Practicing Way Bop.

I think everyone knows that it takes practicing to learn a tangle. Most tangles are easy to learn and easy to draw. But there are tangles that need some more practicing than other tangles to learn them and know them by heart. Those tangles are often called high focus tangles. Of course there are differences between tanglers - what seems easy for one tangler might be hard for another. Sometimes I am not motivated to practice as much as I should to make a tangle beeing mine, and I abandon that tangle and maybe I don´t pick it up at all. But those tangles very often  come my way anyhow and I can´t avoid them much longer. This is interesting, they just show up and tell me to do them over again!  This happened in the last prompt in Todays Tangles - Keeping it Classic. Way Bop: A new possibility for me to learn! 

Step-outs are good. But I don´t like to have the step-out in front of me while tangling. I need to know the tangle by heart to be able to get the full benefit of tangling. 

On the first one I had to look at the step-out. It was a little struggle until Printemps, Striping and Flux could take care of the process and make it pleasant again.

After this I asked little Bijou to help. I made Waybop more than three times, acutally I tangled on the back of the Bijous too. The three last Bijous I didn´t need the step-outs any more! Happy moment!

The second tile was a joy to make! Not me struggling any more. Here with Jonqual, Zinger, Flux and Printemps. This was a way to make friends with a beautiful tangle and I guess Way Bop has come to stay with me this time! 

New pattern Brizl and then 30 days with Arukas!

From the 32CZT Seminar I went back to Susan Kelley Pundt´s home with her. We tangled every day together, most of the time in her studio and we had such a nice time doing this. 2 people that doesn´t talk to much (we did that too), just sitting together drawing and appreciating the moment, that is very developing and a way to get very close. I don´t recall exactly the day, but at one point Susan showed me a pinecone and we started to deconstruct it. I have made a separate page for this pattern, Brizl, you find it here and I hope you will enjoy it!

Now I am back to my life at home and my head is still full of ideas which I think is a good sign. At Providence I had the joy to meet Juliette, the woman behind Artsamuse. I had seen a repost she made on Fb about drawing one pattern for a month! I have been thinking about this and I was thrilled about the idea. I hesitated though, which pattern should I chose? One that I wasn´t comfortable with and try to make friends this way? Or one I do love and use a lot. I made my decision, I choose Arukas, a pattern that is a true friend. If we are going to see eachother every day, it must be a very good friend. There is a risk; we might get bored of eachother! Here are my first 6 days with Arukas:

I have mentioned Lynn Shelton Mead´s tangledeck now and then. As I have drawn Arukas several times I have been inspired by Lynn´s take on this pattern which will be seen during this month with Arukas too!

This is so fun! I had no idea what should happen day 6! I only tried to get Arukas in a string, which is not the easiest for me to do! But Arukas knew where to go! 

Inktober 7 and DC371

Since I follow the inktober prompts made by Stephanie Jennifer in my calendar I have not made them on tiles so much. But I got the chance to do Onion Drops as monotangles following the Diva´s Challenge! there are a lot of fun challenges to be found on the web and I have decided to limit myself following only two of them. Sometimes I do one or two other challenges too, but I don´t want to  have that haunting feeling of catching upp challenges. I am the diva´s challenge and IAST are high priority when it comes to challenges though. Laura had made a video where she demonstrates onion drops (a little different from what I have learned it) drawing it with a dip-pen. So I wanted to do my first one with a favourite fountainpen (Mont Blanc) of mine on a litte Bijou-tile:

The color of my ink is very deep burgundy and I love this color! Then I made one more on a regular tile with my micron:

Onion Drops (Shasta Garcia) is a very relaxing pattern, it just goes on and on and every space can be filled or surrounded with it. I think this pattern already has jumped into my box of go-to tangles! 
Here you find the step-outs.

28th-30th of September and IAST 262

I have been visiting my grandchildren this weekend. A lot of fun was going on. Not much tangling though! But here is my calendarpage with three takes on string 32. Patterns: Mooka, Tipple, Beelight, Static, Striping, ´NZeppel and Hibred. All of them official zentangles. I wanted to do IAST 262 badly, but I think I might be too late. I made it in my new sketchbook on tan paper. 

Gourdgeous and Woooo (Joan Stark). Gourdgeous is not my best friend, but I like the drama it causes! Now I make the post to Adele Bruno and if I am lucky it will come to here in time!

I found this sketchbook Saturday, as I was in Stockholm with my grandchild, 4 years old. The book is from Hahnemühle and the paper is called Cappucino. It is wonderful paper, doesn´t bleed through at all! Gourdgeous was a test!

22nd-24th of September and a Daily tile

I find it so pleasing to revisit strings I have done before and do them more then once! It is a way to see them from other angles each time. This is string no 28 from Tanglepatterns. The patterns on this page are: 3 Loops G (Mina Hsiao), Hexonu (Cherryl Moote), Maryhill (Betsy Wilson), Starmap (Suzanne McNeill), Knightsbridge (Zt), Scallop (Suzanne McNeill), Veez (Margaret Bremner) and Tektonik (Tomás Padròs). Last time I tried this string was in november 2015 and it looked like this:

Hurry, Nipa and a tangle I don´t remember the name of. 

In Square One, the focustangle is Lee Bee (Sue Schneider).I have been playing with it in my sketchbook trying to make it mine.

I am not there yet, but I like this tangle. It can be used as a reticula I think. I have tried it earlier but not really taken it to my heart. Now I definitely have and here is my first tile with it in Square One:

I had some fun with it.....

28th-31st of August, 1st-3rd of September

28th-30th of August I used Daviso (Katie Crommett) as my box-string. Daviso is a very special pattern and I have used it several times but not like this and it was very satisfying. Diva Dance was the first one to join and then Cayke (Rose Brown), Tipple and at last Hexonu (Cherryl Moote) and Florz.

31st I was in a hurry but I grabbed Flukes as my box-string and then Tropicana (Kate Ahrens), Printemps and Pookeroot.

New month. Take a deep breath. This week is important, it is the last week before our election-day, Sunday 9th of September. So Paradox helped me to stay focused and also I needed some Twilight to get some rest. I saw Rick Roberts draw Paradox in a blogpost not long ago and that was my inspiration for this.

Gottago, my calendar and recycling

There are patterns and patterns. So many pops up all the time. Sometimes there will be a pattern that speaks more to me then others. I found one like that when I saw a post from Laura Byerly. I had seen Gottago (Lianne Woods) before but now I saw the posibilities! I had one more watercolorbackground from Gerd Vading that was waiting for this!

I almost forgot to take a before-pic, but here it is taken i not too good light!

I loved this little piece of a watercolor! 

And here is my last finished calendarpage:

Following the Summertangles18: Fiore (Jana Rogers), Trix (Lucy Farray) and Zonked (Barbara Finwall).

Today I recycled one more watercolor-tile:

Quare (Beth Snodderly), Squared Cadent (Margaret Bremner), Fassett (Lynn Shelton Mead), Shira (Marguerite Samama), Echoism (Zt) and Eke (Zt).
We have extreme temperature outdoors, +30C in the shadows, so I am lucky to have the coolest place in my studio!

IAST 251 and calendar 10th-12th of July

IAST 251. It´s a String Thing!I love this challenge, since I really enjoy working with the string in focus. The string is supposed to be the guidance through the process. I had no possibility to do the last one, 250, but this one I did. The patterns suggested were Stikz (Laurel Sponseller), which is a tangleation of BB (Zt), and Munchin (Zt). Stikz was a new one to me so I wanted it to play the lead with the string. I belive Stikz can do a lot of things, but this is the way it went for me and I enjoyed the process.

My calendar for 10th-12th of July:

The theme for the rest of July I have decided to be the prompts for Summertangles 2018. I was a late starter with this, but never mind. I used Ponio (Damy), Fescu, Cubine and Opus. On the 11th it should have been Cubic, but in my head it said Cubine and I think I know why. Ever since I learned Cubine it just get me going and I never know where it will take me!  So I am sorry Cubic, but I´ll get back to you later on! I promise! On the 12th the prompt said Monotangle! I just picked a card randomly from Lynn Shelton Mead´s Tangle Deck and that was the Opus card! I don´t draw Opus often but I always like what happens when I do.

25th-30th of June and IAST 249

Arriving home safely from a trip to Östhammar, where we had a wonderful workshop with amazing people, I am able to post again! I start with the calendar:

The summer is in a mighty bloom and this shows in my calendar too! I started with Arc Flower (JJ La Barbera)- a long time no seen, I almost forgot how much I appreciate this pattern! Then I ran into Mumsy (Sandy Steen Bartholomew), with some Purdy (Margaret Bremner) and then Tri-Bee (Beate Winkler). 

On the 28th another flowerlike pattern was the starter: Cyme (Zt). And Cyme went into Daniel Lamothe´s Dreamcatcher! On the 29th I came to Östhammar and of course there was a lot of Rock´n Roll going on!! Giving the birth to Undu (Daniel Lamothe) and Asian Fans (Suzanne McNeill) and then ending with Mookas and Tipple.

I just have to show you the results from the workshop, since it was so lovely! Here are the pics:

Yesterday, before I started my travel back home, Gerd Vading, my hostess and I made a trip to an exhibition outside town. There I saw some wonderful pictures made by two participants of the workshop! These went straight into my heart:

 

Marja Forsberg has made a portrait of Lars Lerin (a Swedish great artist of watercolor). It is a weave, and it has so much of life in it! Here is a closeup:

And her son Leif Forsberg is a great painter. You can see for yourself:

I love the color and the unique expression in these two paintings!

Well, back home I sat down doing the challenge from Adele this week. It is challenge 249 and it is all about getting Abeko (Lynn Shelton Mead) and the Diva Dance into a string. 

The way it went was a little surprise to me, the Abeko totally took care of the rocking Diva Dance! I loved that!

7th-9th of May , Loev and IAST 246

As I saw Lori Byerly´s calendarpage I realized that Veezley by Sandy Hunter was a patter I had missed. And it is a beautiful one! I had to try it! A second pattern was Loev, which is the focus tangle in Square One. Loev is fun to draw! I went on with it in my sketchbook and on a couple of tiles. 

My first one, Loev is kind of swallowing the air around! Or something like that. I had a big smile on my face doing this. The next one:

Now I tried it without embellishment and with. Together with Veezley and a little Mooka. It is quite funny I think! 

I haven´t been into IAST for some time now. This last one, 246, Adele Bruno wanted us to try Helen Williams tangle String Grid. this is a lovely one and it speaks to my lovely part I think (yes I have got one)! A lot is possible to do with this pattern, but I kept it simple, just to understand the way it is done.

Ofcourse there are a lot of possible things to do with the negative spaces here, but I like the airyness in the pattern itself. Still I wanted to add something except the blue color and as a coincidence, Margaret Bremner recently posted a new pattern, Purdy which has this airyness in common with String Grid!  I think they work fine together and some Beadlines (Margaret Bremner) also made this pattern get a little extra without reducing the lightness. I liked to do this and I guess I am not through with String Grid! Thank´s to Adele Bruno I did pay attention to it!

4th-6th of June

Time is running fast these days! Last three days has been filled with activity! The 5th was the World Environment Day and that was a great day from early morning till late at night, since I took part in an event about our forrests here where I live. We had bright sky and sunshine but not too hot. With us on our guided tour through Ore Skogsrike was Jens Holm who is in the parliament for Vänsterpartiet.

Yesterday was our National Day with a lot of celebration. We went to Levin´s Garden Center nearby that also celebrated their 100th birthday! But here comes my calendar:

Msst (Zt) is a tangle I don´t use very often. I find it a little bit difficult to get it together with other patterns. The transistions are not so easy to make. It is a lovely pattern though. Now I tried to find my ways for it. On the 5th it was so obvious I let Nipa join, then on the 6th I tried it with a completely different pattern, Asian Fans (Suzanne McNeill). Somehow it worked quite well, maybe not too much of Msst though!  

I am the Diva´s weekly, the calendar 25th-30ies of May and Keenes

This will be a quite heavy post depending on the heath of the month May. We haven´t had so warm in May during my lifetime. I heard it on the radio, we haven´t had this climate since 1776!!! May is the month when the garden needs a lot of work, when seeds and plants has to be set in the soil. But I wonder where everything goes this year....

Yes I have been tangling. My studio is the best place in the house when it is to hot to stay long outdoors. I start with the Diva´s challenge: a monotangle with Carole Ohl´s Puf.

I learned Puf as one of the first tangles on my tanglejourney. Then I didn´t understand what tangleations means and how this works. I didn´t even see the similar start as Bales has. Now I know that Puf and Bales are closely related to eachother and I love them both. I find it very interesting the way patterns are connected to eachother, the way they can emerge from eachother and go into something else further on.

Here comes my calendarpages from the last six days (oh time´s running fast):

As I watched Melinda Barlow drawing my pattern in her video I felt strongly I wasn´t finished playing with it. So this is what I made on this page. Cheesecloth (Suzanne McNeill), Tofube (Damy) and Cubine also appeared.

In Square One Keenes is the focus tangle. So much fun! Couldn´t stop actually as I started. the negative spaces this pattern creates are so interesting. Tipple was the one who followed. This was the natural way to go, Tipple is a relative to Keenes in more than one way!

Then I went on with the tile for Square One. The first thing was an Oops taking the scene. I didn´t feel like starting this tile with an Oops, so I put it aside and started it all over again. I know, no misstakes, and this is not the way I use to do it. But here comes my first tile for Square One: 

I love this tangle! Though it seems simple, it has so many dimensions! I used it as a string too as you might see. Fescu is there and also Tipple of course.

This evening I started over again with the Oops-tile.  It was so fun to go on with it, not knowing what would happen.

The string is gone (it was the same string as on the first tile. There is some tranzending in this one, which I needed to make something new out of the Oops and I also blackened parts, not to cover but to emphasize the negative spaces. Oh yes I appreciate there are no misstakes in zentangle! Oopses comes my way to give me another direction. I love that!

I am the Diva´s challenge no 364

The challenge this week was a little bit different. Find an early tile that I liked and remake it. It is a little bit strange for me to do this. When I have made a tile I am satisfied with I also think this is it and then to remake it..... Hm.  But I went through the challenges from the Diva and found one I made 24th of March 2016 in the Diva´s challenge no 206. The challenge was to do something using tools I didn´t use while tangling. I was in the beginning of my tangling journey, so black pens on white tile was what I used daily. I went back to materials I only had used for other artistic purposes: Watercolor. Here is the old tile:

This one was made on heavyweight watercolorpaper. I was so happy about it since I hadn´t used watercolor for a long time (I use all kinds of other materials but not watercolor). Way back in artschool I really had a crush on watercolor. That was my mackandcheese at that time, you could say! This tile was special to me and still is since I found a way back to watercolor! No, I don´t use it much in my other art but I love to use it while tangling! Here is my remake:

This one is made on Fabriano Tiepolo, the same quality paper as original tiles.  I was satisfied with the result and it was another kind of experience than choosing a tile I wasn´t too happy with at the start and remake that one. There are differences between the tiles, not depending on the surface. I didn´t intend to copy, but doing a monotangle as I did the first time. What I see is a calmer, more balanced tile. Still I love the first one though!