Category Archives: Zentangle

Art Tidbit: How to Zentangle

While I am working on updating this website, I’ll only be posting tidbits each day (with maybe a bit more on Fridays) until the update is completed.

We have been fighting sickness here, so I have nothing created this week. So I thought I’d share some information about how to do a Zentangle. :) Here is a wikihow with info on how to do one. The thing about the wikihow though is that the pictures used a pencil and zentangles are done in ink.

Then you can go to someplace like tanglepatterns.com or pattern-collections.com for a multitude of tangles to use in your pieces.

I hope this is helpful to you and I hope I’ll be back next week with some actual art to share. :)

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Heartizen Day 1: Gotcha (Heart)

While I am working on updating this website, I’ll only be posting tidbits each day (with maybe a bit more on Fridays) until the update is completed.

There is a CZT who created a 14 day heart focused project called Heartizen. You can find the list of tangles by subscribing on her website or watch her fb live replays on here on her youtube channel. I won’t put pressure on myself to tangle every day right now. But I will do some of them.

I wasn’t familiar with the tangle Gotcha. However looking it up afterwards I realized that Aishwarya Darbha modified it. I realized about midway through tangling that I wasn’t following the directions properly. :D So mine is a bit different but that is okay. :)

Oh! She has demonstrated this project on circle tiles rather than squares. It is a nice change. I actually have some of these official tiles that I got from an etsy shop for Christmas some years ago. The one I chose is a buff color, maybe a renaissance tile.

So here is my tile before I did any shading.

Here it is after I did some shading.

Since I didn’t use the right number of “petals” mine turned out a bit different than hers did.

I’m interested to hear if you are participating in Heartizen.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Art Bit: Tangle Narfello

Beginning Jan.4th, while I am working on updating this website, I’ll only be posting tidbits each day (with maybe a bit more on Fridays) until the update is completed.

Zentangle released a new tangle recently. I tried my hand at it. I found my auraing of the original line needs a bit of work in the future. ;) Shading really is the key in this tangle; I’ll have to work on it more. But over all, not a bad first attempt.

It really looks better smaller. ;) You can’t see all my lines as much so it has a better overall look. See?

I hope you have a good day! Thanks for stopping by.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Wednesday Tidbit: Keep It Simple

Beginning Jan.4th, while I am working on updating this website, I’ll only be posting tidbits each day (with maybe a bit more on Fridays) until the update is completed.

I found a tangling group on MeWe. I asked about a weekly “challenge” and they decided to do a “prompt”. So this week’s prompt is to use your initial as your string. Then someone else suggested using your favorite tangles.

It took a little thinking to figure out how to work Ratoon into a string of straight lines. But I did it and I definitely kept it simple. If you don’t feel like you have to create a masterpiece, it is easier to create something.

(Since this is a tidbit, I’m only including the one picture this week.)

I didn’t have my correct tortillon and was using an old one, so things aren’t as sharp as I’d like them but it’s the first tile of 2021. :)

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Silver Foil Cosmic Flower

I always like to use the scratch-off tiles when I’m not feeling much like doing any art or when I’m not feeling very creative.

I was tempted to try my hand at either the Frosty tangle or the gnomes I’ve been seeing around facebook. I looked at the suggested tangles in the Tangle All Around group and saw one that I have used before and enjoyed. :) So I gladly tangled away.

Of course, foil scratch-off tiles don’t photograph very well. So here are a few different shots.

The next one was taken without a flash and so it’s kind of blurry. ;) Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

A Little Foil Hollis

I went with another scratch-off tile this week, except this one is the gold foil. I knew it wasn’t going to scan or photograph well, but I wanted the shine of the gold foil for the holiday. :)

One of the Gratitangles for the week is Hollis. I’m not good friends with this tangle but I thought its scrolliness would be nice on the tile. Once I got it on the tile, I realized that my curves/hooks are not as pronounced as they should be, so maybe next time it’ll be better.

I also decided that I wanted more of the gold to show through, so I started “filling” some of the Hollis lines. Some I completely scratched off, others I dotted, and others I stripped.

Then I felt it was still a bit bare, so I added in a few small scrolls/swirls. Then I overdid it. :( But it is what it is.

Here are the pictures. Of course I did this after dark on this rainy and overcast day, so it isn’t natural light. It doesn’t show up very good but here it is anyway.

This first one is the scan…it didn’t turn out at all.

From this angle it doesn’t look like it is shiny gold foil.But it sure is. :) In this angle you can almost see that it is gold. ;) Well, I hope you Americans have a lovely Thanksgiving tomorrow. Ours will be odd but I’m sure it will be good.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Rainbow Rixty Scratch-Off

I needed an easy tile today, so I pulled out the scratch-off tiles. I settled on the rainbow one because I know it will photograph well and I didn’t want any struggles. :D It’s been a crazy week, of which I will elaborate on Friday, but I needed easy today.

One of the week’s tangles for Gratitangles 2020 is Rixty. With its blackened bit, I thought it would look nice on the rainbow tile.

Christmas Present ~ LifeOfJoy.me

So without further adieu, here’s the scan my tile.

I couldn’t find the scratch-off “pencil” that came with it when I started, so I used a skewer. :D And now as I write this I remember that it is in my pen case, with my other tangling supplies. :D

Here is a picture I took . . . once again, I did this after dark so there was no natural lighting. :D

You can see I have some of the scrapings on my finger. ;)

One of the things I like about these tiles is that there is no shading. :) It was fun to do and enjoy the outcome without feeling the need to shade it.

I hope this inspires you to try your hand at some drawing, be it doodling, tangling, or some thing else. It’s good for you.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Gratitangle: Shattuck, Zenith, Poke Root, and Rain

The strings fir this week for the Gratitangles 2020 project were created digitally by Genevieve Crabe for Alice’s, leader of Tangles All Around facebook group, book Tangle Starts Strings. I chose the one with squares. I thought it would be a bit easier to recreate the string than the other options but it was not simple. Mine turned out a little wonky but that’s okay because it adds to the charm of it all. :Dtangle starts string squares by crabe ~ Lifeofjoy.me

Unfortunately I forgot to get a picture of the tile after I drew the string but this is what it was supposed to look like. ;) To say mine was not that precise is an understatement. :D

As you already know by the title of the page, of the seven tangles suggested I chose Shattuck, Zenith, Rain, and Poke Root.

Shattuck is the first one chosen as I figured i could make it work in the spaces provided. However my shattuck seems to be a cross between shattuck and crescent moon. ;) Originally I had planned to only use two tangles but after starting to tangle shattuck, I decided that it needed to stop after one quadrant.

Rain surprised me. I wasn’t sure if I could make it work in the space but I like how it turned out. And because I liked that, I went ahead with Zenith. I have not used Zenith very many times. It’s not been one I’ve really liked but using it on this tile, I liked it and it is very straight forward too.

The last one I used was Poke Root. Admittedly, not my favorite tangle but other choices were Betweed, Auraknot, and Mooka. Although I have made friends with Betweed, I couldn’t see me getting that one on this string without frustration. Auraknot and I have not become friends yet, although I can tangle it but I couldn’t see how to do so in the space provided. Same goes for Mooka. So Poke Root won in the end, by default. :D

Here is the scan of my tile before shading.

With it being autumn and back to normal time, it gets dark way to early for this procrastinator to get natural light pictures. So here is a picture I took inside with a flash. ;)

Then I did some shading. I used my mechanical pencil for some of it because the spaces were so small that I wanted that fine point to get to them. ;)

First the scan then the pic.

I like how it turned out. However looking at it now, I can see that it would have been cool if I had just used one tangle throughout the whole tile. Hmmmm . . .

I’m very thankful for my hubby! He has put up with me for over thirty years. :) Our lives are a lot like this string, looped together and connected to other family. I guess, I’ll have to add the word HUBBY to the bottom of that tile; it is Gratitangles, after all. ;)

Well, that is all for me today. I hope you are taking time to be creative at least a little throughout your day/week. I’m very glad for this day on my blog because it forces me to actually DO some art. I love it but I don’t always take the time to DO it.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

Gratitangles 2020: Fife

Well, clearly I did not do Inktober! :D It’s okay though; I’m not going to beat myself up about it. However, I remembered that Alice from Tangles All Around facebook group said she had some new project for November, so I decided to check it out.

Turns out it is the yearly Gratitangles by Lisa Anderson CZT. I’m not going to be legalistic with it though. I’ll do at least one a week. ;)

Oh, the suggestion is to put something for which you are thankful on the tile. Mine today is Family. :) It is always the first thing for which I am thankful and then when I think of the next thing, I remember I am soooo very thankful for God and all Jesus has done for us.

So on this first #gratitangle2020 I am using the suggested tangle for November 3rd: Fife. With the time change, I didn’t get my tile done early enough to take any pictures outside. :( So I did the best I could.

I decided to write Family across the middle. Unfortunately, I started it a little to close to the center and it went too close to the right edge but it works. No family is perfect. :D

 

Then I put in the dots for Fife and started connecting them.

 

And then I realized I hadn’t finished the tangle. :p

Then I searched for some Fife examples and and realized that I really like it with blackened sections. Here’s the scan of the finished tile.

I added a bit of shading. I like how it turned out but I probably could’ve added even more shading. I seem to be a bit light-handed where shading is concerned. I guess I’m still afraid of ruining all my efforts. ;)

Here are some pictures of the completed piece.

I truly am very thankful for family–all of my family! I’m so blessed with a wonderful daughter-in-love who enjoys spending time with us and makes every effort to ensure her son knows, loves, and enjoys his grandparents, in spite of them living two hours away. I love you Lauren and am thankful for you and all you do. :)

Well, that’s my art for this week. It felt good to do some lettering and tangling again. Tiffany and I are wanting to do another Bob Ross painting. We thought we might do one yesterday and even talked about it as we drove to our polling place but I enjoyed talking with Lauren and Liam when we got home and Tiff and I never did get around to that painting. :D Maybe tomorrow we will.

I hope you will do something creative–it’s really good for you.

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº

NOT Inktober: Waybop

When I started Inktober, I wondered if I should do on piece sectioned into 31 different pieces. I talked with Tiffany about it and thought I’d like individual tiles better. Some of my best tiles (on display) are ones I did in daily challenges, so I envisioned some of these being as good and replacing them in the display frame.

But then things fell apart and I realized that I’d made the wrong decision. Daily inking is not happening for me this year.

Yesterday I did some Christmas shopping with my sister and daughter. I was gone most of the day. By the time we returned, I was exhausted! I’d intended to take some pictures at Ross for my blog post but was so tired by the time we got there that I didn’t remember to do so.

Consequently, when we got home I had to figure out what to do for my blog today. I glanced through the tangles and saw Waybop. I really like this tangle so I decided to tangle it on one of my stained tiles. But I was so tired that I was unable to even pick a tile. :D I had Tiffany pick one.

She picked one, then another, and then a third one. Finally she settled on the third one.

These are all the same tile. I made them back in August with my friend as we played with my Lindy’s Magicals powders (see that post here).

I decided that I wanted to have a Waybop centered around some of that lovely shimmer. So I opted to draw several waybops on the tile. Eight seeds is my preferred number but I also did one with just six and then in the corner I used just three.

I took a few pictures so you could see the lovely shimmer, as well as the tangling.

I opted not to do any shading because I’m just too tired, which is also why there are no scans. (I don’t know, I might feel up to scanning it later today and adding it.)

Well, I hope your inktober is going better than mine. :D Happy inking!

Until next time, God bless,

Michele ºÜº