Journal and DC 387

I really enjoy this journalprompts! No.5 is Textures. Textures is something I have been aware of all the time working with my paintings in my studio, and it has been important to me as an inspiration and as an expression. To make it in a minor size like this was so thrilling! I started with those eco-dyed papers I have saved from the fall 2017. The first one (with the heart) I had made in february 2018, but I had to cut it to fit in the journal. On this page also a strip from a tissue with the pattern bleed through. Talking about my other work in the studio I cut a piece from a paint cloth and tangled on it with Identipen and a Permopaque pen.

The second eco-dyed tile I tangled for this purpose and I love the way it came out! On this page is a structure paper tangled with Rahat Farzana´s new pattern Najam,and then a tissue tangled with Flux (the frontside this time). The page needed some Ipso (Jennifer Hohensteiner) too.

This weekly challenge no387 from the Diva is UMT (Use My Tangle), which is an event the first challenge every month and this time it is all about Holly Atwater´s ha Wy. This tangle is a challenge to me, I admit that. I have tried it in my sketchbook, on bijoutiles and at last I made it on a black Apprentice tile (11,4x11,4 cm).

It is a fun pattern based on an asterisk. I like the geometric qualities but I have to work on it to get it going. I placed it in a round as a monotangle and I am pleased with the way it came out.

Calendar 4th-9th of December

I belive the red spots is pointing out December as the month of Christmas. Can´t help thinking in that direction. The patterns: Florz, Zenith, Icantoo (Hanny Nura), Icanthis, Bales var. Ing, Locar and Ipso (Jennifer Hohensteiner). About the last three days with Ing: After the seminar there was another gathering of CZT:s called Zenagain. I wasn´t there, but after that I saw some wonderful Ing variations and I kept those in mind since I wanted to give Ing a round with fragments this time. I loved to do that, using fragmens from the Zentangle Primer.

Arukas day 7-10

These are the last days with Arukas. I still enjoy it. A lot!

Daily tiles and a classphoto!

To me it is important to do my daily tile (=daily meditation)in one way or another. It helps me to keep my focus, to appreciate, to relax and stay calm. Every tile, and I mean every single one, represents something that is important to me. Every tile is a moment of gratitude for something in my life, gratitude for the method that says "anything is possible, just one stroke at a time". 

Tangles: Quandary, Pokeroot, Pokeleaf and Heartvine (Lori Howe). In gratitude for a short meeting that created a difference in my life.

Tangles: Pokeroot, Pokeleaf, Diva Dance rock-n´roll. In gratitude for Bach´s cello suites played by Jo Jo Ma.

Tangles: Mooka, Shattuck, Tipple, Pokeleaf and Knightsbridge. In gratitude for the Zentangle Method created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas.

Tangles: Qua-Sahnt (Heidi Halpern Kay) and Brizl (Susan Kelley Pundt and myself). In gratitude for friendship that means a lot in life.

Tangles: Zenith and Bales tangleations. In gratitude for little friend Bijou!

Of course there are days when everything seems to happen, almost no time at all left for tangling. But there are always at least 10-15 minutes! Who can say there isn´t? And 10 minutes is what it takes to make a little Bijou! Bijou is always a friend in lack of time! Yesterday was such a day. I had to go to the vet with our black Pumi Bisse, she has been limping for a while. It is one thing to be sitting in a waitingroom by yourself, another to take care of your dog during the examinations and x-ray and waiting for results. You can´t tangle. You just has to stay calm, and be comforting. Home again, having supper, taking care of other things that had to be done, I was very happy to have my little Bijous to go to before bedtime! 

Why do I write about this? I do because I want to stress the fact, that zentangle is not a competition, it is not about doing the perfect tile, it is not about being clever, it is not about having lots of time to spend on yourself, it is not about perfectionism and all that. It is all about the process. To slow down, to appreciate what comes out of the pen and leave the worries behind. Then appreciate the little piece of art that came out of the process. It is so simple!  

At last the classphoto from the CZT 32 Seminar! Love to look at this and remember the days we shared!

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! 

Calendarpost 19th-27th of november

Playing with Rixties. We try to make friends!

Started with Arukas, but went on with Sander and more Rixties!

I want to keep going to the end of the year sharing my calendar. But I have other plans for next years, so I might not comment to much. Last three days I started with Diva Dance, Rock-n´-roll. Now Rixties is following me! Happy about that. But what happened on the 26th! Hollibaugh interfered and took the place! On the 27th Hollibaugh vined through Diva Dance who was walzing! Wonder how she liked that!

Calendar 19th-21st of october and one more for the Diva´s challenge 372

This post might be my last for a while, since I am not sure I will have the time  to post before I start my long trip to US and the CZT seminar 32 in Providence! The inktober patterns keep following me though! Here comes Abeko (Lynn Shelton Mead), W2 (Zt) and Hamadox (Diana Schreur). Drawing with the fountainpen looks so different from the Pigma-pens. I think the main reason for this is that in zentangle I slow down my strokes a lot. Doing so with the fountainpen is a little bit risky, since the ink i very flowing. Normally as I draw with the fountainpen I draw very fast strokes but working with zentanglemethod this won´t be the case!!! Somehow I like the result and it is very relaxing.

On the 20th the inktobertangle is W2.  I like weavingpatterns and W2 is no exception. I decided to let W2 have a meeting with Dewd for the Diva´s challenge and this is what happened when I choose to work with a random string and dots in the corners:

I thought I was finished with Dewd but obviousely I am not. It is just going on. It might follow me all the way to Providence.... Now I will concentrate on doing packing-lists and get everything together before Thursday morning when I leave for Stockholm Arlanda!

Taking ink seriousely in calendar 13th-18th of october and DC 372

I used to do a lot of drawing with my fountainpens earlier, but I haven´t done this so much when I tangle.  But for inktober last 6 days I have taken the ink seriousely. I hade some deep burgundy in one of my pen and that made my first page. But now I have no more of that ink left! Maybe this will be the last page ever with this ink from Mont Blanc!!! I hope not.  The patterns: Dewd (Zt), Ando (Kim Winebrenner) and Inapod (Carole Ohl) 

For the next page I went on drawing with my Lamypen filled with black ink (I have a lot of that) and changed to blue in my Mont Blanc and it got just a little touch of the previous burgundy ink! I love that effect! The inktober tangles: Joki (Kim Aarts), Narwal (Sam Taylor) and Luv-a (Sharon Carforio).  With some help of Aquafleur and a tiny Squid.

The Diva challenge 372 is all about Dewd. This pattern is so fun and relaxing to draw, I feel like I could go on with it for ever!

I decided to try something different. I used a fountainpen which is made with a caligraphy-nib (inspired by Lauras dip-pen): 

I don´t use this pen very much but I like the way it works. The result is a little bit rough but I still like it. Then I went on making Dewd on a black ATC-tile:

Couldn´t resist having some Tipple in the middle. This one is very different from the first tile depending on the surface and on which tools I used; gellypen and white charcoalpencil. Since this wasn´t enough I tried it in my journal with tan surface:

Also quite different approach! I only used gellypen, white charcoalpencil and graphite. Yes Inapod is there too. I think I am a little bit addicted to Dewd by now. Definitely a tangle to go to when stuck!

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.

Calendar 7th-12th of october.

Following inktober -18 in my calendar:

7th-9th:  Onion Drops (Shasta Garcia), Cockles ´n´Mussels (Margaret Bremner) and Fe-Ba (Lisa Chang). It was very nice to revisite patterns I learned very early in my zentangle Journey. I did like these very much then and now they wer like new discoveries!

10th-12th: Sez (Zt), Copada (Margaret Bremner) and Heartswell (Helen Williams). Sez has been and still is a challenge for me. It is easy to learn and I like to see it done by others. Well I guess I have to work on it more to make it flow.

Inktober Calendar and DC370

This time inktober just went over the edges. It was fun to revisit patterns I have tried before, but maybe not experienced the posibilities with! Facets (Nancy Pinke) is such a pattern. Now I am going to use it more often I am sure. Fleavy (Hanny Nura) can go anywhere! And at last Pais (Mikee Huber) is also a pattern I haven´t revisited since I first tried it. So much fun to do with this!

Then it is time for an new UMT-challenge from the Diva. UMT = Use My Tangle. Laura pics a random tangle from other tanglers and this time it was a pattern from Heidi Sue, Mezzanine.

I have not seen this pattern being used before, nor have I tried it. Maybe I wouldn´t have found it if it wasn´t for this UMT-challenge! It reminds me of Abeko from Lynn Shelton Mead but different. Easy to learn and fun to do. Mezzanine worked nicely with Onion Drops (Shasta Garcia). I tried it on a selfcut zendala (!) on the cardstock I have been using for a while. To cut out a zendala is not easy for me but I got some ideas about how to do it from my friend Susan Kelley Pundt. First I traced around a circle I have cut in thinner paper (zendalasize) with my circlecutter. I used a Sakura pen, well used and almost dried out for the tracing part. Then a pair of scissors (sharp one) and cut it as neat as I could. The last step was to use sandpaper around the edge, very lightly.

For the string I used my youngest son´s name, Erik. Almost invisible, but I draw it on white paper first so here it is:

To use a name on a zendala as a string is fun. It is also such a pleasant way to keep someone in focus involving a lot of warm thoughts! 

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.....

IAST 261

There are strings and strings. This week´s challenge from Adele Bruno offered a string I do like a lot! A string with straight lines as well as a beautiful curve. So here is my entry:

I used the cardstock I got from my printing friend and I like the surface more each time I use it. The patterns are 3 Loops 6 (Mina Hsiao) and Hexonu (Cherryl Moote). I have tried 3 Loops 6 once before, but as I almost forgot about it I am so happy that Adele reminded me about this pattern!

16th-18th of September and looking back.

three days with String 002 from Tanglepatterns.com. 

The patterns: Meer, Florz,Beadline (Margaret Bremner), Onomato, Undling (Susie Achter) and Spawn (Shoshi). This time I found the very first tile when I used this string october 13th 2015! My first year with zentangle! Here it is:

As I made this in a project making one zentangle a day for 365 days I also wrote down the patterns: Tour, Quib and Quipple! It seems so long ago though it isn´t.  It is overwhelming to look back like this on early work. I can´t belive it is the same person... but I know it is. 

13th-15th of September and Slow Down with a Zendala!

It is nice to revisite old strings! And so different from when I started working my way through all strings in the Tanglepattern´s resources! Here are three more takes on string 002! I used Tipple, Twilight (Judy Genovese), Beadline (Margaret Bremner), Printemps, Paradox, Webz (Suzanne McNeill), Eke, Diva Dance and Undu (Daniel Lamothe). I would have liked to show the one I did first, but I can´t find it right now. I will look for it.

Today I made a zendala. I saw something somewhere that reminded me of my bottle with Chinese ink and brushes belonging to it. So I made strings on a couple of zendalas using Chinese ink. I love the blackness in this ink!!! Here is the zendala:

I have been writing a lot of Haiku  (Japanese poetry) and doing so I also used this kind of ink doing ilustrations for some of those little poems. Now I could use the same ink with the wonderful brushes like this! So much fun!!! In the centre the pretty pattern OCSIDOT (Sandy Kelly Jones), and then Tipple, Printemps, Indyrella and Fescu.