Diva Challenge 238 Tri-Bee; SQ1 Jalousie; TNTM 40 "K"; Throwback Thursday #2 Black Tile Revisited

Hello Gentle Readers!

This has been a busy week, in Tangle-land and elsewhere!  I had my very first Zentangle class at Pebble Creek Creative Arts Center on October 3, 2015.  My Introduction to Zentangle was attended by eight wonderful and eager students who were new to Zentangle, but they produced such exceptional work!  I am so proud of them! If any of you are reading this blog, take a bow, ladies!!  This coming Saturday we have a class on black tiles, and some of my new students are attending, along with some more experienced tanglers - including the teacher who introduced me to Zentangle in the first place!  I'm honored!

My husband and I welcomed some dear friends moving from Chicago to our Arizona neighborhood. How cool is that?  Well...not really cool, as it is still pretty warm here, but cool, nonetheless...  We celebrated on folding chairs and a card table in an echoing empty newly constructed home with champagne and potato chips (killer combo - trust me), lobster, shrimp, deviled eggs topped with radiant salmon roe and a thermos full of vichyssoise (made in my brand spankin' new Vitamix, thank you!).  Sweet!

Then I tortured myself again to attend a cooking class at a local French restaurant, Vogue Bistro.  Chef Aurore is so warm and lovely. Over white wine and a decadent appetizer of crab and shrimp wrapped in bacon, topped with a trio of lovely sauces, she showed us how to roast a gigantic Rouge Pumpkin and turn it into the silkiest pumpkin soup ever!  She made another vegetable stock into which she blended roasted vegetables and freshly picked sweet corn.  She prepared crispy skinned trout and scalloped potatoes, and pastry chef Chris showed us his baking tips to make Ciabatta with olive oil and Brioche with a beautiful shiny egg wash.  Mmmmm...and my hubby got to enjoy the leftovers that I couldn't finish.

So, enough of that stuff, and on to Zentangle challenges...

This week the Diva brought us a challenge to use new tangle Tri-Bee.  It is one of those tangles that can grow like barnacles, so you can do pretty much anything with it.  I was still stuck on Jalousie, one of my oldie faves that I kind of forgot about, so I had to include that too.

Square One: Purely Zentangle on Facebook has focused on Jalousie this week.  Unlike the Diva challenge where you can choose not to look at other entries until after you finish yours, Facebook keeps throwing them up in, well, in your face!  I had a hard time finding a new twist, but then I thought of another new tangle I saw this week called 4Fun.  So, just 4Fun, I did a tangelation.

That's New To Me is the letter "K".  I chose Margaret Bremner's Krli-Qs, which was really new to me - I don't think I have even seen it before, but it is so lovely!  I used it as kind of a string and added "stuff" all around.

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Throwback Thursday, Week 2

This week I was inspired by the Zentangle blog in which Maria Thomas (our total goddess), got to playing with black tiles in new ways.  I have been frustrated in the past with how the shading with graphite doesn't quite look right since it has a weird sheen on a black tile.  I love my chalk pencil and Zenstone, but those are for highlights.  So I got to work.

I chose an old tile from 2013 that I was pretty pleased with at the time.  I loved the filled in areas and had fun doing that tile.

Now, with some fresh skills, I thought I could do better.  I created a similar tile, but added my best new thing - dewdrops on black!!  You heard me!  I am so proud of myself I could spit!  (Maybe not, but almost!)  I also used the Fabrico marker Maria suggested, but I must confess that I had been playing with that on black and Renaissance tiles a while back myself.  Now, apparently, we all have the "official license" to proceed with that :-).  I also used some new techniques I have been trying out on my own.  I have been doing a fast-slow approach to get the lines fatter, more dense, on the slow parts.  You can see that in the Printemps.  It adds a sort of "self-highlighting".  I also added a few little twinkly things using my pool-and-pull technique where I let the white ink pool onto the paper a bit, then pull the pen back to make a spiky thing.  Actually, I think I got the idea from my nail technician (thanks Vivian!).

So, there you have my Throwback Thursday  "re-do".  What can you find that you used to do differently, maybe not as well as you now know how to do?  I'd love to see your work.  You get to choose what you want to revisit.  Add to an existing tile, color it, do a better version, whatever.  Add your link below the same way you do for the Diva challenge and lots of others.
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Thank you Simone and Michelle for your entries last week.  It may take some time for people to visit me and post their work, but I really hope news of this will spread. 

Thank you for stopping by today, and know that I appreciate all your comments and your participation.

Namaste,
Antonine

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