grey skies and muted blues

It's not always easy - even with the things you love the most. I've struggled in a number of ways during the second half of the 12 Days adventure. For one we've had so many dark days of rain, and I like to tangle in natural daylight so I've been trying to catch the odd hour here and there where it's been bright enough. I've also started to feel a little resistant to the colour blue following the recent result of the UK general election! In addition I felt a little underwhelmed by some of the recent Zentangle videos - the ideas just didn't spark my interest as much as they sometimes do, which perhaps ties in with my fourth struggle – finding the time and energy to tangle at this hectic time of year.

But the good thing about spending time doing the thing you love, is that it encourages you to overcome most barriers that arise. So I tried to keep tightly focused on the method that is central to Zentangle. Focused on the fact that it's about the process rather than the product, focused on the fact that I can turn these tiles whichever way I want, whichever way works on any given day.

So for the second half of my 12 Days offerings I've muted the blue, and while I've held onto each idea, I've carried it a little closer to my natural and comfortable tangling style. So my tiles are a little darker, a little more minimal than those shared by the ZT team. But I love these tiles, and I loved tangling them, despite my lack of energy and the sky's lack of encouragement.

On Day #7 we were encouraged to play with an oversized Bales -
which we then filled with pods and auras. In the spaces of our grid
we put a three-pointed Well style fragment. I chose to contain my
tangling in just one half of the tile.

On Day #8 Maria demonstrated a whirling dervish of tangling -
with abundant embellishment and shading and gold pen. It's a look
she carries off so well, but not me! I tamed mine a great deal – adding
more black, less blue, less variation on the fills, but including Beadlines
and choosing to have two of the Cadent style frames on my tile.

On Day #9 there were a couple of aspects that I just
wasn't keen on, so I tangled this instead. Using an ATC
sized tile allowed the tangled spiral to feel more settled.
I left out the tricolour background and instead just used a
little graphite and some tiny white gel Therefore dots.

Day #10 seemed to take using a very different direction, feeling far
more botanical and calm than any of the other days. This surprised
me at first but proved to be a welcome oasis of calm. I  got
thoroughly lost tangling my Bronx Cheer, Flux and Mooka,
and even a sprinkling of Fescu. Adding just a hint of graphite,
white and blue pencil. Rounding is always the finishing touch - and
then also a 3Z sized triangle frame drawn behind - I don't know why -
it just looked like it belonged there!!

When Rick tangles Paradox you can clearly see he's in his comfort
zone. Not so for me! By Day #11 I couldn't face 4 Paradox Bijou
tiles - so instead this.  A square the size of a Bijou in the middle of
my tile.  I left the centre of each Paradox open allowing me to drop
some Beadlines through the holes, plus a couple of black ribbons.

For Day #12 Maria led us through a variation of Hollibaugh to create
the look of a coffered ceiling. I relished this exploration - it embodied
everything I love about Zentangle - seemingly complex but broken
down into mindful attainable steps.  In a nod to where I started - I drew
a faux Zendala on a 4 inch Strathmore grey tile.  My initial bands came
out thinner so I put in more, and I got a little carried away with shading!
I know I'll play with this idea lots more!

We've reached the end of the Zentangle countdown, and there's a week to go until Christmas Day, but this will be my last blog post for the year. I've prepared some tiles that I hope to tangle during our festive break - and I'll share them here a week or so into the New Year. Thank you for reading my posts, and looking at my pictures over the past 12 months - it's been wonderful to share my tangled meanderings with you. Best wishes for your weeks ahead, however you spend them. See you in 2020!

half a dozen days in December

Every year I look forward to the 12 Days of Zentangle activities.  Whether you buy their Project Pack or not (I didn't) it's a great invitation to watch the videos, tangle along and know you're joining many other tanglers around the world who are doing the same.  It's also a great chance to take some time in your day, to tangle and unwind from the inevitable momentum we gain as the year heads toward its festive finale.

This is the 4th year I've joined in and I often take the ideas in a slightly different direction to suit my mood.  For a couple of years I worked in a sketchbook - and last year I tangled along on one of my Zigzangle's instead of the suggested spinner. This year I needed to make the suggestions work with my Winter Inklings colour scheme.  The grey tiles get a big tick of course, but I wasn't planning on using any colour for this month, however the ideas that Zentangle are sharing do rely on a little pop of colour every day, so I made the exception seeing as it's blue and that works as a winter colour! (Interestingly I also had a burst of blue in my February Winter Inklings when I worked on my Valentangle tiles).  The gold pen had to go, too warm for my idea of winter, but thankfully I had a new silver pen to hand!  I have also used different materials where I'm lacking ones that came in the project pack - but that's great, because it shows that you can have just as much fun, and also produce slightly different results, with whatever supplies you have! I've listed what I used in more detail than usual, which is a little clunky to read but perhaps helpful.  All papers used are discussed on my previous blog post.

On Day #1 I drew 'faux' Bijou on a 4x4 inch piece of Strathmore paper.
I tangled with my Sky Blue Copic and used a blue coloured pencil
(Koh-I-Noor Polycolor 54 / Cobalt Blue Dark) instead of the blue chalk
and it worked fine. I varied my Tipple, colouring some blue,
some white and silvering a handful.

On Day #2 I had a great time working with Tomàs Padrós All Stars tangle 
which I'd used back in Spring. This time it sports a wintery look - on a Murano
pastel paper tile.  Initially a complex looking tangle, the more you use it the
easier it becomes.  White highlights from a Derwent Coloursoft pencil and
white Gelly Roll add bright accents.

On Day #3 I ripped up the rule book - I just didn't fancy that idea on a round grey tile -
I don't know why but I didn't!  So I did it on a watercolour postcard instead,
and added blue watercolour (Clean Color Brush 030 Blue) to the Purk parts,
and only blacked in some of the Jonqal lines.  Graphite and colour shading
sharpens up the finished piece.

On Day #4 I traced around a Bijou tile 3 times onto a regular black tile
and then tangled in silver (Uni-Ball Signo).  I'm not that keen on tangling
predominantly with the metallic pen as the line feels so thick compared
to the white gel, let alone the my usual black 0.1.  But I like the way my
watercolour pencil (Faber-Castell Phthalo Blue) adds a touch of colour
onto the black - that's an idea I might play with again.

On Day #5 I didn't fancy tangling the ornament exactly as Martha did,
so I decided to create a band of ZINGsplatz right across my tile
(Clairefontaine PaintOn).  I'd hope to make it more angular and frosty
looking but of course every line made it more and more soft and curvy -
so there it is.  My white was done using a Graphitint white
pencil. In winter zebras dream of blue flowers!

On Day #6 I tweaked Rick's idea a little - I only inked with a black pen,
added blue into the bands of Hollis using an Irojiten pencil (Horizon Blue VP-8),
and added background of grey texture lines which ties it in with
my recent Hollis tile, although this one is far more minimal.
The key to tangling Hollis is to slow down -
and make the most of whatever strange shapes arise.

So that brings me up to date with the current 12 Days videos.  I'll be back with the rest next week.  There's been days of endless wind and rain of late (apt for the uncertain political times my country is facing today), and many times I've struggled to see the line I'm tangling, or the truth of the colours I'm adding to my tile.  But then a little later, I'll tilt the tile and the silver ink will glint as it catches the light - and there is my moment of hope.

grey is the word

Many people find it dull or depressing but I find it comforting and full of charm and warmth.  It makes me think of clouded skies and favourite knitwear, feathered and furred visitors to our garden.  I'm talking about the colour grey of course. (Or gray if you're reading from the United States!)

I've long loved grey but not used it a great deal as a feature colour in my tangling.  Too often it's simply the colour that gets added when I shade - although it got some attention in January, when I last dipped my toes into Winter themed tangling!   But for the next fews week I'm turning my tangling spotlight onto this wonderful colour to show you what it's capable of.

Trust me when I tell you I'm not sitting a mountain of grey paper, but I rooted through various packs and pads and gathered together quite a sample.  A wide range all claiming to be grey - some dark, some light, some with the barest hint of green, blue or brown.  That's the nature of this colour - it's never easy to pin down, or quantify.  It's also fairly hard to get a photograph that captures their true colours - the truth lies somewhere between the photo of them all together and the scans of my tiles!

[a range of grey papers - detailed below]

1 - Daler Rowney Murano Pastel Paper - from Cool pad - probably Slate
2 - Khadi Paper Dark Grey
3 - Clairefontaine PaintOn Grey Paper
4 - Two Rivers Paper - included in their Studio Pad
5 - Daler Rowney Murano Pastel Paper - from Neutral pad - probably Platinum
6 - Strathmore Artist Tile Toned Gray
7 - Khadi Paper Light Grey
8 - Official Zentangle Gray tile
9 - Stonehenge Colors Paper - Pearl Gray
10 - Bockingford Tinted Watercolour Paper - Grey

I set out on a voyage of exploration - a way to try out some of these papers, to harness and showcase their grey charms, to see which pens and shading styles suited them.  Not a methodical comparison mind you, just a meandering trip through a grey landscape.

I kept my choices simple - a  handful of Official ZT tangles and black pens, white pens, graphite shading, white shading.  First up - something quite minimal, quite sleek.

Mostly just Fife - black ink, graphite and white coloured pencil
on an ATC of Two Rivers Paper (4).  A somewhat delicate paper,
but a rich shade to work on. 

Next up - something different, switching the black pen for the 08 white Gelly Roll with a touch of graphite and some smoky white pastel along the edges.  I find the Pokes quite tricky to tangle elegantly, but rounding helps a lot, a chance to smooth out any anomalies and add definition.

Pokeleaf and Pokeroot - looking frosty and fabulous!
On a tile of Dark Grey Khadi (2) - rough but the Gelly Roll coped fine!

As I moved onwards, each new piece became a favourite - and that's often what happens when I start to get attuned to a certain combination of colour or tile.  I become more confident, but at the same time more calm - more instinctive, more engaged in the process, doing rather than thinking about doing.

Exploring Hollis, with rounding and Tipple - on a tile
of Clairefontaine Mixed Media paper (3).  A lovely paper
to work on, I used the tan version for Inktober.
Black ink, white chalk, graphite and some fine detail
lines in grey ink to add some background texture.

Those three papers all leaned towards the darker and rich end of the grey spectrum, but the next two went to the other extreme, being paler and cooler.

I love how Spoken looks when cut up by the limits
of an ATC.  With Printemps filling certain sections,
rounding and gentle shading in graphite and touches
of white I really like this Stonehenge paper (9).

Last, but by no means least, I tangled on my first ever Zentangle official Gray Tile - released just a few months ago.  This tile seems to be made from the same paper as their Renaissance tiles.  It's a beautiful shade of grey, very classy, very cool - and while you have to work a little gently at the shading stage, both the graphite and white chalk look wonderful

Nothing but Rumpus - looking like frosted flowers. 
This is a tangle that never disappoints offering
a truly mindful calm as you add circle after circle
and then link them together.
Black ink, graphite, and white chalk on a
Zentangle Gray tile (8).

That's all for now with these papers - but I have previously shared tiles tangled on a few of the others.  When I was a novice tangler, way back in 2014, I experimented with my Snag tangle on a Bockingford tinted tile.  A couple of years ago I tangled a lovely set of tiles on the lighter shade of Murano pastel paper.  In January this year I did some reverse Tranzending on a piece of Strathmore! 

My winter time has begun, the nights are colder, the days shorter - but it isn't often about snow and ice and sparkle here in the UK, there's a lot of damp days and grey skies too.  And that's what my last month of Inklings will celebrate - the beauty of winter even when it doesn't look like the image on a Christmas card, even if it's more likely to be raining than snowing on Christmas Day!

the still point

Just one piece to share with you this week – but it's a whopper by my standards! I always prefer to work small, but on this rare occasion I decided a bigger area might suit my need.

In the summer of 2018 I was talking about a paper product I'd seen but not tried - Magnani Acquerello round blocks.  Hard to find or massively overpriced in the UK, a generous and kind tangle friend, Jules, offered to send me a few sheets to try. It took till now to give the first one a road test, but it's a great paper - a little thirsty, smooth but with enough tooth to slow me down and take hold of the graphite.

Link to buy in the US via Amazon.
And at long last, a viable UK seller!

They come in two sizes, and I used the smaller one. It's about an inch and a half larger than the official Zendala tile which doesn't sound like much but feels like a lot of extra tangling space!

Just like the days make a week make a month make a year -
so a tile grows, slowly but surely, a little at a time.

I wanted this tile to represent the cusp between two seasons, that point where autumn segues into winter. I worked slowly over the course of a week, laying down my string, my colour (Peerless watercolours), some tangles to define the space, autumn tangles in one section, winter in another.  I considered shading using colour, but decided that smooth blended graphite was the way to go.

A dance of two seasons.
Defining the space - Marasu, Miff, Beadlines and Doodah.
In the Autumn section - Hollis, Gelijoy, Mooka Easy, Tamisolo.
In the Winter section - Arukas, Flukes, Hemp and Fassett.
And right at the middle, Uncorked by Adele Bruno (my very first tangle friend and mentor).

There's lots of different tangles on this tile, more than I would usually put together on a single piece – but the limited colour and shading and the repeat of those black perfs with their tiny white highlights helped unify and simplify the finished piece.

As the last leaves fall and darken in our puddles, autumn waves goodbye.  Winter lingers on the threshold waiting to be invited in. It can't be stopped whether you welcome it or not, but I plan on making friends with it through the next few weeks with my final seasonal Inklings.

farewell, my frosty friend

At the start of this year I set myself the challenge of tangling in line with the changing seasons - picking appropriate colours and tangles and styles - and working only with those. I defined winter as December, January and February. On this, the first day of March, I therefore declare winter over!

The only colour I've picked up in the last two months is a couple of cool blue pens, which mostly featured in my ValenTangle adventure. However I haven't missed colour in the least, and in fact I'm a little wary about having to reconnect with it again. My last tiles for my Winter Inklings theme really stripped back to the basics. Black and white and graphite, and a little grey watercolour on one or two.

Giving a PersianMosaic the winter treatment -

straight Shattuck over grey and white coloured 3Z tiles

Baton and 4Fun with holes cut out -

a sense of winter breaking up ready to melt

The recent Square One focus tangle was Ipso -

here getting a winter fix with Cat-Kin and more Baton

I end close to where I began the year -

strong diagonals of Diva Dance, Basketweave

over deep grey, and Edie with fragments of Baton

I love living in a country with changing seasons, it feels natural and right to me. Each season has its own character and things to love about it - but usually by the end of winter I'm willing to let it go. But this year I'm letting it go with a little more sadness than usual. I might just miss those bare branches and frosty mornings, that cool blue ink and grey watercolour. It might take me a week or two to get used to the idea of spring.

listening to echoes

Mostly when I tangle I don't think – my mind pleasantly disconnected from anything other than the flow of ink across paper. But if I do think I think about the tangling, and sometimes I think about what I might say in my next blog post.

This week I thought about repetition. About how I find myself often saying the same things to different people within the tangle community. I don't think this repetition is a bad thing. I often rediscover and repeat the same things to myself on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. This is how they sink in, this is how we learn.

This week I shared the thought that taking part in tangle challenges should never feel like a chore, merely an invitation to inspiration, that we should always feel able to decline without a shadow of guilt. This isn't the first time I've said this, and it won't be the last.

I didn't feel inspired to respond to the invitations that the Diva put out in the first couple of weeks of the year. But this week I did. The opportunity to fill stripes was too good to resist.

Keeko and a Beadlines variation -
ragged in places like a beloved old cardigan

But then a funny thing happened, all of a sudden I felt like doing a tile for the previous week's challenge as well. I explored a new medium by trying out a form of reverse TranZending which I've been watching Anica develop and explore over the last few months.

A rare photo of the works in progress

I used a Posca white pen to lay down a base layer of Baton. The benefit of the Posca pen seems to be that it dries to a permanent finish – which means it doesn't clog your micron when you go over it many times, and it doesn't re-moisten and start to move about. I drew my tile on a Strathmore grey tile - newly recommended to me by tangle friend Jules after I'd admired one of her 'hairy' grey tiles. These come measuring 4x4 but I cut this one down to our more familiar 3.5 x 3.5.  I often tangle on grey toned pastel paper, but these tiles have a smoother surface which seemed better suited to this technique.

Bunzo, Mooka and Tipple - I love how shiny and dark this looks -
like seeing an underwater world trapped beneath ice

Guess what happened then! I fancied doing yet another Diva tile, one for the first challenge of the year. I don't have a spinner machine so I laid down some concentric circles using two shades of grey watercolour brush pen. When I blended these with a water brush a subtle purple started to appear - sometimes an unwelcome side-effect, on this occasion a welcome hint of colour.  Not that I'm missing colour, despite being firmly locked into the blacks and greys of my Winter Inklings project.

CC and a bit of Mintea - and lots of graphite -
ornate cloud banks on a misty day

I politely declined to join the party for the first two weeks of the Diva challenge year, but this week I had a ball doing all three. I feel sure that I wouldn't have created these tiles if I had forced myself last week or the week before. These tiles could only appear when they were ready, when I was ready - I just need to remember over and over again to listen to my instinct.

these darkening days

For the past couple of years I have worked on a tangle project over the festive period. I've given myself limited materials and focus and have been pleasantly surprised by the results. I planned to do the same this year but things didn't turn out quite as hoped. In addition to my injured tangling arm I also had severe back pain which left me unable to do much beyond lying down, moving occasionally and tentatively, and trying to keep hold of the Christmas spirit while substituting a gin and tonic for a handful of painkillers!

Christmas and New Year wasn't what we planned or hoped for, but despite that I wouldn't say we had a bad time, we found gentle pleasures in unexpected places. And while my tangling wasn't quite what I planned, it wasn't a failure either.

I allowed myself only a handful of supplies - pen, pencil, tortillion,
plus a dark grey watercolour brush pen, and a water brush

True, I only produced two tiles in two weeks, working just a tiny amount each day, before needing to take a break. But the tangling still felt absorbing and helpful, and the results look pretty good too.

Tangles used – Divi, Diva Dance, Mooka and Twile

I've been playing with the scrap of an idea for a while - of working in a palette and style in keeping with the seasons. I'm not sure if I'll keep exclusively to that for a full three months, but it's something I want to revisit again and again, as I like the idea of having a body of work reflective of the time it was made.

Tangles used – Divi, Diva Dance and Bask-It

These two tiles start my Winter Inklings, as I think I'll call it. They are stark but striking, cool but somehow comforting. Broken branches and fractured ice, heavy woollen blankets too.