string 217 and 218

If anyone wonder where string 216 has gone I asure you I have done it. I won´t expose it yet though, since I have done that one for a friend of mine and she won´t get it immediately.  But here is string 217 (Lianne Woods):

The patterns are: Starawn (Judy Murphy), ´NZeppel, Ing and up in the corners a fragment I made up from a pattern I have used, don´t remember the name. I like to draw Ing. I love geometry. Ing is one of those patterns I seldom use though and the reason is: it is a challenge to make it work with other patterns. At least for me. But in this case I am quite happy about it. 

string 218 (Mei Hua Teng):

The patterns are: All boxed up (Alice Hendon), Yincut (Zt) and Florz (Zt). I do love patterns that are built on straight lines only and this pattern from Alice Hendon is great in it´s simplicity! And it is very forgiving when the lines wobble around because of an unsteady hand!

Wonderful Black

I love black tiles. They are comforting in a certain way. Today is Christmas Day and the Daylight doesn´t stay to many hours. I walked my dog at 7:30 this morning, it was still dark and now 14:15 the daylight is fading away. But it is slowly getting brighter.  I worked on a black surface today and in the basic way, dots in the corners, frame and string 215 (Shirleen Long). I took my time, breathing, appreciating and gratitude.

I can´t help thinking of Angels when I draw the pattern Drawings, the most recently published pattern from Zentangle. I know it shouldn´t be representative but to me it is. Here together with Tipple (Zt) and Gord (Sue Zanker). I tried to think of Drawings as fragment and then enlarged fragment.

I loved to do this and I am very happy with the result and that´s because of the process! It is important to start and end with appreciation and gratitude. To focus on these things gives another perspective upon life. This method has brought a lot of joy to me and it has brought new friends to me from around the world. We may not have met in person, but we have met on other levels that has become very important. I am grateful this is possible!

Merry Christmas!

String 214 (Debra Sweeting) with patterns: Stella (Jana Pharmer), Stiping (Zt), Tipple (Zt), Shattuck (Zt), Paradox (Zt) and Zinger (Zt). 

Strings again and Merry Christmas-time

Yes. In zentangle strings are important. When the string once is on the tile it opens up for new possibilities. The string is a guidance, I don´t have to follow, but I can let it lead me on the journey. Weather I use strings from other tanglers or my own string doesn´t really bother me. Using other tanglers strings might lead me into directions I would not have expected. Using my own string might give a deeper relaxation. I said might. The string helps me not to plan the tangling. This has become more and mor obvious. If I start a tile without a string, then it is more uncertain that I can reach the flow I appreciate so much. In this post there are 2 strings from tanglepattern.com and one made spontaneously.

String 210 (Judy Okawa):

The string is almost not visible here. I used the patterns: Stella (Jana Pharmer), Icanthis (Zt), Drawings (Zt), Striping (Zt) and some stippling. It happens to be christmas soon and I guess that affected the tangling!

String 211 (Mary Helmers): 

This time I tried a technique that is new to me, but I have seen others do it. I made a tangling in graphite in the background (Stella) surrounded by Gord (Sue Zanker) Rixties (Zt) and Icanthis (Zt). As I saw the finished tile I felt unsure about the result. I wasn´t used to see such a thing as I had done. The contrast in the tile was very high. But now  having looked at it a second time, I am satisfied with it and I thing I am going to try this again further on. 

At last my own string, the meditation for today:

Patterns: `NZeppel, Flux, Tipple, Striped Shattuck, (all Zt) and a pattern I saw on Ilse Lukken´s blog: Daggerly (Carole Ohl). There are some tiny beadlines too (Margaret Bremner). Here is the string, which I draw afterwards as I remembered it (scanned):

Now is christmas-time and I guess I will be more laidback, relaxing, take time for my own, seeing sons and their families and not blogging frequently (but you never know)! If not I wish you all that follow my blog a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!  Until next post: Happy Tangling! 

String 209

Back to basics!Which in this case means, back to the square, back to black micron and pencil only! I was most satisfying to do this as my daily meditation! 

I used string 209. I think it is Anne Marks who has shared this, but there is another name too in the first descripiton with thumbnail on the tanglepattern.com. I used Striping, Vitruvius, Cubine (all official zentangles) and Conoor (Rosemary Turpin. This geometric string was exactly what I needed today. No planning, no nothing just go for it focusing on well known tangles. Ok Conoor is quite new to me, but I have tried it in my skectchbook a few times and it was begging to come into this!

The 11th and 12th Day of 3Zs

Today was the 12th Day of 3Zs. The tangle for today was Crazy Huggins. With 12 tangles it is pretty crowded. But I had made up my mind that on the last day in this game all tangles should be present. It was a true challenge. Here is my final mosaic:

I am not kidding. They are all in. But you have to look close to see some of them. The tangles are from Day one: Tripoli, Diva Dance, Shattuck, Marasu, Tipple with gold, Molygon, Knightsbridge, Pokeleaf, Auraknot, Drawings, Icanthis, Crazy Huggins.

Two tangles are new from the Zentangle headquarter, Drawings and Icanthis. 

The 11th Day was yesterday. Here is the 11th mosaic:

And the 11th 3Zs:

On the 11th Day Molygon and Auraknot took a rest. The tile felt too crowded for them to be comfortable. But they enjoyed watching!

It was quite an adventure to take part of this game and a lot of fun. I think I haven´t used 12 tangles in one tile before and this is on 3Z! It is smaller than the ordinary tiles! Don´t know if I will do it again, it is breathtaking, like running a Marathon or something. Maybe next year though if there will come another 12 Days! 

On the 10th Day: a new tangle!

On the 10th Day Bijou brought a new tangle; Drawings!It is a fun and magical tangle. It is hard to stop it!

I bet that´s why Marasu went shy and almost hide himself in the background. That is very unusual, Marasu is very dominant and used to be in focus! All are in: Tripoli, Shattuck, Diva Dance, Marasu, Knightsbridge, Tipple, Molygon, Pokeleaf, Auraknot and Drawings!

I had to go on with Drawings. Here it is with Auraknot and a Zengem:

Thisone might be for a Christmascard I belive. Drawings just went on and also took place in my daily tile:

Now I have come to string 208, which happens to be my first string on Tanglepattern.com!The patterns are: Drawing, Pokeleaf, Jetties, Hollibaugh, Shattuck and Laced (Mary Elisabeth Martin). I was quite happywith the outcome!

On the Eight and Ninth Day

Now it is getting crowded!But here it is. The Ninth Day:

Bijou now brought Auraknot after having a rest. I had to change the backgroundpaper, the red one wasn´t big enough.

The Eight Day Bijou brought Pokeleaf:

Besides the game I made my Daily tile with Aura Leah (Carla du Preez):

String 207 (Cheryl Stock). Hollibaugh, Tipple and Beadline (Margaret Bremner) also joined. Aura Leah is light and airy and very easy to learn.  I have used it a lot and will come back to it. 

Op-Art in Zentangle - string 205 and 206

Op art was a big thing in the sixties. I remember it since I was a teenager then and this movement in art affected not only the artscene but a lots of other things like clothes and stuff. When it comes to zentangle there are patterns that could belong to that movement. I did try Gord (Sue Zanker) a while ago and now I ran into a pattern I have done before: On Target (Barbara Finwall). I first found it on Pinterest in the beginning of my Zentangle journey and made some tries in my sketchbook. Here is my first try this time:

I used it with string 205 (which happened to be a string by Barbara Finwall!). This first round didn´t make me too happy. The pattern went to small, it was really hard to draw it! So I decided to give it one more round today with string 206 (Beth Snoderly):

This time I was wiser.  I also belive it shows more of the op-effect when the pattern is a little bigger. Aura Leah (Carla du Preez) was begging to follow this string and Crescent Moon also joined.

I am fascinated by these patterns that balances black and white in this way and what they may do with the feeling of depth and also how they creates meta-patterns. I also find them most relaxing to draw when I have learned them.   

On the sixth and seventh day...

On the Sixth Day Molygon arrived....:

On the Seventh Day Knightsbridge took over the space:

Go and check the Zentangle Blog! There are things happening! 

On the fifth day...

Bijou came with golden Tipple!

Gold is very striking. It easily takes over the place. But doing it like this I like it very much! The adventure goes on... 

Yesterday evening I took a break from Christmasrelated things and went for string 204 (Mei Hua Teng).

I used Hollibaugh, Nipa, Tipple and Crescent moon. I also tried a Fragment from the BOOK: W7.

On the Fourth Day

On the fourth day Bijou came with Marasu... 

I don´t know where this will lead, but it is so much fun! Marasu comes with a lot of drama, which I like. 

On the third Day and string 203

It is about the timezone. The third day is today, but in the US they are at least 8 hours after us in Sweden, depending on where in the states the post is made. So this evening I was on my toes to get the third pattern which was Shattuck!  So here is my 3Z for today:

It is the same feeling as our "Adventskalender"! So much fun! But today I also made my daily tile using string 203 (Mary Ellen Calhoun). Here it is:

There are a lots of patterns in this! I use to have three or four patterns, but now they are overwhelmig the tile and me. Don´t know why... But I like to do this and I am excited where this will lead... The patterns are: Reel (Lily Moon), Shiraz (Linda Farmer), Hollibaugh, Shattuck (!), Jetties, Diva Dance and some perfs.

On the Second day...

It is special with these 3Zs tiles! The outcome is something else, nonpredictable, at least for me. It is fun to play with this size! The second day little Bijou brought Diva Dance!

My tile started with the Foxtrot and ended up in a little Rock n´ Roll! the two tiles so far goes fine together:

Now I have to cut some more triangles to be able to continue this game!:)

12 days of X-mas

On the first day of 3Zs... Is something that happens at Rick and Maria´s blog. I have seen it last year happening. Now I´ll try to follow it and this year it is all about the triangle format.  Here is my first post for this occasion:

The tangle for today is Tripoli.

Repeating patterns and about strings

There are an infinite amount of tanglepatterns around. So many experiences to make, and so much to discover. To me that sometimes becomes stressful. I want to learn so many of them, that I might loose focus on why I am doing this every day tangling. The point is when you have learned 4-5-6 patterns by heart, there actually are many more. Tangleations and patterns with a lots of similarities. Right now I enjoy go back to basics and work with patterns I am familiar with. Of course I am inspired by the BOOK. But I have been thinking about this for some time now. 

This tile is special to me. I worked with string 202 (Nancy Eaton). I felt so much peace and relaxation just leaning back, choosing patterns I knew well by heart. They are: Shattuck, Jetties, Tipple, Hollibaug, Crescent moon and Printemps. I hope I will remember this further on; It is not the amount of patterns that matters, finding new ones or the patterns in themselves. It is the process, the repeating of them that gives relaxation and I am thankful being able to do this.

The string is special in zentangle. It is a guiding line lightly penciled by freehand on the tile. It is randomly drawn mostly. Not if it is the way I try all the strings at tanglepattern. com. But it works the same way. The string helps a lot not to plan. Just follow.

String 201

My tile for today:

String 201 with patterns: Lolly Wimple (Sandy Hunter), Cruffle (Sandy Hunter), Mooka (Anya Ipsen), Shiraz (Linda Farmer), Beadline (Margaret Mead) and Florz.

Before I made this I started with my Zentangle Grundkurs 1 in German. It was quite easy to understand the German text. Not too many words I have looked up in the dictionary. Maybe 3 or 5. I tried to follow the first lesson which was familiar. What I liked with it was the background-information about the tangles and of course it is good to get back to the basics again! 

I liked what I did and I can see there is a big difference today compared with my first tangles! I guess it is called improvement!

The book

Today it arrived! Zentangle Primer Vol. 1, or as it is called in German: Zentangle Grundkurs 1. So now I have taken my German dictionary out of the bookshelf and yes, I am reading it!

Of course I had to jump to the chapter about Reticula and Fragment at once. I have just started to read but it is interesting and I think it is worth the effort! I couldn´t just read I had to make a tile too where I picked two of the fragments and made a simple reticula to draw in:

I just picked them out as I saw them and did what I did. Not much to say about so far, I have to study the chapter more. But the book is beautiful and very inspiring. Now I have to go to my choir to reherse so this is all for now.

String 200 and a fragment

The pattern Sindoo I call a high-focus pattern. To me that means I have to make an effort to learn it. I have to explore it before I can make it "mine". What I have done is to break the pattern down into a fragment. So now I am in that fragment-reticula thing again. Today´s meditation might make it clear what I mean.

The second pic is the scanned back side of the tile and I draw the fragment there to remember what I have done. The reticula is obvious in this tile I guess.

This is also a monotangle in my way to see it. Yes there are some small round orbs too. But I decide it is a monotangle. This was not planned but it went that way and I used string 200 (Margaret Bremner). Of course I could have filled all the spaces but I didn´t. And I am satisfied with that.

String 198 and 199

Yesterday was the first Sunday of Advent here in Sweden. It is special, with stars, lights and candles that are coming up everywhere there are people in this country. And in many countries around the world. It is the beginning of christmas season and it affects almost everything if you are a christian or not. You simply cannot avoid participating this strong movement through society. I did spend some hours in church rehersing and singing in the choir at the worship. Then home, getting the stars in the windows fixed and the candles and the red curtains in the windows and whatever. It all came out the usual way: very cozy when the evening came, the dogs exhausted asleep because of all our activity at home and us sitting at the table with the candles burning and resting. Then my tile grow from string 198 (Shirleen Long): 

I usually sits on my own in my studio tangling, but not last night. But it was very peaceful and the focuspattern of Square One, Sindoo (Sharon Robinson) was a perfect match to the string. 

Today´s meditation went in a totally different direction:

There are some worries in my mind right now which affects me. I started with string 199 (Mei Hua Teng) and Reel (Lily Moon). Moowa (Anya Ipsen) was moving in. I wasn´t satisfied with the start at all but took a deep breath and decided to just go on and not condemn what I just did. Let it be there and se what the finish would lead to. More Moowa. A Beadline (Margaret Bremner) and then Amaze as a filler. Despite of the outcome I feel satisfied with what I have done and I am happy I didn´t give it up at a certain critical point but went on till the finish was done!

Black Friday

Why do we have this BLACK Friday? And why call it BLACK? It has popped up during the past 2 years in Sweden and is all about commercial stuff. Buy whatever, if you need it or not. I admit. I did buy something but I won´t tell what! I love BLACK but not in combination with Friday. So I didn´t make a black tile today. I went for my personal project with strings and I have come to string 197 (Nancy Smith). A very geometrical string and I love geometry.

I started with a favourite of mine, Lollywimple (Sandy Hunter), and then followed: Cubine, Starmap (Suzanne McNeill) and Appearance (Sandra Strait). These four are all such patterns that just appear unplanned and so easy to learn that anyone knows them by heart very quickly! Very relaxing!