My new favorite place

I’m pretty excited about this new craft store (link provided), Valley Stamp & Scrap, that opened in May of this year not only because it’s right in my neck of the woods, not only because I’ll be teaching there (hopefully on a regular basis),  not only because it’s fun to browse and shop the amazing artsy-craftsy inventory, not only because of Sasha and Oliver (you’ll meet them when you go there), not only because it’s a cozy place to hang out, but also because the classes that Ed and Linda Wiese offer at Valley Stamp & Scrap are so varied, interesting, fun and have really helped me expand my artistic endeavors. So it is my heartfelt recommendation that you visit for all the reasons I have listed above but also to help support a local small business that is needed in this area. Whatever your artistic endeavor is, I am sure that VS&S has whatever you need to support it and take it further.

So, yes, I am teaching at Valley Stamp & Scrap. My first day of classes is Saturday, November 3rd. Zentangle 101 (a basic class and a prerequisite for other Zentangle classes) will be from 9:30 to 12:30. Then from 1:30 to 4:30 is Zentangle 102 (this is a beyond the basics class). All materials needed will be supplied for each class. Even if you have taken classes from me before you will learn something new and creative to apply to your tangling activity. If you’re interested in signing up, please use the link I have supplied in the first line of this post – it will take you to the VS&S website and follow instructions for signing up.

What’s a blog without some images – – – so here are a few that I don’t think I’ve shared here yet.

Crazy Huggins

 

Betweed and Scrawlz

Tangled heart

Take care and tangle on!

Up to something . . .

The summer, as usual, flew by. I thought I would do a quick post showing some of the things I have been doing during the very pleasant last three or four months. So not much talk but examples of some action 😉

 

Until next time, tangle on, my friends.

A little zen in the round ;)

Zen Buttons! A new passion – so fun, so satisfying – love doing these on a Zendala tile.

Sharing . . .

Just wanted to share some fun things I’ve been doing. Some will be offered as classes 😉

Zendala Snowflakes

You can just see the sparkle in the middle image.

Dingbatz

TranZending

 

Diptychs

 

Some gridwork

 

Tangling around an image

 

Til next time – keep on tangling, my friends!

Zentangle activity

The busy summer has gone by but I am still as busy as ever. Just wanted to stop in and show that I haven’t let my tangling go by the wayside – I am visiting my zen zone regularly. Below are some of the items I have tangled lately and some I am offering as a class.

Using color Pt 1

White Zendala with color

Using color with tangling

Adding color to tangling

ZIA leaf tangling

14 Shades of Gray

14 Shades of Gray

Example of Dingbatz

Example #2 of Dingbatz – fun to do. Request a class if you’re interested. 🙂

Enjoy this wonderful weather and keep on tangling!

Zendala Love

Every so often I remember how much I enjoy doing Zendala tiles. A few months ago I started doing tree-like tangling on Zendalas. I framed a few for Christmas gifts but I’ve continued doing them when time allowed and now have, what I am calling, the beginning of a series.

Here are the ones that were gifted:

 

 

Sorry about the misalignment of these images (drives me crazy!) but I’ve attempted to get them to line up for the last 30 minutes – enough all ready! Rant over. So here are a few that I am including in my “series.”

 

I’ve really enjoyed finding tangles to fit in the tree-like shaped string I used in the middle of the tile. In the past I usually used the prestrung Zendala tiles and considered the blank ones rather intimidating. It seems to me that it may be safe to say that I’ve grown artistically (after 6 years of tangling) and can now approach a blank Zendala with confidence. hooha!

Keep tangling, my friends!

 

 

 

Diva Challenge #290 plus meanderings

Tags

classes

I’ve been thinking about morphing quite a bit lately. Well, not me personally, but morphing one tangle into another. Thinking about it and imagining it, but not actually putting pen to tile to do it. (There seems to be too many other things that need doing these days.) However, this week’s Diva Challenge has spurred me into action. This week she has announced “Duotangle: NZeppel vs Flux.” These are two of my favorite tangles and it seemed to me they would morph together beautifully. Here is my first attempt and, I have learned my lesson, publish the first attempt or no further attempts will see the light of day. This was fun to do and I would like to do more like this – morphing these two tangles in another tile, but also trying my hand at other tangles that may naturally flow together well.

Other meanderings (as intended over the last few months). I taught a class at a local high school in September. It has been awhile since I’ve taught in a school and I have found that I really enjoyed it. Here are the tiles the students in the two classes created – I think they enjoyed it.

Central High Students of Mr. Stellmacher

Recently I taught an advanced class called “14 Shades of Gray” a technique developed by Sonya Yencer, an amazingly talented CZT. The students who were able to attend were very pleased with this technique that creates a softened tangle on one’s tile. Here is the result of that class. I hope to offer it again within the next several months.

Lastly I would like to add a gallery of fall inspiration for you.

Tangle on, my friends!

Color

For the most part, I don’t usually add color when I am tangling. Creating a black and white composition is very satisfying to me. With that said, I will admit that I sometimes play around with adding color or tangling in color. I have such a beautiful supply of color media that I need to use it more often and so I have been experimenting and thought I would share a few things I’ve done recently.

This mandella I did today – it’s done on cardstock and I just started making this tangle (I’m not sure of the name). When I had done enough I decided it would look good colored in. I am not a person who enjoys the adult coloring book phase that so many people are taking up, but I did enjoy making my own outline drawing to fill in with delightful colors.

Tangled and added color with Caran d’Ache colored pencils.

This creation is a spread in my art journal – it covers the two pages and I used a variety of things to add texture before adding the two mandellas that are tangled with colored pen and colored in with pencils.

This next one is what I created while fooling around with my set of Wink of Stella pens. These pens add sparkle which is hard to see in a photo. I started with the outline of the leaf and tangled inside that, added some color with watercolor pencils, then added the Wink of Stella tangling. I don’t think I am finished with this one yet. It’s been fun to go back to when I need to do some tangling. (Sorry about the poor lighting.)

The last one I am going to share is a water color I did of a sunflower. I am ashamed to say that I didn’t make a note of the YouTube video tutorial I followed to get this but if you’re interested in doing something like this it would be easy enough to search YouTube for just this type of tutorial. I am not very experienced with using water color – I think I laid it on a bit too thick – but it was fun to do and I will continue to create with this medium. This was also done in my art journal.

My practice in Zentangle has really opened up my creativity – I am more open to giving other medium a try just to see what works for me and what doesn’t. It has certainly been fun and, although, what I’ve done isn’t the best art in the world, it has been immensely satisfying and fulfilling to me and I think that is what should matter the most.

Tangle on, my friends!

The Eye of the Beholder

Tags

classes, Diva's Challenge, Weekly Challenge, Zentangle

Sometimes things just don’t go together, no matter how strongly you try to reason with yourself. Take the unnamed character in Green Eggs and Ham (Dr. Seuss) – he just didn’t think they would go well together – until he tried it. When I was a child, I had a very pretty dress for one of my dolls. It was a yellow net fabric with flocked red apples all over it; no other color – just the yellow background with red. It was a very dressy dress. I just couldn’t like it though because I didn’t think yellow and red went together very well. Much later in my life I had an adult friend who claimed brown and blue should not be placed alongside each other. Well, after all, it is just a matter of opinion. Apparently there is nothing wrong with green eggs and ham, yellow and red together and a blue and brown combination. I guess it’s just a matter of the degree of acceptance; what is lovely to one is dissonance to another.  That certainly is a long introduction to the Diva’s Challenge for this week. We have reached Weekly Challenge #276 which is a duo tangle of Drupe and Poke Root. When I read that my heart just sank a bit because, like the yellow and red dress, I just didn’t think those two would get along well all alone on a tile together. In spite of my reservations, I did a tile, in fact, I made myself do several titles – forcing my hand to SLOW down increasingly each time. My attempts look awkward to me and I’m not at all satisfied, but it was a good lesson to experience and I share these tiles with you to illustrate that you may not be totally pleased with the outcome, but keep in mind that, very often, it is in the process that you can benefit. Slowing down as I made each stroke made me more conscious of each line I drew – I took pleasure in putting the ink down. Here are the three tiles I enjoyed creating – perhaps they’ll look better to me in June 😉

Although I haven’t tried green eggs and ham, I have come to accept red and yellow as a fine duo and I’ve never thought that blue and brown looked bad together at all, but Drupe and Poke Root really didn’t work for me. I am now going to go see what wonderful tiles were created with this duo by other tanglers – I know I will be surprised and delighted!

Other goings on – I had two classes this past week. On Monday was the first class in a series of four with a Zentangle for Kids class. This is what those awesome kids did in the hour long class:

On Tuesday evening I had a basics class called Zentangle FUNdamentals. Four people took this class as a refresher course and the following two tiles are the result of this delightful class.

That’s it for this week – make it a good weekend and tangle on, my friends!

Checking in . . .

Tags

classes, Update, Zentangle

Recently returned from an amazing Hawaiian cruise that I took with my sisters. Since most of the time was spent on board ship I didn’t have an internet connection. Actually it was rather nice not checking email, receiving calls or looking at FB for a good two weeks. So during this time, while I did not participate in the Diva Challenges, I did, indeed, do some tangling with my CZT sister, Cari. The captions relate what I used as far as tools and background.

Next week I will be starting a 4 part series for kids through the Kaukauna Rec Dept. and also conducting a Zentangle FUNdamentals class at Atlas on the 10th. Let me know if you’re interested in either and I will send details for registering.

Here is some of what I accomplished while on vacation:

Practicing Aquafleur – one that can always benefit from practice.

Water colored background. Used black and brown 01 Micron pens and a white gel pen.

Water color background – used blue and green Micron pens and shaded with colored pencils. This is in a 4.5X6 book I made with water color paper.

Water color background. Used blue and black 01 Micron pens and shaded with colored pencil (a page in the aforementioned book).

First attempt at the new tangle, Ellish, introduced at the April CZT seminars – soon to be released to the public. 😉 Need more practice with this, but it’s a fun tangle to do and will be teaching it in an upcoming class.

That’s it for now – tangle on, my friends!