Crescent Present

Crescent Moon is like a gift--a present from Zentangle, as it is so satisfying and so versatile. It is also a great tangle for keeping you in the moment--the present. You have to really focus on coloring in those half-circles and spacing those auras, but it's such a joyful focus. It's no wonder Crescent Moon is used by Rick and Maria and probably nearly every CZT in introductory classes. It's a classic.

And Crescent Moon is the focus on this week's Diva Challenge (#72). I am excited about this challenge, as it will give me a place to send students to see a ton of beautiful ways that Crescent Moon can be utilized and tangleated. Without further ado, here is my first contribution to this Tanglation Nation Crescent Moon Challenge.
 

Pea-nuckle Pasta Parfait

Molly Hollibaugh's new tangle, Pea-nuckle, does actually remind me of pasta--cavatappi, to be precise! Those hollow, ribbed spirals that I didn't even know about until recently. Such a cool pasta! I'm not sure what parfait has to do with it...but I liked the way it sounded. And Pea-nuckle indeed comes together in distinct layers.

The Diva chose Pea-nuckle for Challenge #71 (click to connect to her blog post about it), and I am barely getting it in before the end of the week. It was the last week of school, for me as well as my kids, and was a doozy, but I didn't want to miss yet another challenge! I do plan to go back and complete #71, the Sepia challenge. But here is what I "knuckled down" to complete and submit this week:

It was fun, and I enjoyed the challenge of making
Pea-nuckle come together. My way of striating it in this tile makes the foreground shapes look like striped zucchinis or super long, skinny watermelons. (Such a food-focused blog entry this is!) So I think next time I will not do it quite this way. As I was working, I had several ideas for several other approaches I'd like to try with this tangle, but for the sake of getting the tile done, I forged ahead and just strove to be consistent. I did not even use another tangle...I just added auras to the background, with a few swirls and some weighting/rounding thrown in to keep things interesting.

Today I enjoyed a delicious lunch with my parents and my kids at the Tomato Head in Maryville--what a treat! In fact, though none of us had it, I do believe they serve cavatappi as the pasta on the kids menu! Mostly Tomato Head is known for delicious pizza and salads, sandwiches, and burritos. It offers a wide range of vegetarian options, and the food is always fresh and interesting, not to mention yummy.

Afterwards, a short stroll down the street brought me to an art studio where I met Cindy McDannel, an artist and teacher who had contacted me earlier this spring to do a demo in June for Fine Arts Blount, a non-profit artist association in Maryville. I'm all set up for the June meeting! Just a quick demo. Should be fun!

In other news...I stopped into the Knoxville Book Arts Guild's meeting last week to introduce Zentangle. Thanks to Louise Ragle for inviting me...Louise had seen my presentation to the Smoky Mountain Quilters back in  April, and thought her book arts guild would enjoy learning about Zentangle. I think they did, and I know that I truly enjoyed learning about this local group. I met some wonderful artists, and can't wait to go to future meetings. Zentangle and book arts are a fantastic match!

Groovy Grin

I'm smiling because I completed a Diva Challenge tile earlier this week!

Challenge #69 is the fourth UMT Challenge ("Use My Tangle"), and I am so glad to be introduced to a new-to-me tangle: "Groovy" by Eden in Georgia. Her blog is Cut'n It Up...and Sewing It Back Together.

This isn't going to be along blog post (how uncharacteristic of me!). Here's my tile using Groovy:

Groovy, plus Mooka, Udine, Tagh, and Floo.

Maybe I'll get a second Challenge design turned in this week! Time will tell....

Happy Tangling,
Amy

Two Tangles & Two Scout Events

This week's Diva Challenge (#68), a Duo Tangle challenge, had us utilizing two-- and only two--tangles: Hibred and Strircles.
I don't think I've ever utilized either of these tangles, so I had to step out of my comfort zone on this one. So here it is:

Hibred and Strircles

I goofed up so many times on Strircles...I just had to keep improvising variations as I went along. I had fun, though.

Once again I finished my tile and am posting and the very end of the week...maybe next week I can be a little less last minute! I did start this one much earlier in the week, though: either Monday or Wednesday afternoon. I began it while waiting in my van in the parking lot in the afternoon heat...not typically what one does for "fun," but I actually did not mind the wait at all since I had my Zentangle Kit with me and the weekly challenge on my mind! But alas, my parking lot wait time was not enough to finish, and I had to hunker down and complete it late Saturday night.

So that covers the two tangles.

Erin in the Center, her mom Jackie on the left,
and yours truly on the right.

Now for the two Scout events! I'll tell you in chronological order. A week ago Friday I had the wonderful opportunity to help a Girl Scout Troop earn their art badge. One of my former students, Erin, was coordinating this badge, and she contacted me earlier this spring to see if I could come to a meeting and provide an art experience. I was thrilled to say yes! I planned a more traditional drawing activity for the troop, but also offered Zentangle as an option. Guess which one she chose?!

18 Scouts attended the meeting, and a few Moms were there, too. Caroline was there to assist me (Thank you , Caroline!)  We had a fantastic time. I was so happy to see several of my former students (who attended the elementary school where I teach, but have moved on up to middle school), as well as several girls from Caroline's school. I brought in all my Zentangle books and lots of tiles to display, and some posters...and my computer so I could show them all the online resources that are available...but the majority of our time was spent hands-on, creating their first Zentangle tile.



Troop Mosaic

The second Scout event was with the Boy Scouts. My son and husband are at the Spring Camporee this weekend, and Caroline and I drove to the campground this evening to see my son Joseph get surprised with an honor: he was selected by his troop to be a member of the Order of the Arrow. The OA is like the honor society of Boy Scouts, so you can just imagine how proud I am of him! I don't think I've talked about Joseph in his blog before, as it's a Zentangle-focused blog, and he doesn't tangle (yet!), but since I was talking about Scouts, I just had to share the news. Proud mama moment!

Amandamandala'aladnamadnamA



Crazy post title, huh?! Let me explain.

I was talking to my youngest nephew earlier this week, and he had just learned about the Panama Canal. Which made me think of the best palindrome of all time: A man, a plan, a canal: Panama! I always wished I could come up with a palindrome as cool as that.

Friday afternoon I had a small group of 5th graders working on a special collaborative project in the art room during a smidgon of free time that they had. One of them was wearing a cool screen printed shirt from Hawai'i. Pictured and named on the shirt was the Humuhumunukunukuapua'a fish, the state fish of Hawai'i. I just love the name of that fish! Yes, I can say it! I hadn't thought of that fish in a long, long time, and it made me smile. And made me wish I could name something with a long, unexpected awesome-sounding name like that. (I am familiar with this fish from a unit I taught many years ago about Hawai'i.) Speaking of Hawai'i, I need to shout out a friendly "aloha" to Lois And Earl Stokes, two CZTs who live on the Big Island.

Stay with me, now! The title will soon make as much sense as it ever will.
This week's Diva challenge, to use the Earth as our prompt, introduced us to a new name for Earth, brought to us by the Diva's oldest son, Chewie. Chewie has renamed our planet Amanda. So in their household, they celebrated Amanda Day last Sunday. Sweet!

So I figured if Chewie could rename Earth, I could come up with a palindomic (is that a word? or did I just invent it?), unexpected, awesome long name for my belated Earth Day (aka Amanda Day) post. I love the way Amandamandala runs together and sounds so neat. I almost went even longer by adding the word "day," which coincidently also adds "Amy," to the arrangement of letters
(Amandadaymandala'aladnamyadadnama), but it didn't all fit on one line in my post title bar. And it was just too ridiculous.

This design is a first for me: it is my first Zendala design! A bif thank you to Sandy Hunter, a CZT from Texas. Click here to visit Sandy's latest entry in her tanglebucket blog! And click here to see her beautiful Earth Day/Amanda Day tile. Sandy sent me a blank Zendala tile earlier this spring, and I've been waiting for inspiration to hit. It seemed to me that Amanda Day deserved something special, like a Zendala design. So I took my beautiful round Zendala tile out to my front yard this afternoon, sat on a dilapidated bench that we will be soon getting rid of--thank goodness it didn't collapse!--and took in the fresh air, glorious beauty, and joyful sounds (birds, dogs) of a gorgeous spring day in East Tennessee. And I tangled. In color, for a change--I thought that Earth/Amanda deserved it. I was trying to stick with Earthy-colors, but one of my green Microns is a bit bright! I tried to make it work.
I strove to use tangles that are reminiscent of land and water, plant life and sea life.
I wasn't sure which background to use. So here you see some of my other options...which do you prefer?

This post is now officially too long to write on a completely different subject that I am extremely excited to tell you about... that will have to wait until my next post. So visit me again soon! I have more to tell!
Happy Tangling,
Amy

Aura Exploration: my second tile

I have a second tile to post to this week's Challenge (#66: Laura's Auras). YAY! It's been a while since I have had two to submit.

It was a tiring week; the kids were wild! I had tons of different projects going on with my classes, and stayed at school until 8 pm last night cleaning and getting things put away! I woke up in a fog this morning and felt a complete lack of focus despite everything I need to take care of here at home.

Florentine, Erbluhen, Mi2, & Msst.

So I did what any reasonable tangler would do: I took a few minutes to check out the tiles that others have submitted for this week's challenge. I then sat down and drew this tile after having seen some new tangles that I was eager to try. It's so hard to hunker down on household tasks when there is Zentangle inspiration racing through my mind! I put off the shading until tonight, and kept it simple. I do have a "before shading" scan, but I don't think there's a big enough difference to post them both this time.

Florentine and Erbluehen are by Simone Bischoff, while Mi² is by Mimi Lempart. Click on the names to see step-outs. :-)

I had fun with this!

As always, comments, questions, & suggestions are welcome and quite appreciated!

I Adore a Good Aura...

Time to let the Diva, aka Laura Harms, work her magic and inspire me to complete another Challenge tile! Weekly Challenge #66 is "Laura's Auras"...about which she writes, "Ha, this actually has nothing to do with me, but i just like how Laura and Aura rhyme. :)"

I'm actually quite behind on my Challenge responses. I have several started but not finished, and part of me wants to get some closure on those before moving forward. But that's just foolishness--part of the beauty of the Diva's Challenges is that each one is a fresh start, no need to worry about your Challenge history.

So I went to my new favorite Tangling spot: Gourmet's Market and Cosmo's Caffè , a wonderful kitchen shop paired with a cafe/bistro in Knoxville's Bearden Art District. It was my first time tangling there...but the environment was just right. I knew it would be. It's a cozy, funky, casual, gourmet destination. They carry my favorite chocolate bar: Cinnamon Chili Mexican Style Chocolate, stone ground and handcrafted in small batches by southern chocolate artisans in Nashville, TN: Olive & Sinclair. YUM!!! But I skipped the chocolate today, since I have a few bars at home, and went for the latte, which is now a rare treat for me, as I no longer caffeinate daily like my former coffee--guzzling self.

Mooka, Rick's Paradox, Pweeko, Snircle, Inapod,
Vitruvius, Bales, and Sez.

So here is my response to this week's Challenge. As you can see, I played not only with the concept of auras, but also with line weight and rounding.

This is my first use of Snircles, a fun circular tangle from Sandy Hunter, CZT. Her blog is http://tanglebucket.blogspot.ca/, and I learned about Snircles from Geneviève Crabe's blog, Tangle Harmony.
As I tried to explain to Caroline why I wasn't quite happy with it, she understood and summarized beautifully: "I think maybe you overworked it."

Fortunately, I took a few photos of it in progress at the coffee café, so you can see how it looked before shading.

  . . . before the outermost aura . . .

and after the outermost aura and Sez background. I think I like it better like this than I do shaded. But that's okay...it's all about the process,

as the Diva reminds us. :-)

I would LOVE, love, LOVE to hear your thoughts, questions, suggestions, responses to my art and/or my blog entry. So don't be shy!
Leave me a comment!
And if you are new to my blog, please read my back posts to learn more about me and my amazing tangling daughter Caroline.

Happy tangling!
Amy in TN