Diva #273 - Tangle remix

This week's Diva challenge - you know what it is because you came to this site via the Diva's page.

I chose to remix a tile I created about a year ago. In this tile I was experimenting with a design I'd seen on the Zentangle website.

I remixed it this evening, using better drawing skills and improved attention to detail, as well as colour. Still not happy with the Hollibaugh/Quib but you can't have everything. Rick and Maria often say that mistakes can be turned into something special. However, I find mistakes just lead to a promising tile looking a bit um, er, not quite it. Still, I did enjoy the process of drawing.

Something to look forward to - drawing with Shelly Beauch

Next week I have the very great pleasure of spending two days drawing with Shelly Beauch CZT. Yay!

I visited Shelly this time last year. I'd been teaching myself Zentangle for about a year but wanted to learn with a person. A bit of research led me to Shelly, then the exchange of some emails and there I was, in Northern Tasmania spending two days at Shelly's place, getting invaluable one-to-one instruction in the wonderful art form of Zentangle.

It's thanks to Shelly that I have this blog and that I participate in online challenges, such as the Diva and IAST. Both of these challenges - the challenges themselves and the links to other artists - have improved my skills enormously and given me countless hours of pleasure.

And I'm about to see Shelly again. Yay x lots !

Solo travel

I fly out of Canberra early Sunday morning and arrive in Launceston late morning (travel time from my door to Launceston will be about 7 hours), spend the afternoon doing whatever I feel like, then the next two days with Shelly. After that I'm off to the NE coast for a few days again doing whatever I feel like. I'll be staying near a place called the Bay of Fires National Park. The last night will be in a village on the outskirts of Launceston.

I'm travelling on my own. This will be my 3rd solo holiday in the last year. For me, solo travel is about regaining confidence in myself and my abilities, and about seeing places and people with new eyes. It's a totally different experience to travelling with other people. 

When I'm on my own, I'm more likely to chat to locals, I'm more likely to take in my surroundings and really explore. I get less-stressed if I get lost and gain confidence when I get myself un-lost. And I spend a lot of time drawing.

Stay tuned for photos next week.

A photo of Arthur

Couldn't resist adding this photo to my blog. I'd left the study to take photos of my tiles (the light is better in another room). Came back to find this impatient critter waiting for me. 

Thanks for your comments. I love reading them.

Miss L

Diva #272 - Black and white and red

This week's Diva challenge is to use red in our tiles. Red is not a colour is use very often so it was fun to let go and play. Here are my two tiles.

This tile features cyme x fengle, flux, 'dillo and mooka.

My second tile uses Skye as one of the axes of Squill. 

A tiny 10 seconds of fame

Did you receive the latest Zentangle newsletter? If you did, did you look at the screen shot of the tangle mosaic for Ellish? One of my tiles is on there. It's the pink swirly one in the middle.

That's my 10 seconds of fame in the world of Zentangle. I was very excited to see my tile up there. I post tiles under the name of TheCreativeMissL (surprise surprise!).

Winter in Canberra = rain and truffle season

I had the very great pleasure of trying my first ever fresh truffle a couple of years ago. Since then, I indulge just a little bit in truffles during our truffle season, which goes from about June to maybe August?

I'm the only one in my family who likes them. My Saturday lunch treat (and Sunday lunch treat) was truffled eggs on spelt loaf toast, followed by mandarins that I picked from our own tree.

I bought all the ingredients at our local farmer's market. On my out of the market shed I saw this little cutie. Couldn't resist taking a photo. He's wearing a particular type of coat called a Dryzabone, which is an iconic rain coat worn by farmers in Australia. These coats often feature in the design of what our Olympic athletes wear, so you get the significance. This was the first time I'd seen one on a dog.

Canberra - the bush capital

Another iconic image of Australia is of our kangaroos. Most Australian's live in cities and don't see them often, except in zoos. However, in Canberra we get to see them often. I live near a golf course which is near farm land and native forest reserves, so I'm lucky enough to be able to see these creatures nearly every day. Even so, I never tire of seeing them.

Today I had to stop and take photos of this mob (BTW: the term 'mob' is the correct way to describe a group of kangaroos; herd of cows, murder of crows, mob of kangaroos). My photo shows only a small part of the mob who were sunning themselves on the practice fairway.

Thanks for dropping by.

Miss L

Diva challenge #271 - Beads of Courage

This week's challenge is a special one. It is based on Beads of Courage, which are beads little kids get who suffer chronic illnesses tell and track the story of their medical journey. She asks us to use this idea as our inspiration for our tile(s).

My first tile represents my own beads of courage. Regular visitors to this blog know that I'm a breast cancer survivor. I used the Breast Cancer ribbon for my string and Tangles starting with the letter B for my beads. 

My tile is therefore a 'Beads for Boobs with B tangles' tile. Tangles I used include Barney, Bateek, Bunzo, Bales, Bask-it, Baton, Balo, Beelight, Borbz and Buttercup.

A special shout out to the amazing Linda Farmer and her Tanglepatterns.com website. I referred to her site during the making of tile as most of the Tangles I used were new to me and I couldn't deconstruct them on my own.

My next tile was just me playing around with colour. I used Buttercup again. I was never able to draw it before but now it's working for me.

Other drawing

I've been doing lots of other Zentangle drawing lately. Today I'm only going to share one. It's a work-in-progress ZIA on A3 card stock. The idea came from a recent IAST challenge set by Adele Bruno which asked us to use Fengle as a string.

You can see that I've done that, and added Ellish and Skye, which have been featured in a few Zentangle challenges and blogs of late.

The finished piece will have colour. Not sure where, just that I want to add bright pops of colour to enhance and not detract from the Tangles.

Here it is.

No more excuses

This mantra seems to be working for me. I've been to the gym for four days in a row and will be going again for the next couple of days.

I can now do full push ups on my toes and I have muscles in my arms that I can see AND feel. 

My thoughts, heart and prayers go to those people affected by the shooting in Florida.

Have a good week.

Miss L

Fengle on Opus

This week's It's a String Thing challenge was to use Fengle as a string.

I decided to go big with this one, using an Opus tile and multiple Fengles.

Tangles I used within the Fengles include: Printemps x Tipple, Mooka, Paizel, Fescue, Aquafleur, and a version of 'Nzeppel. Tangles surrounding the Fengles include Flux, Rixty and Printempts.

Miss L