Challenge #61 UMT v.II Golven

Mariet's tangle pattern, Golven, is this week's challenge from I Am the Diva.  My tile was actually started before the challenge was posted.  I've mentioned before that I often tangle during church services to keep my mind from wandering and my butt from squirming in my seat (back row center of the choir loft - pretty noticeable!).  I rarely finish one and this one was no exception.  I took my tile home and forgot about it until Monday when Diva posted her challenge.  The center just beckoned to be filled with Mariet's waves.  Love the tangle and I will definitely be using it again!

Happy Tangling!

Challenge #57 - UMT v. 1 - Sanibel

I realize that my post for Diva's challenge is nearly last minute. It has been a full-moon sort of crazy week. It started last Sunday when I found out that a dear friend's 12 month old grandchild died suddenly in a choking accident. I struggled all week with the thoughts of losing a child - no matter what the circumstances or age of the child. Today I was able to finally sit down with my soul-brother (Shane's step-grandfather) and spend some time - sharing, crying, venting, and even laughing. It really did my heart good to see him. I hope I was a blessing to him, too.

Before I went to meet Tom, I wanted to create something tangible to remind him that I was thinking of his family. I had bought some "drawing cards" today on a whim so I started tangling using the grandchild's initials as my string. I was able to include several "S" patterns, including Sanibel, for Shane and several "T" patterns for Tom and Tita (Tom's beautiful lady and Shane's grandmother). It felt good to draw while holding this family in my heart. Inside, I included a poem by John O'Donahue. Fra. O'Donahue was an Irish Catholic Priest who died too soon but who left some of the most beautiful words behind to comfort and bless us. I share the poem below. I hope and pray that you who may read this will never, ever experience this kind of tragic loss. Yet, I hope that you will find blessing and peace in these words.

For a Parent on the Death of a Child

No one knows the wonder
Your child awoke in you,
Your heart a perfect cradle
To hold its presence.
Inside and outside became one
As new waves of love
Kept surprising your soul.

Now you sit bereft
Inside a nightmare,
Your eyes numbed
By the sight of a grave
No parent should ever see.

You will wear this absence
Like a secret locket,
Always wondering why
Such a new soul
Was taken home so soon.

Let the silent tears flow
And when your eyes clear
Perhaps you will glimpse
How your eternal child
Has become the unseen angel
Who parents your heart
And persuades the moon
To send new gifts ashore.

~ John O’Donohue ~

(To Bless the Space Between Us)

Happy New Year - Challenge 53

New Year - new beginnings.  I don't believe in making resolutions.  I try to avoid setting myself up for failure whenever possible.  However, as some of you know, I am working on my dissertation towards completion of a doctoral degree in psychology.  So - my resolve is to get past the blocks I've encountered up until this point and make significant progress in the coming weeks and months.  Zentangle is and will be a very large part of this process!  Here is my homage to Diva's "Undine" - SO glad to be back!

Weekly Challenge #41: DuoTangle v. II "Jonqal/Opus"

Sometimes the weekly challenges come easily, sometimes I get so bogged down in the trying that I never get anything done.  I appreciate the challenges, though.  It seems that I usually remember them at a time when I need to think something through.  Or a time when I am feeling particularly vulnerable (and struggling with accepting the vulnerability wholeheartedly).  This is one of those days - inexplicably out of sorts...feeling like I have done (or not done as the case may be) something wrong...maybe just something thoughtless.  I don't know why except I'm exhausted and I haven't been sleeping.  But lo! and behold... a challenge comes along to at least let me clear my head even if I have nothing figured out.  For once I have no opinion about my tile... I neither love nor dislike it.  I offer it as it is unconditionally.  Maybe in the letting go I'll figure out what is bother me.

Jonqal and Opus

Happy tangling.

Love means...

I truly appreciate Diva's challenge this week.  In tribute to the events of 9/11/01 and to advent healing for the world, Challenge #39 is to create a representation of love.  Before I even remembered it was Monday, I had been working on a tile for 9/11.  Another Sunday Sermon tangle that was born out of the emotion I was feeling.

So sometime on Monday I opened Diva's site and realized that she had posted this week's challenge (I think that's when I realized it was really Monday!)  I really loved her "love" tile. Her quotes and verses to illustrate love were spot on. Laura wrote: "So, this week the challenge is Love.  Whatever it sparks in you, however you want to interpret it.   As long as you do so with the spirit of love, because through love we have the ability to change the world."

The first thing that popped in my head was "mother love."  I can think of nothing more precious than mother-love (unless, of course, it's grandmother love!) so here is how the challenge sparked in me.

In the words of the immortal words of Mahatma Ghandi: "Where there is love, there is life." 

Namaste and happy tangling!

Dish it up...

This has been a weekend for projects.  I worked on my dissertation topic some more and am in another waiting phase for feedback from my mentor.  So what do I do while I'm waiting?  I tangle, of course!

I am not sure how I ended up with so many projects at one time, though.  Well... yes I do, too.  I started one several weeks (months?) ago and found a spurt of inspiration last week with some new tangles to try.  And then, a friend approached me today about donating a couple of "art" plates to a local silent auction/fund raiser for our local AIDs awareness and treatment non-profit organization. (By the way, it's called Upper-Savannah-Care-Services-Dishing-It-Out-In-Greenwood if anyone wants to take a look).  He said, "Your Zentangle (R) stuff would be really cool.  So - after running around to a few stores for white plates and a paint pen, I sat down this afternoon and whipped up a couple of plates.

First of all, tangling with a paint pen can be frustrating.  I could not find an ultra fine pen so I had to settle for fine.  Also, the tip dries pretty quickly so you have to keep shaking and priming it. However, the quick dry part is good for larger pieces so you don't run your hands through it.

One of the plates I chose was a Corelle pattern that already had a "string" on it!  I didn't add any additional strings to this one... I just tangled where I felt like it - letting on pattern melt into another.  Another issue with paint on a surface like corelle or china is that shading is not really an option.  So the depth I might get  by shading didn't happen.  Here's a shot of my progress about 1/2 way through...

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And here's the finished product:

That one was so much fun that I decided to do another.  This was a square salad size plate with an inch border:  I used a Tombow gray marker to create my string then tangled it like the first one:

This one is oriented correctly

This one flipped clockwise when I uploaded it!

And here are both plates ready for the auction!  Well - almost.  I have to spray them with a poly coat first...

Another project that is nearly completed is my "envisioning" piece.  I took the 3" tiles and traced them randomly on a large 16x20 cotton fiber paper.  I drew a string behind all of the tiles and tangled the spaces as I felt led.  Some tangles were chosen because of their "elemental" meaning - droplets and waves for water, florz, and knightsbridge for their foundation/earth feel - others were chosen because they represent something important to me - the scrolls represent my degree completion, jetties always look like bouncy-balls so they represent my grandson, etc. And Abbe Road (among others) reminds me of my anam cara, MaggieKat.  All of these things are important in my life and in my vision of my future life of abundant joy and well-being.  Now I need to search for the right words or images to add in the tile spaces.  I hope someone else will take a chance on some Z.I.A. (zentangle inspired art) and envision their own perfect self.

Initial draft from my sketchbook

Just need to add my visions now!

OK... one more.  I wanted to try the new tangle Tuftid on Linda Farmer's Tangle Patterns site. I tend to tangle at times when I have to be quiet or still - neither of which are easy for me.  So - I typically start a tangle during church (I know people wonder what on earth I'm doing, but I think I'm less distracting when I tangle than when I fidget!).  Here's Tuftid and friends:

Happy Tangling!

Challenge #33 Pendrills

I just need to say that my homemade chocolate zucchini bread is to die for!  Ok... now that's out of the way, on to tangling.

This week the challenge is to use a new tangle pattern by Rick and Maria, founders and creators of Zentangle,  I have looked at a lot of the other takes on this design and am in awe of the various ways Pendrills has been used by others.  I'm still not that comfortable with it but I am going to share what I've done anyway.  I wanted to make it stand out in my finished tile...I'm not sure I accomplished that.  Oh well.

I practiced awhile last night with branching off in multiple directions and turning the piece.  I kept ending up with something that looked like a dream catcher... so I drew a dream catcher!  great... I'm having scanning issues.  Maybe dream catchers are like faeries... you can't capture them by camera or scanner, it seems.  If I figure it out, I'll post it later.  Anyway - this is my first attempt at using Pendrills in a tile format

I like parts of it but I like my finished tile better.

I'll post more later when I am feeling less technically frustrated and less disjointed.  Mercury in retrograde seems to be messing with me more than usual!  

Happy tangling!

Oh - here's the best I can do on the dreamcatcher... sigh

Before the new challenge is revealed...

It's been an interesting weekend.  I now know what "bored to tears" means.  It's been such a busy summer so far that when I found myself with nothing (that I wanted) to do after I submitted my dissertation topic for review on Saturday morning that I literally cried while watching a Hallmark Channel movie - and, trust me, the movie wasn't good enough to warrant tears!  So - I decided to tangle.  "Why didn't you think of that earlier," I hear you asking?  Ok... so it was a V8 moment, for sure.  I had been thinking about what it is that I really want to manifest in my life.  I am a firm believer of "be careful what you ask for" - been there, done that, have few scars to prove it!  So I sat down and wrote out some notes, placed them on my sketchbook and loosely traced around the notes.  I then created a string connecting all of my "non-negotiables" and the following is a draft of what will eventually become a larger piece.  The finished piece will use the official Zentangle tiles in place of the post-it notes for larger open spaces to representations of my dreams/desires/needs.  You'll see they are not listed on the draft piece... I'm leaving my options open for awhile.

Feeling less "needy" and more centered, I decided to tackle a "tile noir" - I really need to get over my fear of making a mistake... very little in life is truly perfect.  It's that erroneous notion that anything we do as humans could ever reach perfection that fuels the pharmaceutical industry (and keeps me in busy during the week).    Assuming that others are scrutinizing and judging everything about us - our size, our clothes, our hair cut/color, our messy house, our wayward (read: perfectly normal) children - keeps us in a state of constant panic and self-doubt.  Most of the time I am quite capable and successful at letting that stuff go, but when it comes to committing words or lines to paper I feel that old self-judging worry monster crawl up onto my shoulder and whisper negative words of discouragement in my ear.  Anyway - last night I flicked the little bugger off my shoulder, grabbed my first black tile and white jelly roll pen and just drew.

I'm a fan.  It was fun and I am sure I will like my future attempts much better.  But for now, in all of it's imperfection, I kind of like my "dark side."

All in all the weekend has not been as bad as I feared.  I had a nice lunch with friends, took a great nap, and then baked homemade whole wheat and flax crackers just because I had all of the ingredients.  The cooler temps from the weekend will give way to more high heat and humidity as thee coming week progresses and I am sure there will be a few more challenges.  But I am looking forward to seeing where my manifesting takes me and waiting for news of the birth of a new baby girl in my family.  Oh, and what new challenge Diva sends our way.

Shalom!

String Theories (Challenges 29 and 30)

So... I am behind in posting my offerings for the past two weeks' challenges. I wish I could say it's because I've been diligently working on my dissertation but that would be a big, fat fabrication! I really have to buckle down and start working on that. For now, while I wait for inspiration, motivation, mojo, or kick in the pants I will keep tangling!

The first tangle is my take on challenge #30 for which we were asked to use our first and last initials in block or script. Since my first and last are the same, I decided to use one block and one script. I kind of like what I ended up with:

The next are my offerings for challenge #29 which used a real string (or my interpretation of a string) that was weighted. For my weights I used two of my favorite objects: a sodalite pendulum and a double butterfly pendant.

Here's what I ended up with for #29. The first two used the pendulum and the last one used the butterfly/heart necklace:

My next adventure will be using the black tiles! I'm a little intimidated...

I'm behind

So what else is new?? Between starting a new quarter in my school process (it's dissertation time!) and returning to work after 10 days off, I have fallen behind on posting my weekly Zentangle challenges. I've done #29 but haven't posted it yet. I have added a direct link through the gadget-thingy on the left to the weekly challenges in case you want to play, too.

I'll be back... but for now I really need to get dressed for work.

Challenge #28

There is a website link on the left bar for "I Am Diva" - Diva is really Laura. She has been challenging us for the past 28 weeks to take tangling to new heights (and depths). I have enjoyed most of them - some have been more challenging than others. All are welcome to play. She creates these lovely slide shows after we submit our offerings that are simply awe-inspiring! So here is my offering for this week's challenge. If you like what you see and want to join in the fun, pop on over to Diva's site.

The patterns used in the challenge are Tripoli (the challenge focus), Droplets, Betweed, and Dex.