J is for Jellyroll...Diva is for Amphora

this week's Diva challenge is a UMT, with Amphora as the featured tangle.

It's a pattern I want to tangle with more. Haven't gotten it out in a long time, and it really is cool looking.

Because I fell in love with Crazy Huggins this past week, I wanted to use it, too. So I made an amphora frame, and filled it with CH.

I also did a line of amphora "inside" the Crazy Huggins... another thing I want to play with is putting a pattern IN another pattern, not filling the space inside a pattern but making it sort of go over the pattern, if that makes any sense. That's what I was trying for with that one line of amphora going up on the right, inside the Crazy Huggins.

So, that one still needs work. But I fetched a colored tile out of my stock, and did this:

After  making that amphora sea slug across the middle the colors themselves cried out for Aura Lea, so I complied. A few highlights in white charcoal pencil, and shading with various Faber Castell and Prismacolor pencils, and I think it turned out okay. It is vaguely Under the Sea-ish, which I've seen some of, from other artists in this challenge.

Now, on to Joey's challenge this week: The Letter J and the tangle Jelly roll

This is on a colored Bijou tile. I took a cue from Michele Wynn's page, who is making her Joey challenge tiles on a theme: Bijou size, with a coordinating color scheme, so she can use them for a project involving pattern sorting. I doubt I'll go that far, but using a bijou appealed to me, so I did.

Jelly Rolls on the bottom with a few Jetties, and Jilli all in the background. I filled in the j string with white charcoal pencil, and outlined it in white gelly roll pen. Jilli looks pretty cool overlaying all that color. I shaded with prisma and Faber Castell.

I do like the Faber Castell pencils. they have a creamier feel, and blend with each other SO nicely. they're oil based, whereas the Prisma's are wax based, and they cost about twice as much as Prismacolor, but their quality is superb. I bought all the "rainbow" colors, plus one brown and one gray. I'll be adding to this a few pencils at a time. They really are nice.

Some sketchbook play:

 I wanted to do a classic zentangle piece, just black and white and shading, using a string and filling with patterns. I used some tangles I haven't touched for a while: Knightsbridge, striping, bunso, and florz. With a little bit of flux, and some misst, printemps (of course) and Mooka is always fun. Hmm, I do like the contrast, and it has enough white space to keep the eye from overload. Hm.

Another tile from Kate Ahrens

She sent this delectable ATC in butterscotch, with Tropicana crossing it. I finished it with my own Concert  beaming up from behind. Shading with brown Faber Castell, highlights with white gelly roller and white charcoal pencil. It did turn out pretty neat looking, eh?

I'll be working on another tile from Kate today, as I've declared this a Stay At Home Day. It's 1:00 pm and I am in my jammies, watching some Hiyao Miyasaki, and relaxing deeply. 

Torsdag

The idea for this pattern came from some clicking around in Celtic and Viking stuff one day. The picture of a wooden statue of a Norse warrior really caught my attention.

This isn't EXACTLY the one, but it's the general idea....so I made a pattern based on what he had carved on the front of him

1) two squares on point, with a line connecting them vertically
2) square spirals in each "corner" Start each one next to where the squares meet the line.
3) a vertical line connecting the spirals, on each side of the initial vertical line


I call it Torsdag, which is Norwegian for Thursday hahahaha! Which means Thor's Day, right?

Pillarph

I woke up with this idea in my head the other day, and eventually got a chance to sit down and work on it. It reminded me of ancient Egypt...what the pharaoh might have had in his palace...pillars perhaps, on either side of his throne? That is where the ph at the end of the name comes from.

1) Two parallel vertical lines, curving slightly outward at the top.
2) an arc across the top, connecting the two curves
3) some stylized "V" shapes, with possibly little strands and dots downward
4) add a rim across the top.


Doesn't it look like pillars from a Pharoah's place?

A Little Bit of Everything

This might turn out to be a lot of pictures with minimal text, as I am at work and it is busy today. People are in chatty moods.


Which sort of brings up my job, since I mention it here often. It is a call center, but not the usual kind where I answer customer questions and solve problems. What I do for a living is providing captions for telephone conversations. This means I'm not talking TO anyone, but directly repeating word for word, whatever I hear in a phone conversation. It's a wonderful service, but as a job it can be a bit tedious...BUT I rose one rung on the "ladder" and became a mentor, thus earning my own cubicle, so I can decorate it how I want! It has a lot of my tiles and larger pieces on it, along with a growing collection of Traveling Tiles. Makes sitting in front of a computer inside three gray half walls a bit more enjoyable.


Sometimes we have lengthy pauses between calls (our idles) where I can settle in and tangle, or read, or watch something pleasant on Netflix. And...most times...our idles are quite short, and today idles are short AND people want to have nice long visits.


So now that I've loaded this with a LOT of text, here are some pictures


the diva has a duo tangle for us this week: Molygon vs Marasu

I was trying to make the Marasu stripes with Molygon sections...and until I shaded it, I wasn't that impressed...LOVE SHADING!


Now, for Joey's challenge, I have a special treat:

Ria Matheussen and I exchanged tiles, and this is just part of what she sent me...from Belgium! I just LOVE traveling tangles! I'm getting mail from so many wonderful places...SO cool.




so, this was her start sent to me. From Belgium.








Do you see that Icanthis? Hmmm?

I decided to make Ria's wonderful green start into my tile for Joey's I challenge...and boy did I have fun! Does it look like glass? The i? hahahaha a glass i! oh my goodness, I'm giddy. Lack of sleep.


Ria also sent me a couple of 3Z tiles, and this is how I finished one:

I decided to go symmetrical with it and ended up liking it a LOT. I've not been overly fond of the triangles, but this one was fun to do! Thank you, Ria for so much fun stuff!




Another tangler I swapped with this week was Kate Ahrens
You can see the wonderful tiles she sent me at her blog. BUT you can also see things here

Fun Mail from Lady Kate! Oooh I just love the depth and richness of these colors!

a little blue Bijou

Don't you just love the straight border on this? I know it has a name...




and this is how I finished:

I thought Star Map seemed the perfect counter to the (I can't remember the name of the little circle spikey tangle, though I've actually used it) and some Aaah's in white gel pen.


The photo doesn't do justice to the wonderful blue of this tile. I have another bijou in red, started by Raye Burnett in my very first TT swap...this one will go right next to Raye's on my cubicle wall :) getting quite a collection going!




A start for Aleesha in Thailand:

Aleesha wanted to swap circles, so using my compass, I created a couple of circles. One of them, I filled with gems...this one, I started and have it in an envelope ready to go to...THAILAND!?


wow...I'm so excited to be getting mail from all these very cool places on the earth. Can't hardly wait to receive fun mail from Aleesha! ha!


And, to finish up, a few pieces that I've been busy with...some finished up a while ago, some just this past week:




Grapes in the Weirdness

The color combination on this one wasn't

appealing, so I tangled on it. It still wasn't

that wonderful, but again, with shading! 

Onomato into the Center

Planet Jumble



This little  brownish one had more color appeal and there was enough circular stuff on there naturally, I just went with it.


and the blue "warp drive" one...it started out as a tile marked for Zendala, with lots of lines radiating out from the center. With a bunch of concentric circles, it would have been set up for something more traditionally mandala-esque. As it was, I decided to run with Onomato, and WOW!

Woah! Waybop!

The Diva Challenge this week was to play with Waybop, the new Zentangle (tm) that is so impressive, and SO much fun!

I started the tipple corner at work, thinking it would be a traveling tile, but when I sat down to this challenge, it was the one I grabbed...tipple ended up playing a pretty big role.

the aura was fun, too 

This week's String Thing Challenge looked interesting, too. I liked the string a lot, for some reason. Usually curves are more my thing. Well, I decided to try this one "Lori Byerly Style"... 
She likes to "bigify" things, and every SINGLE thing she creates is striking and unique. Well, I bigified the Flec to start:

A creek with little cairns along the banks

I ended up liking this one a lot. Oh! that's Lori's "Bublz" pattern in the corners. Even though Edgar doesn't turn me on, I managed to include it.

Also keeping me busy this week have been some Traveling Tangles.

I stayed inside Stephanie's border

 Stephanie Jennifer, from Singapore...SINGAPORE!... sent me this sweet start with Dicso and Bales. I finished it off with Footlites, a little bit of shading, some color int he centers of the Dicso flowers. Such fun! Singapore. wow.

Another Stephanie, Stephanie Drewa from Wisconsin, sent this bright colorful tile, and her Blorbs start

I added some more Borbs, and her Butterflyz along the right...and see the one little orange feller there? he broke away from the ribbon. My Cypresses, and then some round bits: Niuroda, Hamail, Proza, and Phicops. Then tipple...seems that Tipple spilling off the edge is a theme with me lately.

Stephanie's Lovely Bold Card

Stephanie and I are going to swap back and forth:

an Opus size tile. I'll start, she'll add to it, and send it back

then I'll do some more! until we are done.

Won't that be fun!

The fun mail from Stephanie was all packed inside a blank card with the cute Citrus, cruffle, and Barberpole in the bottom left corner. I had so much fun finishing this, and can hardly wait for an occasion to give to someone. :) that motif in to the right is called Proza, which I learned around the same time as Waybop. 

So, I found the most adorable bird picture...a Splendid Fairy Wren...and isn't he JUST splendid! Then looking at him, I realized...I can do this...so I did:

I maked something

Wouldn't it be truly splendid to get that brilliant shade of blue on his cheeks? But...it's still adorable.


And, one last picture. It's an ATC tile, cut from a sheet of watercolor paper that I colored using the tissue paper transfer method...when I had this one in my hand, I just knew it needed Fronds, so that is where I started:

Suzanne Fluhr's Aloha just hollered out to be included, and then Fescu here and there.

Oh, these colored tiles!

Valentine's Diva and Lovely Family

this has been a fun week for me, because my son who lives in Denver has been in town since Monday night! We've all been hanging out, he's been staying at his sister's new house...who JUST moved in literally the day he got to town. So, with her moving, and her little sister moved into a new place one week before and I helped with that...hahahaha...supervised is more like it, since my knee is out of commission. And at work, moved my desk. I knew it was coming, but didn't know the day it was supposed to happen UNTIL I arrived last Friday.

Long story short: I need a drop shelf for my keyboard, for ergonomic reasons. They uninstalled my drop desk from THIS desk and installed it at my NEW desk during my days off. So when I got to work, I found out: NOW is moving day. And I like my new location, but a day's advance notice would have been nice...

But more about my wonderful kids.

Santa put fake noses in their stockings that year for Christmas. These three are Abbie, Robby, and Katie on Xmas 2010. Robby is the one who now lives in Denver.










but since this picture doesn't include their oldest brother Jason, I have another:

all the hands! hahahaha!

That's Jason wearing orange. Real mature, Jay...and Rob. This was two ish years ago. That's me in the middle with the sideways head.

Yes, we are always generally this goofy when we get together. And now my Robby lives in Denver; Abbie (the dark haired girl on the top layer) is expecting her firstborn in May and just moved to a new house. Katie on the right is head over heels in love and just moved to her first apartment "with" someone. :) Jason has two kids of his own. Yes, I'm a gramma. And the year this one was taken, the oldest was 11. Which means he is now 13. Good grief. How old every else has gotten.

Well, it's been over a year since we've seen Rob, so we've been enjoying his company. He's hanging out with siblings, took me out to lunch on Tuesday which was lovely. Pizza and unpacking the kitchen together at Abbie's last night. And tonight, with even more family, hanging with my mom, and then out to dinner, all of us. Yay! And he drives back tomorrow. Boo.

Now on to the art!

We were challenged to do something Valentiney this week, for the Diva Challenge.
Valentine's Day isn't all that important to me. I found a card for Wylie this year, and made some inchies with hearts on them and put them on a few friends' desks at work. And Wylie got me some earrings which are lovely. Well anyway, I wasn't wanting to do all kinds of hearts and lace and such. And this is what I came up with

Looks sort of heart and lacey after all doesn't it?

Luffline is the main pattern, with a few perfs nestled in there, and floatfest along the edges. Floatfest is one of the first complex patterns I learned. I hadn't encountered Hollibaugh yet, and here I was drawing "behind"...I just loved it and it was fun bringing it to this pattern. The shading is"pen flick" method, using a ball point pen...a REALLY fun technique that I enjoy so much and it looks very cool when you're done.

Still enjoying all the colored tiles, though with all the family activity I haven't had time to make any more or to cut tiles...though I do have lots of starts on colored tiles.

Anyone want to swap? Let me know in the comments and we can arrange addresses, etc. I'll wait a few days before posting on FB.


Meanwhile, I also have a couple of starts that came to me, from two Stephanies! One from Wisconsin, and one from Singapore...now who would have thought when I started tangling three years ago, that I'd be getting mail from Singapore!

I'll share those starts and finishes here, when I'm done.



Haven't gotten to Joey's challenge yet. Maybe today. 

Hamadox, F String, and More!

It's been a fun and busy little while, as I got some color transfer tissue and made some just amazing sheets of stained paper. Made some regular tiles, and colored some opus size papers, and have one piece I'm just in love with

Isn't this one funny...you can see where I pressed down on the tissue with my fingers.

an opus piece I may leave it whole

This is one of the opus pieces. I might do more with it, to tone
 down or balance the brilliance.

This one, the colors are muted because it's the second run with the tissue. I really like how the tones get muted when you use the tissue a second and third time.

a third run with the same tissue, plus some new indigo

This is my absolute favorite. I just love the tones, and the marbling effect is just stunning. It's pretty enough to frame, I think. Well, my mom gave me a great idea...take it to a professional printer, where they can make a high quality print...frame THAT, and then use the paper for art. 

Nice, eh?

 The colors on this individual tile were so pretty. This was my first one. That pattern on the right is Helen William's String Rose. I want to play with it some more. It isn't as easy to do as she makes it look !!! but I know with practice it'll get better.

Now, on to the challenges of this week.

the Diva gave us hamadox for a challenge this week. It's a pretty fun pattern but I had a hard time making it part of a tile. It just had to be the star.

Hamadox with Squid and Tipple, on tan toned paper and shaded with brown, red, and dark purple. Some white charcoal pencil.

Joey's alphabet string challenge is up to F which she started for us with Festune...

Festune in the lower corner and I added Fescu, and I put Fang in the F, Fronds at the base of the F, and Fiore. After all that color work, this one needed something so I did the edges of Fiore in pink and yellow. 

And a string thing challenge

It reminds me of looking out a cottage window into a sweet little garden. 

the Traveling Tangles Project on FB has been keeping me pleasantly busy. I've swapped with Michele:

My start to Michele: cypresses by me on an ATC

Michele's start to me: rooster colors and Elven on a regular tile

 My finish on Michele's glorious tile. I had so much fun doing these gems! And sort of wish I hadn't done that Gnarly "rooster tail" but there you have it.

And Michele did this amazing finish on the start that I sent. It's like a little babbling brook with a leafy bank. Love it!