This week’s string thing challenge #121 is tree themed to mark the occasion of the lighting of the National Christmas tree in Washington, D.C. The challenge is to create a tile using a triangular tree-shaped string and fill it with the official Zentangle pattern Aquafleur. Adele was inspired by a beautiful Aquafleur tree tangled by CZT Carole Ohl (link). A step out for Aquafleur (by Maria Thomas) is available here.
Dilip Patel, CZT09 is the guest blogger for Diva Challenge #246. His challenge is to create monotangle trees as a way of artistically expressing and supporting the global need for afforestation. What a lovely challenge!
I made two tangles. My first tile features Twiggy, a pattern by Sandy Steen Bartholomew. I added the green branches to symbolize new growth.
My second tangle comes from my sketchbook. This monotangle features Wist by Shelly Beauch. The tree shape was modeled off of a Yoshino cherry tree that is in my front yard.
Thank you Dilip for such a meaningful and beautiful challenge this week!
This week the Diva’s challenge is to get back to basics with Hollibaugh. Laura points out that returning to basics with a foundational pattern such as Hollibaugh can be a helpful exercise. A step out is available here.
While I followed the spirit of the challenge, I took a major liberty by monotangling Btl Joos — but in Hollibaugh-style. Btl Joos is a pattern by Sandy Steen Bartholomew, and you can find a step out here on her blog. The pattern is very reminiscent of the movie Beetlejuice, isn’t it? My tile was fun to draw. All of the winding around and crossovers were an interesting challenge.
Laura’s mention that Tuesday was World Prematurity Day has personal significance for me too. My oldest child was eight weeks premature. The reminder brought back memories of her time in the neonatal intensive care unit. It was a good while ago, because my “little peanut” has grown up to be a lovely young woman. She is currently a college student and she’s doing great!
This week’s Diva challenge #244 is to create a tile using the official Zentangle pattern Tripoli. A step out for Tripoli is available here. The Diva explains that Tripoli has been somewhat of a challenging tangle for her, and she provides some hints for drawing the pattern. Her primary tip is to keep the spaces between the triangles the same. Consistency is important.
I have to admit that since beginning to tangle a year ago, Tripoli has been a rather elusive tangle for me. I have worked at it over time, and have seen some improvements with Tripoli, but still it never quite seemed to gel. At last the Diva’s tip really seemed to click for me.
With my tile I wanted to experiment with small Tripoli, medium Tripoli, equilateral Tripoli, and oblong Tripoli. While I am not entirely pleased with everything about this tangle, I am happy about how my groupings of Tripoli came out — especially the ones with oblong triangles. They are better than my previous attempts.
Thanks to the Diva for another fun and educational challenge!
This is the first time that I have participated in Erin Koetz Olson’s weekly Zendala Dare which she hosts on her blog. I love mandalas (and zendalas!) so it was high time that I give the Zendala dare a try.
The template for this week includes six large ovals, so the first tangle that I thought of was Uncorked (by Adele Bruno). It seemed to work well in the rounded spaces. Next I tangled a border of Tipple surrounding the ovals, and then I filled the triangle shapes at the edges with Hibred.
Thank you Erin for the lovely template and Zendala dare this week!
For this week’s Diva challenge we are asked to intentionally leave most of the tile blank, and to give “just a tiny taste” of the tangle. Laura points out that there is usually a tendency to fill up every space when tangling, so the idea to not use up all or most of the space is indeed a challenge.
I have two entries. My first tile features a pie-shaped grid using the tangle Heartfully by Helen Williams of A Little Lime. I love this pattern, so it seemed a natural one to draw for this challange. Also, I am intrigued by Helen’s wonky grids, so I thought a pie-shaped grid would fit the bill for “wonky” here.
And wouldn’t you know it, Helen posted a brand new heart shaped tangle pattern last night. So of course I had to try it out! The “just a tiny taste” theme seemed to call out for Heartswell. Here is my first attempt at drawing this lovely pattern. It is taken from a page out of my stetchbook. (I’m also experimenting with a new signature).
As always, thanks to the Diva for another fun challenge!
For the “It’s A String Thing” #117 challenge we are to make a monotangle using Adele’s brand new pattern Sand. Adele has created a specially designed string for this challenge (included in her post). A step out for the pattern Sand is available here.
Sand is a lovely circle grid pattern. I like how versatile this pattern can be. For this challenge I chose to make a grid that covered the entire tile, but tried to vary the styling for each of the “quadrants” indicated by the string. The portion in red is intended to represent the area covered by the circle in the string.
As always, thank you Adele for the opportunity to stretch my tangling skills! I enjoyed trying out Sand, and am pleased with my resulting tile.
In this week’s Diva challenge #242 we are given the opportunity to create a tile using the latest official tangle, Gourdgeous. A step out can be found here in the official Zentangle newsletter. Gourdgeous, as the name suggests, is a pattern which resembles a gourd. Very suitable for the autumn holidays!
So, I am later than I had hoped in posting my entry for this challenge. Part of the delay concerned my difficulty in “mastering” (and I’m really using the term loosely here) Gourdgeous. It took a fair amount of trial and error, but I think I more or less have it down now. My other problem was that I was bothered by pain in my left thumb joint, wrist, and lower arm for a couple of days. I’m left handed and the only thing to do was to rest my hand until the pain subsided. Happily I can report that it is better now.
My tile includes a large, centrally placed Gourdgeous tangle, surrounded by a grid of sparkling Bales. Thanks Laura for another fun and challenging round!
After missing several rounds of the “It’s A String Thing” challenge I am back for challenge #116. The theme has to do with Halloween. We are to use TanglePatterns string 095 by Sandra Hart. Appropriately enough the string looks like several candy corns arrayed in different directions. The strings of choice are: Chartz, Cadent, Cracked, and Confettus. Click each text link to be taken to a step out for each of the patterns.
I enjoyed this challenge and liked the Halloween theme of Candy Corn. Thank you Adele for another fun challenge!
Diva challenge #241 features a guest post by Paula Bramante, CZT 15. The theme for this week is “Stones and Ceremony,” and we have the option to use a cairn template (provided) as a string for the challenge. Paula’s post includes more details and examples (diva link above), which I encourage readers to check out.
When I went to see what this week’s Diva challenge is I was very happy to see the stack of stones theme. It’s a little funny but my current desktop background happens to be a photo of a pile of stones. I find it very serene and beautiful to look at, and it reminds me to relax. I also picked up an inexpensive Japanese rock garden at our local dollar store. It is in our living room and I’ve noticed how guests always seem to gravitate to it. Most of the time they will use the little rake to make patterns in the sand, and perhaps rearrange the stones. Very Zen!
For this challenge I used the recommended cairn template as the string. I decided to keep it simple and to use tangles that felt natural. Tangles included are Tipple, Sag, Diva Dance, Mod Box, Sand Swirl, Crescent Moon, Hollibaugh, Printemps, Msst, and Nipa. Thank you for the interesting and meditative challenge, Paula!
