Getting Ready for an Advanced Class on Zentangle

Ing, Yew Dee-Well, Zander, Purk, Indy-rella, Bumper

I admit that I am head over heels in love with Renaissance tiles.  They are my FIRST choice when I go to do a tile now.  

I am putting together a resource of as many different tangles now that I can that look "swell" on this color tile with using the brown pen and the white charcoal accents.  

As you can see from the "sidebar" I am teaching an Advanced class on October 10th in the Lake Geneva area and I want to have my "ducks in a row" for that class.  

Needing a title for my painting!

8 x 10 Mixed media on canvas

I posted this en plein air painting a few weeks ago on a white background and asked my blogging friends for suggestions as to whether to leave the background stark white or paint in a background.

The vote came out heavily in favor of a dark background. I didn't want to lose the nice ground shadow, however, so I compromised.  A little white remains.  It's not signed yet, but I think it might be done.  

Does anyone have a title for me?

Diva Challenge: Striping

Krinkle, Brabs, Coaster, Hearts Divdided, Knightsbridge

Okay…always time for a few little stripes.

Laura is posting on FB that she is doing birch bowls.

How this woman finds time to sleep is way way beyond me.  And everything she does is pretty awesome too!  Runs the challenge, is wife and mother of two busy little boys, AND makes birch bowls…it's amazing.

I am prepping for teaching a big Zentangle group on Sept 3 (see side bar).  I have 17 signed up for the class.  Whew.  Lots of materials to get ready!!!  The Rhinelander class looks like a "go" too on September 15th although I do have more space in that class!

Cool front just hit the north woods again…back to autumn.  We are rolling into our last month now with so so many things on the September calendar. 

We are beginning to plan our fall trip east and south now thinking of dates and stop over points.  We take like 3 weeks from start to finish because we just like to sight see and play along the way.  Have a good week everyone…we are headed to Labor Day weekend already!!!

Calendar Catch Up

Been trying to  keep up as usual.  Even a day ahead…but then I get busy and a day or two slips away.  Still I am keeping up.  

One tangle as no name as I have not found the name for it yet.  Someone posted it new and then after I copied it I realized if the name was given, I'd forgotten to write it down.  Darn.  Hopefully when I post it to the CZT FB page someone will recognize it.

I am LOVING "Trio".  What do you think Roberta?  Would you like to learn that one?  It as so many possibilities and I think could work on Renaissance Tiles too.  B'Dylan does not follow the rule of not looking like something.  But there are a number of organic tangles that are floral like "cat-kin" and they are still considered okay.  So we sort of have a thin line we cross back and forth over for that.  

The gold one in the last square was watercolored before tangled.  Note Helen loves to use "screws" on her tangles.  Can you find them?  

Zentangle Challenge: Water

Mooka and Yew-Dee Well

Water is our theme for the week and this is by far one of the wackiest interpretations of the theme I've probably ever done.  One of those "let it just happen" tiles.  

I love Yew-Dee Well and I use it often and I thought of it as "wave action" when I started but like a true Zentangle had NO idea where I was going with it.  It just seemed to wave up and spill over at the top.

Where Mooka came from I have no idea.  But it sure is getting wet.  I think of Mooka as organic plant-like tangle.  

I wanted to do this challenge without resorting to color…I am guessing there will be a ton of blue and green tiles this week.

However this might look better with some colored pencil. I may reconsider.   

Wildly Diversify

Box cover (Kraft box) about 6 x 8" with sliding drawer
black and brown ink, white charcoal

iPad cover (gray rubber) done with black Identi-Pen by Sakura

earrings (wood) and ceramic cat pin

We've had company at the north woods cabin over the last week…but now and again, things would quiet down and the kids would all go out fishing and I'd have a few moments to slip into the studio.  Skies have been gray 4 out of 5 days (although not as cold as usual) and so sunning on the deck was only available one day last week.

CZT friends on Facebook have been talking about crazy things like doing Zentangle on your iPad cover. 

And I began to wonder why THAT had never occurred to me.  (Any flat surface is vulnerable.)

But wow, was that a difficult surface to master…that rubbery finish did not take kindly to ink.  Identi-pens are a permanent ink with a thicker nub on it and that was about the only pen that would work.  I tried a little shading with a Pentel gray brush pen which turned out to be the only "gray" pen I possess here. It was only moderately successful.  I think up on the top I may do some lettering later. 

The kraft type box was a gift at CZT training and actually contained a sketchbook.  But everyone there liked the box too and Molly Hollibaugh (Maria's daughter) gave us some examples of how she tangled her box and we were all consumed with trying it too.  Despite the empty space on the box, I think I am done.  Space is good when tangles are complicated.

And the jewelry is just 25 cent garage sale jewelry I picked up at a garage sale recently.  I painted them all with black gesso and then tangled with white jellyroll pen.  I will give them all a light spray of matt  acrylic and then probably the jewelry will get a gloss coat of gel on top of that.  

After all the company takes off on the 24th of August I hope to settle down and prep for several Zentangle classes I have coming up.  Hubby and I are now beginning to make our travel plans for the southern trip.  We plan a week in southern WI before we actually start the major trek east and south.  Seems like we just got the cabin open and now we have to think about closing.  ARRRGH.  

Zentangle Calendar for up to Aug 18

Some painting fun

6 x 8 Watercolor on Strathmore CP wc paper

Art Exhibit at Howard Young Hospital August - Oct 1

Just to prove I do some things besides Zentangle now and then!

These are wall watercolors.  

The ones in the exhibit are wc on canvas.

The abstract is collage and acrylic.  

The story on the little bunch of flowers is that the jar is an old original cottage cheese container from the Lockwood Dairy in Plainfield, Il.  The nice jars have been carried around from move to move since the dairy closed as memories of the old dairy and farm life.  Imagine cottage cheese in a glass jar?  

The words on the jars say:

Contents

12 oz liquid

Lockwood Dairy

Plainfield, IL

The little bouquets were door prizes at the church pot luck last night and I painted the painting to give to Mr. Lockwood as a memento of the jars.  

Diva's Challenge: MacDee

A blanket is just what MacDee looks like to me.  And here in the north woods on August 13th we had the first mention of the "f" word on the weather last night.  Yes, that is right "FROST" 

Temps in Land o Lakes, WI just 1 hour north of us were down to 42 already at 10 pm news time.  Yikes.

I slept in to after 7 this morning and it was bout 48 degrees when I woke up…so I don't know if WE had frost or not here in Lac du Flambeau…but temps are supposed to start moderating for the week…a bit anyway.  

But anyway, drawing MacDee inspired a blanket for sure!!!!  This is pretty early for frost here although we often have warnings before Labor Day and that is like 3 weeks away.  I am in total denial of the end of summer.  Yet all the grandkids are getting ready for school again, starting football practice and sports teams again, and we do have some color starting in the trees up here.  Like my hubby says…4th of July is summer and then we get autumn.  ARRRGH.

Ballace is way complicated but in a way it has a sort of delightful lace-like look.  This is a "variation" of the main tangle, of course.  

I am baking a cake for the church pot luck tonight.  Great day for baking.  The sun is shining and by noon it was up to 60.  Still brisk but pretty.  

Zentangle Calendar…coming to a close on month Nine.

It's been quite a ride Jan 1 to August 12 without missing by more than a day or two and then catching up again.  Discipline?  Habit?  Daily meditation?  

My one regret is that Carole Ohl has stopped posting on her blog Open Seeds (she created this calendar) and I know I am not alone in missing her.

Margaret says that Carole is busy with her Bead Store and I did look at that web site.  I am not much into beads so that wasn't so interesting to me.  Anyway, no one seems to be communicating with Carole.  I leave messages and comments for her here and there to let her know how much her Zentangle friends miss her.  

Incidentally my Sept 3 class is FULL (see side bar) and I am starting a wait list for that and encouraging folks to consider the Rhinelander class Sept 15 instead.  It may not be as "convenient" for some folks from this area.  But it's a nice shopping town and people could combine lunch and shopping with the class!  We'll see.  

ps it took some time to figure out the variation on Fiore on Aug 12th calendar above…but it is kind of cool once you get the hang of it.  

Illuminated Letter "D"

Onamato and Printemps

Just a little fun for another grandson's birthday card  whose name begins with "D".  The paint is Twinkling H2o which has iridescent qualities.  It's done on a 4 x 6 greeting card.  

Diva's Challenge: Bijou

Facade

The Diva's Challenge is to do a Bijou tile for this week.  Since I was at CZT15 with Laura in June…I've been tangling Bijou all summer!!!  Just have fallen in love with them.  (I had NO idea she had interviewed him, however!)  

I am presenting this one on top of a Bijou  "presentation folder" which is folded according to the book All Tangled Up by Cherryl Moote.  You have to change the measurements slightly for this tile.  If you follow my blog you will see more samples of the folder on previous blog posts.  This one done with deli paper painted on a gelli plate.  

"Tile Folders": Presentation Booklets for Bijou

Because I have a very slow server in the north woods of WI I could not download Cherryl Moote's free e-directions for her folder for Bijou.  BUT I already owned Cherryl's wonderful book called All Tangled Up and so I just "did the math" myself.  She had the folder all done up for ATCs and for 3.5" tiles.  I just fiddled around and came up with 6.75 x 8.75" paper and it seems to work pretty well.  

I love doing them because the paper size is so convenient…a piece of scrapbooking paper or wrapping paper or whatever works well.  In the top two I used regular computer printer paper that I had designed with a mono print on my Gelli plate printing. (AH another use for my gelli prints).  The last one is a sheet of music from an old music book I got at a garage sale.  And you could surely do tangles on the folders too.  

If you google Cherryl's name you'll come up with her website and you can get more info on how to get her great books on paper folding!  She's THE best.  I got to meet her and get a lesson at the April event in Florida called Retreat to Paradise.  

If you are a CZT you could give each participant a sheet of paper and have them fold their own presentation folder in about 5 minutes!  

Painting Paper for Collage

11 x 14 canvas on board: background collage

Making our own acrylic painted papers (see below)

Barb McFarland's collage example

I am not new to painting my own papers in collage work.  Since I took Elizabeth Nelson's workshop in Florida some time ago…I have been playing with that a lot.  I also use Gelli plate mono printing and lots of patterning.  Then I store the papers by color in big bags.  But Barb McFarland does her in a slightly different way. 

She starts with large sheets of white tissue paper and big 30# plastic garbage bags which she lays down on a table.  The tissue paper is Hallmark brand.  But almost any kind will work.  Some folks got theirs at the Dollar Store.  This is just the kind you wrap presents with.  Then she wets it down with water (it just about disappears at this point) and then she gently paints the papers with a hake brush or other soft brush with thinned acrylic (soft or fluid) in several colors blending then.  Unbelievably the paper holds together if you are careful. 

Then we put our paper/pastic in the sunshine to dry for an hour.  After that (see second photo) we just peeled the paper off the plastic.  It's amazing…the side facing the plastic is shiny like the plastic and the front side is a mat finish.  Very sturdy actually.  You can cut or tear this into shapes for collage.  

My mostly green background at the top will be a "bird house" theme.  Barb's at the bottom is a "Raven" theme.  She is drawing on the the background with watercolor pencil.  She also likes to use watercolor crayon.   

Keeping Up with my Calendar!

Oops…am still a day behind.  
Uh oh.  

Having a little fun with Zentangle...

Marasu

Making birthday cards for my grandkids and keeping them fresh is a challenge (I have 12 grands from 7 to 24 years old!).  MOST of them were born in the summer and I seem to be making cards every week!

Trying to have some "fun" with a teenager is a REAL challenge.  I found this cute "newspaper stamp" at a garage sale for $1.  I printed it on a 4 x 6 blank greeting card.  

Then I used "Twinkling H2o" paints for the color and let dry and I tangled over that with an Apprentice Pen.  
I wanted to see if I could get Marasu to look good in another color besides just a Renaissance tile!  I think it looks pretty cool!  

The check for the grandchild is inside and so I tried to think of someway to tie the design to the "not-so-immense" check inside.  Hahaha.  

One down, 11 to go.  

My two classes taught this past week were totally fun.  I'll post some photos.  Great people and my daughter Julie (CZT from Madison) came down to teach with me in one class.  THAT is fun.  

Celebrating Bijou

Such fun to play with tiny 2" Bijou tiles.
Top left: Facade
Top right: Roscoe
Bottom left: Crux
Bottom right: Maryhill

I tend to enjoy mono tangles the best with Bijou but I know that a duo tangle can work if kept simple.






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Bijou book, anyone?

This is darling tiny book...about 2.5" x 3".
I found it at Janke Bookstore in Wausau, WI after I taught Zentangle on Thursday.

What a darling store!!!!

Called "Paper Blanks" by Playful Creations the book ran $7.95.
This particular book is called "Sweet Friend Micro"...unlined, Smythe-sewn binding, Acid free paper

To me it seemed perfect for Bijou journaling and trying out various tangles.
Bijou tiles are the newest tiles from Zentangle.com..2" tiles with a darling story behind them. CZT 14 and 15 have been waiting for the big roll out of this product which happened this week. Everyone is excited to begin tangling with them!!!!

Bijou means "jewel" in French.

More to come on them!








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Zentangle Calender Aug 3

Meringue and A-Fog just out on Linda Farmer's blog.
I really like them both. Very fun. Keepers.

Blogpost posts these photos quite small from my iPad. Remember you can double click to enlarge them.

I am spending a relaxing day in Fontana in southern, WI.
My younger daughter stayed until after lunch and then left to back north to Madison. Hubby is off with his son at the Union Grove Drag racing track father/son bonding over noise and grease and the smell of burned rubber.

Things are summery and beautiful here.
I am out on the deck some, reading curled under the shade umbrella in the 80 degree day.

Just finished up two back to back teaching classes of Zentangle which was totally fun and helpful to have Julie with me to critique different ideas. Now I can get supplies reorganized. I have a "gig" for Aug 12 but don't know yet if I have enough signed up to make this a "go". I should know by mid week how sign ups are going. Have 11 signed up for Sept 3rd so that one is a go.



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Zentangle Cupcakes

At our "graduation" ceremony at CZT training in June we were served gourmet Zentangle cupcakes. Each in a tangled cupcake holder. On some was the "logo" for Zentangle which is a red square. They were OMG delicious!
(and yes we got gorgeous hand lettered diplomas!)



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Zentangle class

On Friday my daughter Julie and I co-taught a class in a private home!
Fun morning!
Thanks Roberta!!!!








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