Friday Again

Where has January gone?? This time next week will be February--can you believe it? Are you ready?? Pink hearts, boxes of chocolate, velvety red roses...Oh yeah, I'm ready! Don't you just love love? Haha...I drew up my Idea Journal Page for February and definitely like the monthly breakdown rather than a weekly. Maybe when I get more ideas I'll need a weekly page again, but until I'm all caught up this feels like a better solution...and here we are:

Very Joanne Sharpe inspired--can't wait to take some of her online courses!

 

The Yahoo Zia group has begun a Tangle of the Week prompt to help learn and explore our patterns more in depth. This week's tangle is Bales, an old favorite with endless possibilities. I filled up another page in my Tangle a Day calendar playing with Bales (I'd say I'm almost caught up but every day I slip a little further behind...again...but it's just too much fun even trying to keep up!!)

 

An assortment of Bales

We have no bowling this weekend--but my car has an appointment at the shop to find out what is ailing it...poor old girl, she's even older than our Boo...Hubby believes it's a problem with the brakes catching, definitely repairable--yay!! I love my car--it's carried us from Tennessee, to Pennsylvania, and up here to Massachusetts--not ready to say goodbye!

 

So have a super fantastic weekend! Enjoy this last week of January and start planning something sweet for your lovies in your life--Valentines Day will be here before you know it!

 

More Catching Up and Crazies

The craziness carries on this week...The migraine that crippled me Monday and Tuesday finally let up yesterday morning-praise God--but then I pulled something in my lower back trying to put Sweet Pea up in bed and gimped around in more agonizing pain all day. My car is acting up--it's not been wanting to go in reverse, makes a big, rather violent jerk after laying on the gas pedal. Yesterday it decided maybe it didn't want to go forward either. I'm not taking it anywhere today. Or tomorrow. Hubby's having it checked this weekend. My luck I'd get stranded somewhere over in Dartmouth with no way to get back home again, so staying right here where I'm safe and happy and not in need of emergency transportation. Then the cuckoo crazy icing on the wacko cake this week comes from Ruby (our almost eleven year old Pyrenees mix) who is now afraid to go into the kitchen. Mind you, she needs to go through the kitchen to get to the back door to go outside. Nope. Not interested...Why???? She peers terrifyingly at the pantry and veers as far away from it when I've managed to coax her to the back door, shielding her bodily from whatever she's imagining is lurking in there...Then she didn't want to come back in! I had to bribe her with string cheese as she bolted back to the safety of the livingroom. (Bolted...this one who fell down the flight of stairs last week...) Nothing has come crashing out of the pantry at her, as far as I know, in the previous twenty-four hours to cause this strange attack of paranoia, and I'd been home with her the whole time. I can't imagine what's gotten into her head. She's doing it again this morning...won't step a paw into the kitchen, just lears at the pantry door from the safety of the hallway. Tuck and Pea aren't showing any reservations-they jaunt fearlessly in and out the back door a hundred times a day, scratch at the pantry door for treats and chewies...No idea what bug has gotten in Boo's baffled brain...Just another day in Cuckoo Crazyville...won't you join us??

 

I did play a little catch up yesterday afternoon (after catching up on a monster pile of laundry and a host of other cleaning chores, which more await me today...) Another page from the Tangle A Day Calendar:

 

Played with a little distortion of Shoshi's Y-ful Power, and Mi-2

And I finished my photo mat for the Zentangle Swap on Facebook--yay!

Heartstring, Zedbra, Puf, Verve

 

Scratching those piled up projects off my list!! Getting there, anyways! Hope everybody is having a fantastic and far less weird week than we are! Thanks for checking in!

 



Zroz

Well, one good thing came out of lying around like a pneumonic lump today...I created my first pattern! Okay, I've played with a few things that possibly could've turned into patterns but I never bothered before...never felt the potential like this little fella has...Meet Zroz (zee-rose....got it? 'Kay...)



 

Zroz step out and a little ATC I did for my Bugga...

So there I was, happily playing catch up in my Tangle A Day calendar (yes...just a wee bit behind...) I wanted to do another of my heart/triangle Auraknot/Bunzo from the duo-tangle Diva Challenge this week (though, I don't quite like this one as much as I liked the original...blacking in the sides rather than filling them with Bunzo felt flat this time around...). Tossed in a little Inapod, then what?? Hmmm...a few circles filled with some aura looking bulls eyes kinda sorta...zip zip, shade it up, viola! I originally tagged it Oh's in the corner but immediately Zroz popped into my head (conveniently AFTER I'd inked in the Oh's...grrffff,,,) But, I think there are tons and tons of variation possibilities with this--fills for the O's and for the bulls eyes....Many, many ways to play!! I was only disappointed to find out I couldn't submit it to Tangle Patterns since there's penciling in and erasing involved (not quite zen enough...) but, that's okay...I'll still play with it and anyone else who'd like to give it a whirl, by all means--go for it!

 

Bunzo, Auraknot, Inapod, and Oh...Zroz (haha)

 

Lookee that! Really happy with my Inapod...

So, enjoy! Hope to see what all you zentanglers out there will do with Zroz....

A Snowy Zentangle Sunday

Woke up this morning to some new snow coming down...always a happy sight to start the day! And figuring we weren't going to venture out for church on possibly icy roads, I put a second pot of coffee on and went back to work on the zendala dare for the week. Erin's 39th dare on the Bright Owl is a ZenDon't challenge. Throwing convention to the wind, the challenge is to ignore your typical 'rules' or favorite go-to patterns, and do your dare a little differently....Well, that just smacks me square in the face as I'm all about rules and convention and things being done a certain way...Dare I Don't? And I did...I don't ever take my art work out in public-I'm too self-concious and scared of people on just a normal given day. Bare my soul and do art in front of people?? What??? Well, I was so excited about this challenge AND this new pattern, Palrevo, just put out on TanglePatterns, I took my zendala template to Bug's bowling league yesterday morning and *gasp!* did a little public tangle! Another less daring don't is that I don't typically do monodalas but this week's template just screamed Palrevo to me, and I ran with it...

I think I messed up with the direction on the outside ring, which is where I started, but as there 'are no mistakes' in Zentangle, I ran with that also and just kept going...Wanting to go back and shade a little more...may do that later...

 

I also finished this week's Tangle A Day calendar page (more Palrevo!) and I'm obsessing with swirlies right now--feel something coming on with this...

 

This is just a slanty shot that I played with the contrast level on the photo editing program...

And more contrast, up close swirly and Palrevo...

 

Looking forward to the new Diva challenge this week--having a little withdrawal with her taking the past couple of weeks off (yikes!!) I miss seeing everybody's work! Plus lots more fun stuff to play with this week...yay! For now, just want to go play in the snow! 

Happy New Year!

Wow, 2013...That number is just crazy to me. Another year, and how fast will this one fly, right? My brain is swimming with artful ideas and dreams and plans for the new year. It's only up to me to make them all a reality. And we begin with Bright Owl Erin's Zendala Dare #38!

A little Betweed, Ibex, Baton, Zedbra? and a lot of just fun filling in...

I love these slanty side shots....

The first page of my Tangle a Day calendar complete!

 

And also beginning the Creative Every Day Challenge for 2013...yay!!

How will your new year sparkle?

May the God of peace, the eternal One and only God, grant you an awareness of his immediate return. May you be patient, may you be eager, but most of all may you be found ready when he calls.

“Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”
1 Peter 1:8, NIV

Looking Back

As I was shoveling the driveway yesterday morning, it occured to me that at this time last year we were preparing for Bill to leave for New York to begin training for his new job that would take him even further away from Michael and me, to Massachusetts. Hearts were heavy facing another separation, but I thought surely it would go faster than the last time when we moved from TN to PA (five months spent apart) Oh how wrong I was-and I had no idea what was coming medically for me either, just a little further down the road of the year to come...

But, 2012 wasn't all that bad. I had some incredible friendships that carried me through the hardships. I discovered Zentangle! And what a fun venture that's been this year! I've met so many wonderfully talented ladies through this creative circle-they inspire me with their work, encourage me with their kind words, and light my days with smiles as they share their world, their art, and their lives...I look forward to learning and playing more with Zentangle this new year and hope to get certified as a teacher in the fall (actually meet Rick and Maria Thomas!! Whoa!!)

2013 looms ahead with some still unanswered questions regarding my tremors. Whether or not we'll ever find out the cause remains to be seen. But, regardless, we move forward. I'm training for my first 10k I hope to run this spring. All I can do is take the very best care of my health and the rest is in God's hands, come what may.

I plan to enjoy as much of the ocean as I can possibly squeeze in--to the Beach!!! I plan to paint, to draw, to play, to write, to enjoy this gift of family, to go see the whales and the seals! Yay! I barely made a dent in my list of books to read this year and I've already dumped another good half dozen in there with certainly more to come. So much to look forward to for this coming new year...


10 Questions for a New Year’s Eve Reflection

1. What was the single best thing that happened this past year? Moving to Massachusetts!!!

2. What was the single most challenging thing that happened? Being separated from Bill for the first nine months of the year.

3. What was an unexpected joy this past year? The amazing friends God blessed me with--Missy and Jenn and Diane, who made the world of difference getting through a very scary time....

4. What was an unexpected obstacle? My tremors that led up to spinal fusion surgery.

5. What were the best books you read this year? The Song of Ice and Fire series by George RR Martin--I'm completely hooked on that world!

6. With whom were your most valuable relationships? My girls!! Coffee dates at Panera!

7. What was your single biggest time waster in your life this past year? Stupid games on Facebook

8. What was the best way you used your time this past year? Zentangling!

9. What was biggest thing you learned this past year? I want to write something amazingly brilliant here but really...I guess in the very bleakest moments of the year, God blessed me with the most beautiful women I've ever known in my life. I never could've made it through without these three and I am so thankful...What I learned is God will never let me fall. His love will always carry me through, in the gifts of friendship and so many other little amazing ways...we are so blessed...

10. Create a phrase or statement that describes 2012 for you. All's well that ends well...

Our happy little home covered in snow

Boo wantsa go play...

Happy girl!

Loving my new calendar!

A little Rock 'n Roll Diva Dance...

It Snowed!!

Woke up this morning to a gorgeous white wintery wonderland outside-well, I really woke up to lights flashing in the windows a little after three a.m....There was a team of snow plows doing a tango, making quick work of the snow covered streets. It was really fun watching them--I'd never witnessed anything like it before. We'd always just had one big plow run a quick path down the one side of the street and then make another quick pass going up the other side. Here, I'm guessing because of the way our streets run wide in the corners, they worked together-one would push a pile of snow to the middle of the street then another would come from another angle to  push the pile to the curb, back up and they'd make another pile, push it to the curb, working their way around our deep, turn around corners. To me it looked like they were having fun, this little snow plow dance in the middle of the street...I could've watched them all day, I think, but once our corner was all neatly scraped clear, off they went to work on the rest of the neighborhood....

Then I watched as the moon settled over the trees out back and the sun slowly rose in the opposite direction. Pink washed the sky out front as the grey of the night sank softly away. The clouds were a feathery mist, flanking the moon in a ring of red that my camera just couldn't quite pick up. Magical, this first snow, so beautiful...it always makes me feel like a kid again!

Winter wonderland

Watching the moon sinking in the horizon

So wide awake and full of excitement, I pulled out my Tangle A Day 2013 calendar and thought I might start to play (Carole Ohl, of Open Seed Arts and the calendar's creator, said it was okay...) I'm really looking forward to taking some lettering courses this year and fancied up a Happy New Year, then also in awe of Helen William's latest post with Mooka, I went a little Mooka-ish with my numbers....I'll fill it in more and post again--it was just fun getting started this morning! Yay!!

 

Happy New Year everybody!!