This week's Diva challenge
The challenge this week was to use Skye. Now this is one I break the Zentangle rules for and use a pencil first. Sometimes rules are meant to broken, right?
Here's my first tile, featuring Skye and Tipple. I coloured it afterwards using simple pan water colours. This tile is amongst my best work.
My next two tiles are OK. I like my Skye and I like the other elements but I'm not thrilled with how they work together. Need more practice with Mooka I think.
Other drawing
This weekend I've been playing with geometric dinosaurs. Huh? Do a google search and you'll find lots of dinosaurs filled with lovely triangles, just waiting for you to print out and fill with Tangles.
My first try I filled with Paradox.
My next try I filled with Puf which is a relative of Fasset.
The last one I filled with Puf but in colour, as you can see, with a back and foreground of Hollyhock, Sanibelle, 3-Loops-6 and a touch of Flux. I haven't used these Tangles in combination before but I'm going to again.
Eating out
A shout out to Andrew at Versatile. The Husband and I had dinner there on Saturday night. We felt the need for some time together and we found this place, just a short drive from us. The menu is described as being 'Modern Australian'. For those of you not in Australia, that is code for combining whatever ingredients the chef feels like, using whatever cultural references or techniques they want to.
The food was delicious. The ambience relaxed and quiet. The host entertaining. We'll be back. Andrew, you have been warned.
My dessert was a re-imagining of a Cherry Ripe, which is chocolate bar we get in Oz. Chocolate, cherries and coconut. Yum, yum, yum.
No more excuses
I have broken my no more excuses plan into strategies. Here's how I'm going with each.
Exercise more.
- I've joined my local gym.
- It is ugly, crowded with equipment, and has both men and women. (I've found the mix is far less intimidating than women-only gyms)
- It is also INSIDE and out of the cold, meaning that I have actually been going to it.
Drink more water. My tips for doing this are:
- drink and blog
- drink and surf the internet
- drink and draw
- drink and cook dinner
Eat more veggies
I planted a lettuce garden. The plants are pick-and-come-again types, so I just pick the leaves I want when I need them.
Your comments
Your comments lift my spirit and inspire me to keep going, keep drawing, keep playing with cake, keep exercising. I will try and return the favour.
Miss L
Diva Challenge
This week's Diva challenge was to use the new Tangle Ellish. I took the Diva's advice and looked at some examples of this tangle on the Zentangle app. But then I had to stop looking because (1) I was being put off by how intricate many of the tiles were and (2) I wanted to do this challenge with fresh eyes.
My first tile is not that great. I have included it as I received lots of positive comments from people when I've shared mistake tiles in the past. So, here's tile 1. I kept it simple with Jetties, which are not a Tangle that I use very often.
For my next tile I chose one of my coloured tiles. I coloured a batch of these weeks ago. I added Antidots and Mooka. After doing this tile, I think I'd like to spend some time on the weekend exploring this new Tangle some more and seeing what other Tangles it matches with. The Tangles 'dillo, Ta Da, and Tamisolo come to mind.
Other drawing
Not much this week because I've been doing other things. I did submit a tile last week for Adele Bruno's It's a String Thing challenge. The feature tangles were Skye and Antidots. Skye is hard work but worth it.
More cake
Moo and I decided to do some more cake decorating on the weekend. We had such a blast the the decorating course the weekend before that we wanted to keep going.
Our cakes are going to my school tomorrow as part of The Biggest Morning Tea which is a Cancer Council fundraiser.
My cake is the one with the dots. Moo's is the one with the stars.
Apologies for not visiting your blogs
Normally I spend time visiting other people's blogs, particularly around Diva Day. Lately that hasn't been happening. Very sorry for that and sorry that my absence may continue for a bit. There's been a bit going in the family which I'm not going to blog about. That's calmer now but it is end of semester report time. Being a humanities and English teacher, the marking work load is big. And I'm trying to get back into the gym.
So, many apologies for not stopping by to comment on your blogs. I am probably still looking, just not saying hi.
Have a good week.
Miss L
Diva challenge
This week's Diva challenge was to incorporate more black into a tile than we'd normally use.
I did that with my first tile, which uses Sandy Steen Batholomew's Mumsy and Skein tangles. I then did the same tangles and design but on a black tile. What do you think? I rarely ever use black tiles, so this was a big step out of my comfort zone.
Once I had my black tiles out, I thought I'd do another one. This one features two favourite tangles - Flux and Printemps.
Other drawing
I haven't been doing much drawing lately. Lots of other things going on. I did find time to do this ZIA. The basis is Fengle with favourites (Purk, Shattuck, Tipple, Flux, Puf and Dex). I've drawn on a A5 300gsm card stock, which is my go-to paper when I don't want to use a Zentangle tile. Nice and simple.
Cake Day
Last Sunday was Cake Day. Not for you? It was for my daughter Moo and I.
We spent the day (from 9.30am to 6.30pm) learning how to decorate a cake. This was part birthday and part Mother's Day present.
I'm not a cake decorator and have no real desire to become one. However, I do like learning new creative skills and I do enjoy cooking. Although no cooking was involved in this occasion, I think there might be some cake cooking in my future.
I've written a page on this blog about it and where I've put more photos. Here are just a couple.
Have a great week. Thanks for your comments and for simply dropping by.
Miss L
Diva challenge
This week the challenge was to combine Poke Root and Drupe into a tile but not as two distinct Tangles.
The first one is a simple black and white.
The second one was intended to be black and white as well but those Poke Roots were crying out for some colour. I used my new bigger set of Inktense pencils.
Other drawing
On Monday I was lacking inspiration but still wanted to draw. I turned to Sandy Steen Bartholomew's Yoga for your Brain. I've decided to slowly work my way through this book, learning some of the Tangles and Tangellations that Sandy demonstrates.
I chose the Tangles Slurp and Muffit because I like the Tangles, not just their names (which are cute). I used string #184 for my first tile.
Fail. Fail. Fail.
Decided to go back to basics and choose Tangles that actually complement each other. I stuck with Slurp and added Warped Eggs. Much happier with this tile.
Also did some drawing on the weekend. I created a simple ZIA of flowers for Mothers' Day. Mothers' Day is a day of mixed emotions for me. My relationship with my children is great but the same cannot be said for my relationship with my mother.
Dinner at Jamie's
I'm sure readers of this blog would have heard of celebrity chef Jamie Oliver. He has a restaurant in Canberra called 'Jamie's Italian'. We went there for dinner on Saturday night - part birthday for me (not quite 50 yet) and Mothers' Day.
Dinner was super lovely. Food was high standard, as usual, and my family were funny and talkative and wonderful. We went across the road for dessert. Here are photos of my meal (I feel so 21st Century doing that!). My main included kale. Erk. Why bother with this plant when spinach tastes better and cooks more evenly?
No More Excuses
This is the name for my get fitter, lose weight and exercise more plan.
My weight is coming down slowly. I'm not a perfect human so it did go up a bit over the weekend due to not exercising as much as I should, eating at Jamie's and having a cocktail with dinner (Jamie's make a delicious vanilla and lemon martini. I also helped Moo finish her Mojito - nice but not as good as my martini).
I met with a personal trainer at my gym yesterday. That was useful. Meeting him again next week so he can show me the weights exercises. This week I'm working on a new cardio program and some core strength exercises. It was good to be able to check in with him this afternoon to make sure I was doing the core exercises correctly. I expect to be very sore tomorrow.
Have a good week
Miss L
Diva challenge tiles
Here are my Diva tiles for this week.
The first is simply Crux with some broken Crux tiles in the corner.
The second uses Crux as a border with Pubfluer in the middle. The latter is a tangle I found in a book by Cris LeTourneu. Dex is in the corners.
ZIA
This is a ZIA I created on the weekend, inspired by a table that Adele Bruno made. See more of her work at tickled to tangle.
No more excuses - progress
I have been making great progress with my No More Excuses health program. My weight has started to come down, slowly, which is what I want. Energy levels are up. Pain in my knees, elbows and hips has decreased - not from the weight loss because that is not much but from the increased exercise I do. Maybe. I think. I'm rewarding myself by going for walks instead of sitting in front of the TV. Sugar cravings are still an issue but, hey, it's only been 3 weeks since I started this program and I've had issues with sugar for years.
I've also joined a gym. This is so that I can get cardio in during winter (mornings here are already below 5 degrees and it is only early May) and get help with exercise. Like a lot of comments last week, I do need to be careful of injury. Advice from the gym people should help there.
Thanks for your support and encouragement.
Miss L
