This 28 day challenge ended up being quite an adventure for me that resulted more in a tangled up life than being able to make more time for Zentangling. I’m glad I kept my expectations flexible; always a good approach to life no matter what is going on.
As I mentioned in my last post my mom became suddenly ill but my challenges did not end there. In between trips to care for my mom and trips to the airport for pick up and departure for a dear, dear visiting family member, I caught a break to come home for a couple of days to manage things on the home front. The afternoon after I arrived home a fire broke out close to our home and we were on evacuation alert for a couple of days which means packing up whatever you deem of importance to take with you if you are evacuated. Fortunately the winds remained low and the fire headed away from us. I feel deeply sorry for the three families who lost their homes in this fire.
Once our evacuation alert was lifted I headed back to take care of my mom. She was starting to improve and continues to get better and is able to now be on her own. Once I got home I fell ill for a couple of days, probably from exhaustion and lack of sleep.
Although I did not tangle every day through the challenge I was able to fit a bit of tangling in between everything else. And my husband, Jerry, did keep up with the daily challenge.
My labyrinth. Start at the tumbling Tipple and follow the clues to the center.
We got excited about tangling on a labyrinth. You can double click on the images to make them larger. To learn how to draw your own labyrinth follow this video link.
Jerry’s labyrinths.
A selection of some of Jerry’s completed tiles over the course of the 28 days.
Day 11, 12 & 13
Not much tangling to share. My life suddenly got a bit hectic when my mom went into the hospital on Sat. with blood clotting in her leg and lungs. She requires 24 hour care for the time being, so I am with her now in her home. We expect a full recovery with plenty of TLC.
I have been trying to squeeze in a bit of tangling where I can. Mostly just exploring in my own tangle journal. I taught my mom to tangle too and she enjoys creating her own tangles on gourds. I’m hoping she will feel up to tangling while I’m here but so far she is not up to it. Knitting has been her thing lately and she hasn’t been up to working on the Christmas projects she has started.
Jerry has completed a couple of tiles over the past few days.
I explored in my Zentangle journal with Twilight Zone and Rain.
The tangle Twilight Zone is created much like Knightsbridge but in the round.
I also explored a new tangle created by my daughter which will be debuted on her blog at a future date.
Day 9 & 10
I am in San Francisco celebrating my daughter’s birthday this weekend. I have been working on her birthday card over the past couple of days.
Day 8
Today I got busy on a project that a friend asked me to do.
I’ve been making my own Poo-Pourri® spray. This stuff is really expensive so
I found a recipe on-line and I have been making my own. I recently made some as a bridal shower gift complete with a little framed explanation of how it works. I told my friend Cathy about this and she loved the idea and requested that I make her some as well as 2 of my gift packages for a couple of bridal showers that she will be attending soon. I had picked up a bunch of small picture frames for about 50 cents each at the thrift store recently and have found that these are perfect for the little framed explanation. I paint and wax them with Annie Sloan’s chalk paint and wax. For today’s Zentangle® I tangled around the text in the framed pieces.
How To Make Your Own Poo Away Spray Recipe
- Find a clean 2 oz (or 4 oz) spray bottle.
- Combine 10 (or 20) drops of Essential Oils and 1 (or 2) tablespoons of Rubbing Alcohol in a small spray bottle first.
- Shake to mix thoroughly.
- Next, add water to the spray bottle, enough to almost reach the rim. (I used lavender water that I’d made last summer from my lavender harvest.)
- Shake extremely well — until you’re confident that all of the different liquids are dispersed evenly throughout.
Day 7
Tangles we added; Sez, Poke Root, Emingle & Hollibough.
9 Tile Revisited; Today we decided to tangle a bit more on this set because it was fun to get one started and now we are curious to keep going. I may have to start a whole new set for the gallery. Not sure yet of the plan but here is how it looks now.
Day 6
My completion of older tile; Indy-Ella, Festune & Munchin. By the way, this tile has no string.
Today I am still catching up from a long 3 day weekend and the gallery opening last night on top of just trying to juggle all the other details and challenges of daily life. That’s my excuse for not getting much tangling done today. I ended up grabbing a tile that I actually started a couple of years ago and finishing it. I’m pretty happy with the result and it qualifies as my tangling for today.
Jerry’s day 5 & 6 Tile. Tangles; Evoke, Squill, Gheiss, & Jongal.
Day 5
Already!
This was an exciting day at the new gallery, Brushstrokes Art Studio & Gallery, where I will be teaching Zentangle classes in Oroville. It was grand opening day so I thought it would be fun to start a project for the gallery. I brought along a display to intrigue potential students and a plan to do short demos where people could complete small string sections on a set of 9 tiles that would eventually fit together to make one big tile. There was a lot going on and although I generated a lot of interest in Zentangle only a few took the time to sit down to tangle with me. I had much difficulty focusing too with all the excitement going on around me. I will amend my plan to having my future students complete little sections during my classes and future demos there. One day in the future it will e a lovely collaborative work of art donated to the gallery.
Tangle table display
9 Tile Tangles so far; Rain, Tipple, & Huggins.
9 tiles makes 1: This tile kit is no longer available but it’s easy to create your own with 9 blank tiles. Lay them out as shown and draw the string as though it were 1 big tile. Then have each of your tangling tangle a tile or keep passing all 9 tiles around until all the spaces are complete. Put the puzzle back together and frame it.
Days 3 & 4
Left tile; Cadent, Tipple, Printemps, Courant, Flux, Nzeppel, & Hurry. Right tile; Indy-Rella, Ixorus, Stricles, & Hibred.
I did say the rules would be lax to none; just tangle every day. And I’m finding out that trying to tangle every day and post on this blog are challenging within an already full life. I am enjoying the process. I’ve been tangling before sunrise every day and then getting to watch the sunrise too. Challenges definitely have their rewards.
Day 2
Phew, busy weekend but I’m trying to stick with the plan.
Today we began by creating watercolor drip strings.
Then we tangled between the lines. Left tile tangles: Printemps, Static, & Emingle. Right tile: mono tangle; Nipa.
That’s it for today and the next couple of days will be just as tight on time. For more watercolor drip string inspiration visit here.
Thank you to my dear, dear friend, and former business partner, Joan, for contributing this lovely tile to beautify these pages.
Day 1
Like I said, no rules…so today is our official start day but if you need to start on another day, so be it. Once you get your challenge underway you can refer back to these posts for inspiration.
“28 days,” “challenge,” that’s some pretty heavy terminology right there. Our lives are so full of commitments and challenges but how many of them are mainly about things outside ourselves?
This is an opportunity to make your creativity and your mindfulness the focus for at least a few minutes every day. I’m hoping you will take this as an opportunity to step up for yourself and give yourself some of the loving attention you constantly give to so many other aspects of your life. For some of us that might seem like a luxury you can’t afford. However, leaving ourselves off of our to-do list can lead to resentment and a general lack of enthusiasm for the things we’ve filled our lives with in our desire to love our families and be successful in our careers.
We all need a way to recharge with exercise and creativity so we can continue to keep up with our other responsibilities with love and enthusiasm.
28 days of commitment to something is a great way to make that something into a healthy sustainable habit. You may have to remove something to make room for this; like less time on Facebook for example, for most of us that’s a pretty easy choice. Just glance through your day and see where you can find an area that can be pared down, or simply removed, to make room for the fun, creativity, and mindfulness of Zentangle.
To begin my first day I decided to pull out a Zendala tile I had started a while back and never finished. I didn’t want to spend too much time planning and over-thinking getting myself started.
My husband Jerry decided to take the challenge too so he also selected a Zendala tile and we spread our pens and materials across the dining room table and began selecting tangles and pens. We had no idea how long we would be tangling and 3 hours later we had both completed our tiles. We worked in silence as we explored new tangles and rediscovered those we’d drawn before. I don’t know if I’m capable of completing a Zentangle piece without Tipple.
Jerry’s Tile: black and color pens, pencil. Tangles used; Betweed Variation, Tipple, Festune & Nekton.
It was delightful tangling with Jerry. At one point he commented, “It’s very much a surprise, you begin with an idea and how it comes out is another thing.” That just nails Zentangle; you could give a million people the same tile with the same strings and every completed tile would be totally different. I call that the kaleidoscope effect.
My tile before shading.
My tile after shading: color pens & pencil. Tangles: Crown, Knase, elements of Fraces, Tipple, Shattock, Tagh.
I shared mine before and after shading to show what a difference shading can make.
That’s it for my first day. I hope you got started too but if not, there is always tomorrow. If you did get started I hope you will comment about your experience and or send me a pic of what you got up to. I won’t post your pic without your permission and I will only use your first name.
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