String 021

Tangle Patterns' string challenge this week - can not believe we are at number 21! And I've done every one so far - that's a minor miracle all by itself :).

Here's the string we started with. Pretend it is upside down and what I drew will make more sense :). String provided by Sue Zanker. There is still time for you to head over to Tangle Patterns and post a string tangle of your own.

Under the Sea

I got some new stencils in the mail yesterday - from Dream Weaver. I figured I'd play around with them for awhile. I took a watercolor notebook and slapped around some paint in greens, purples, and blues. They had a bit of metallic in them - cause I like shiny!

Then I took four of the stencils and traced them on top of the dry paint. Totally sacrificed a pen doing this.

Next, I tangled a few patterns into the stenciled areas. Then I added some seaweed, flowing plants, and amoeba-stuff. So "sea" like :). When I uploaded this above picture onto the computer, I noticed what looks like a shark in the upper left corner. Totally unplanned. The only thing I intentionally added was the small black line to designate a mouth.

So much fun! I tried out some new patterns. I always think featherfall looks sloppy, but that's pretty much the way it is detailed out in the drawing steps. I also used: finery, hybrid, heron, fescu, shattuck, tearse, waves, squid, and beadlines. 


I may come back to this tomorrow and add some bubbles - something I meant to do. I've been following the national championship speech and debate breaks today - in the NCFCA, a Christian homeschool league that my daughter competed in for several years. I got so tied up with breaks to semi-finals. I worked on this in between checking the computer for the hundredth time!!! and forgot the bubbles. Tomorrow!

Tangle Patterns' String #3

At Linda Farmer's Tangle Patterns we are doing a weekly challenge :). She provides a string and asks us to tangle them as we wish. The string this week (above) was provided by Anne Marks.

I had this watercolored tile left over from our trip last week and decided to use it. I found that it was really hard to transfer a pattern over to a painted tile - I used the pencil technique that The Bright Owl taught me. Didn't work well. I guess the tile was too squishy from the paint, so I free-handed it.


Patterns I used are: crescent moon, chard, caviar, hybrid, shattuck, waves, organza, warped eggs, up and across, zedbra, vache, baton, betweed, and beadlines. Yes, it is a busy tile, but I think it works and flows well together - and I learned some new patterns. Thanks, Linda and Anne, for a fun string!

Diva Challenge #68: the Duo-Tangle

Each week, the Diva gives us a challenge and sends us to work! This week's challenge was to make a duo-tangle, using the patterns Strircles and Hybrid only. No other patterns, just these two. I started with a zendala - kind of liking these now. Now that I'm not afraid of them anymore! (Thank you, Erin!) It kind of reminds me of this huge star with a lot of little moons circling it! Haha!

Then I pulled out a square zentangle tile and drew this. (I forgot to shade, so I added the shading in photoshop just before I posted this.) The strircle pattern is just determined to remind me of the solar system! I think I'll keep working with this idea of the two patterns. I'm still new at this - I'd like to rev it up and get more detailed and intricate. Coming up with the ideas is the hard part for me! I keep looking online, and studying other artist's work, hopefully the ideas will start coming :). Please visit the Diva's page here to check out the other tiles, and even consider posting one of your own!