed you the start of this 11" x 14" piece I'm working on. This is destined to be cut down into fifteen separate ATCs for a swap I am participating in. In this one view you can see three brand new tangles - merryweather, stella, and crezn't. These pink links will take you to step-outs for two of those. Stella hasn't been released (I don't think). It is the pretty poinsettia looking flower in the center. 

This bold band across the middle is something I made up. I was trying to draw Caren Mlot's new tangle spokes and got lost in the first two steps. It isn't a hard tangle, I just wasn't paying attention. So I just kept drawing and that dark band from lower left to upper right is what I came up with. You can also see some printemps, Sandy Hunter's cruffle, cirquital, Sandy Bartholomew's msst, Jane MacKugler's henna drum, knase, and a few random other tangles. 

In this photo you see more of merryweather and crezn't. The fan shaped tangle near the top right is called S Wich Blade and it's by Carol Ottaway. She's an awesome artist, you should check out her blog here.  That dark wavy line and circle tangle is beanpodz from Neil Burley. A little footlites, more stella, a little munchin, and a variation of rain. 

I hope to finish this up today.  Still having some issues today with creativity, but trying to push through. Trying to find my groove once more. Thank you to everyone who sent me warm wishes and encouraging words, and thank you to those who offered to pray for me. You are loved and appreciated!

Flying Geese

I sat up a long time last night working on this tile. I wanted to use the simple Z shaped string that Zentangle uses and see if I could still make it work. I love that whole little squadron of flying geese there in the blue section. This tile was looking pretty good until I painted on some cheap watercolor paint from the kids row at the grocery store - cause that's what I have here 800 miles from home. I didn't do it any favors by trying to go over lines with a pen, but I thought I'd post it anyway. Sometimes you just have to take the chance and post your no-so-fabulous work, too. It helps keep you humble :) haha!

Posting From Kali's

I am up north visiting Kali. I had planned to be working on a book project during this trip, but the book deal fell through. So I am kind of at a loss for what I should be working on. Some of the CZTs are getting ready for a postcard swap, so that's what I'm working on now. No more than three tangles allowed, black and white, the only color we can use is by pencil or micron. I used Derwent Graphitint Pencils for the color you see in these two.

This card was fun. These are two of my own patterns: Blox and Harlequin. You can see the step out for blox by clicking on 'My Patterns' at the top of this page. On to more postcards. I have something like 16 more to make! That should keep me busy for a day or two :).

Diva Challenge #78 - Auraknot

This week's Diva Challenge was to practice, and get familiar, with Zentangle's new pattern - Auraknot. I watched the video you can see here.  It made perfect sense. Then I picked up a pen and tile and went to work. Let me tell you I was so confused. I did mark my first point like Maria suggested, and that is the only way I was able to complete the above tile.

As I looked at it, I realized it was hard to tell where the auraknot was - because of all the 'aura's I drew around it, so I went over the basic outline with a thicker pen.

Not totally happy with my results, so I did another. I think I like this one better. 

Then, I decided to add a triangle into the background like they show on the video clip. I like this and I probably should have stopped here . . .

. . . but I'd been wanting to try something with pencils that didn't involve water. I like the way this looks - at this stage. 

Overall I am OK with my first attempt with auraknot. Truthfully, I got better results than I thought I was going to get - hahaha! It is a bit intimidating, but oh so beautiful when done right. 

To see everyone's auraknots, please visit the Diva's page here.