Just a quick update… I’ve scheduled “Framing on the Cheap” for this Thursday, November 21, 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm at Emerald City Tangles Studio. So if you missed the last one and want to learn to frame your Zentangles easily for under $15 using ready-made frames that look like they were done professionally, join us. This is just in time for Christmas gift-giving. I only have room for 4 students, so you’ll need to register now if you’re interested.
Happy Tangling! B.
Although I did have a beginner Zentangle workshop this week (again in Andover – see the class mosaic to the left), I deviated just a wee bit. Twice a month I will be doing a painting class at The Regent with my lovely ladies and I just had to show you what Virginia did. She is just the neatest lady! She shared a little of her life with me and I was so fascinated. She was raised in Kansas on a farm by parents who were both deaf. When I asked how they had met, she said they met at a school for the deaf in Olathe. She communicated with them through sign language, and when she was ready for school they sent her to stay with an aunt so she could learn proper English. She’s in her 90’s, so you know that took place a long, long time ago. I find people’s stories to be so interesting!
I have a couple of workshops coming up – a Paperweight Workshop this coming Saturday (plus you’ll learn a new tangle that just came out), our monthly Tangle & Talk on November 30, and then in December I’ll be doing a Black & White & Glitter Workshop. Hope you’ll join us! Check the “Workshops” tab for more information.
I’ll also be participating in a couple of shows this month, so if you are looking to do some Christmas Shopping or you just like shows, stop by…
Thursday, November 14, 6-9 pm, The TheraPlay Spot, 914 S. Hillside, and Saturday, November 23, 9-4 pm, Calvary Arts & Crafts Mission Market, 2525 N. Rock Road.
Happy Tangling,
Bonnie
What a week! As you know, I consider all of my beginner tanglers as my “tangling babies”! Well, this week I helped over 40 people become tanglers! It is really quite exciting for me to be able to share the Art of Zentangle with so many people.
Newton Mosaic
Here is a mosaic of the work that we did in the Beginner Workshop at The Carriage Factory Art Gallery in Newton. I am always amazed at how wonderful these turn out. Most people who take this workshop have not created a Zentangle before. It’s so empowering to create these and realize that everyone has the talent and capability to create art.
After the Beginner Workshop, we also had a Tangled Ink & Watercolor Workshop. I always have fun with this class, too. Everyone seems to especially enjoy working with the pearlized and metallic watercolors.
Playing with Watercolor
Here’s a tip…when I tangle over the watercolor, I use one of the Apprentice pens (Pigma 05). This is not to be confused with the Micron 05 pen. The Apprentice pen has a hard, plastic nib. Using a Micron pen on top of watercolor eats away at the nib. But the Apprentice pen holds up quite nicely. I am not sure where you can buy these types of pens. As a CZT, I am able to get mine from Zentangle. If you are interested, just call or email me; I’d be happy to sell them to you ($2.99 + tax + S/H).
Happy Tangling!
Bonnie 🙂
I have a friend who blogs just about every day and I’m looking at my site and it’s been two months! I’m thinking I must be the slowest blogger on the planet. So she says to me, “you need to blog more, just put in a tip or two if you can’t think of anything.” Well, it’s not that I can’t think of anything, I have plenty going on in my life, it’s just that I can’t seem to find the time with everything else that I do. You’d think with me being unemployed now for four months that I’d have plenty of time, but alas, I’m busier than ever. In fact, I don’t know how I ever had time for a J.O.B.! I am sure that some of you can empathize with me on that score. It seems that many people I talk to who are “retired”, whether of their own accord or through circumstances like mine, are busier than a hen on a hot tin roof. This is as close of a picture of a hen on a hot tin roof as I could find (actually, Foghorn Leghorn is a rooster and he’s laying in the sun on the ground, not on the roof, but beggars can’t be choosers, as the saying goes). If you don’t know who Foghorn Leghorn is, check out this Foghorn Leghorn link to watch these great classic Warner Bros. cartoons.
So, here’s my small, very small tip for the day. When my micron pen begins skipping, as if the ink is running out, I don’t like using it to create my Zentangles. So what I do is, I wrap a small piece of masking tape around it so that I can use it for fill in. There’s still plenty of ink left in it for fill in so I don’t like throwing them away, and the tape keeps me from picking it up and thinking it’s a good pen to start tangling with. Hope that’s of help.
With that being said, I’m way behind on reporting what I’ve been doing, so my goal is to put up a couple of posts a week to try to catch up. As Chief Cook and Bottle Washer my time seems limited, but I do enjoy writing and sharing, so let’s see if I can keep this up.
Thanks to my friend, Gail Foley, for giving me the push!
Happy Tangling! Bonnie 🙂
Suzanne, me, and Angie
I spent almost five whole days with some of the most talented and amazing CZTs in Dallas this week! Suzanne McNeill (author and artist extrordinaire), Angie Vangalis (calligrapher, graphic artist, CZT Marketing Diva), Marney Makridakis
4′ x 3′ Floor Cloth We Tangled
(author and ArtellaLand inventor) and a group of the most fabulous, ZENTABULOUS CZTs in the world! We gathered for a Business Promotion program for Certified Zentangle Teachers to help us better understand the world of promoting our Zentangle businesses. We discussed so much my head hurts! Getting started, marketing tools, getting ready for class, classroom environment, running a class, email marketing, social media and more. Added to that were different projects we had to complete. It was so much fun sharing and learning from everyone else. There was also a bonus workshop where we learned lettering with various pens, colors, and markers. It has provided me with a whole new level to add to my Zentangles.
I’ll be posting some of the things I learned in the near future. Right now, I’m still recuperating from staying up past 1:00 a.m. and driving to and from Dallas (six hours each way)! Until then…
Happy Tangling, Bonnie
Watercolor
You asked for it, you got it! The Tangled Ink and Watercolor Workshop will be offered again in September, along with my advanced workshop – Zentangle Too!
Beginner workshops are offered every last Saturday of each month unless noted.
Register by clicking the link.
Come on out to enjoy the fun and learn some new tangles and techniques!
Happy Tangling! Bonnie
Tangled Ink – still needs tangling!
Congratulations to Tina…in my last post I asked you to guess which of the tiles was mine. It is the first tile, upper left side. She’ll be getting one of the coveted green Lokta Zentangle envelopes! Watch for future chances to win!
Happy Tangling! Bonnie
Beauty of Zentangle by Suzanne McNeill, CZT and Cindy Shepard, CZT
The Beauty of Zentangle, by Suzanne McNeill, CZT, and Cindy Shepard, CZT, is in the process of printing and will be available around mid-September. This book has “Inspirational Examples from 137 Tangle Artists Worldwide”, of WHICH I AM ONE! It is so exciting for me to be included in this book (although I must admit, I have no idea what my page looks like). Suzanne and Cindy contacted me to be included in this book while I was out of town in Massachusetts last May. I had no access to my computer at that time so I was unable to provide photos. They did their best by trying to recapture pictures from my website which were apparently minuscule when they tried to retrieve them (as most of you know, I am technically challenged!!). I’m not sure how they performed their wizardry, but they must have managed something, because I’m on Page 94! So, it will be a surprise for you and a surprise for me 🙂
I will have books in stock if any of you are interested in purchasing. Once they are in, you can stop by to pick your book up.
The publishing price is $24.99; however, if you order through me BY SEPTEMBER 1, 2013, and pick up from me once they are in, I am offering my students and followers a Special Price of $18.99. Contact me if you are interested and I will put you on the list – payment can be made at time of pickup.
One of the blogs that I keep up with is from Sandy Bartholomew, CZT, who has written a number of books and who has provided great inspiration to many people interested in Zentangle. Her most recent post was quite interesting! The part that I found to be most interesting was that she re-posted a blog from 2009, way before I even knew what Zentangle was. It just reaffirmed my belief in Zentangle, and why I create them and want to share the process with people. I hope you enjoy the post as much as I did.
Sandy Bartholomew’s post can be found here. You may want to bookmark her blog to read…she’s quite the gal!
Happy Tangling!
Bonnie
Lecture Hall
Over a year ago I contracted with the Prairie Quilt Guild to present a lecture and workshop on Zentangle. Who would have known that a year later, when it was time to do the presenting, that I wouldn’t have to take off from work to complete this?? Things happen for a reason, no? I was able to do my presentations and workshops without worrying about using my PTO (paid time off). Plus, it was a paid lecture/workshop event, so I even made a little money (good thing…bills have to be paid)!!! The morning lecture had about 200+ people and the evening lecture had about 100+ people, so I was quite excited to expose Zentangle to this group of quilters! A few of them had already experimented with Zentangle on their quilting and were looking forward to taking the workshops – they were very excited about translating Zentangle to their quilting craft!!
The new document camera!! Ain’t it sweet??
The program was a wonderful two-day event where I met many of the members, had the fun of enjoying the “Show and Share” – seeing quilts different members had completed and were showing off on stage, and just being in awe of the beautiful work and amazing talent I was surrounded by! I gave a 45-minute lecture presentation about Zentangle in the morning and evening sessions on the first day, and then on the following day we held a Zentangle 101 (Beginner) workshop and, following that, Zentangle Too – the advanced workshop. I was quite excited about presenting the workshops because I finally purchased a document camera and projector, so now my students can see me working on a tangle on the “big screen” in real time. It is so much more fun than the whiteboard or the chalkboard!! A picture on the left…
Beginner Tiles Mosaic
Advanced Black Tiles Mosiac
The workshops were well received. I had 16 participants who attended both workshops. For the beginner workshop we learned the basics and completed a tile which is shown in the mosaic on the left. In the advanced workshop we worked on black tiles. All I can say is ZENTABULOUS!! The black tile mosaic is shown on the right.
Okay, so I’m getting a little better at posting these pictures, but still need to learn more about it. I finally went to the help section on WordPress to see if I could figure out anything and I learned a teeny, tiny, little bit as evidenced in this post – the pictures are at least are synchronized with the paragraphs. I’m still trying to figure out how to get the pictures to go across the face of the page in a row…eventually I’ll take better pictures, too, so y’all just gotta be patient with me 🙂
Tween Tangler, Holly, and Grandmom
I have to tell you a story, too! While we were in the workshop, one of the quilt members stopped by to introduce us to her granddaughter, Holly (to show us what Holly had created). Holly had recently attended quilt camp and had come to the meeting the day before with her grandmother to sit in on the lecture I gave about Zentangle. After the lecture she and grandma purchased a couple of Zentangle books I had for sale. Holly promptly went home and created a Zentangle even before she opened the books. She had seen the pictures on the screen during the lecture and enjoyed it so much that she just stated tangling!! This is one of the reasons I love sharing and teaching Zentangle! You just never know who will catch the fever!
Me and Susan
AND, I would be remiss if I didn’t give a shout out to those who helped make this program possible for me – Evelyn Gernaat, PQG President; Susan McMillan, VP of Programs; Donna Loehr, Workshops; Shirley Prouse, Publicity; and Mary Ann Smith for being my helper in the workshops! Without your incredible efforts and coordination this would not have been possible! ZENTABULOUS!!!
Happy Tangling (in the Land of OZ),
Bonnie
Emerald City Tangles 