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Occasional Cursing Involved.

5/13/2023

It's 10.75 x 13.5 inches; punched with a #10 Oxford Punch Needle using Malabrigo Chunky (the dark blue, a single ply hand-dyed variegated 100% wool yarn), Creative Mélange Chunky yarn (the lighter blues, 53% wool and 47% acrylic) and Valley Yarns Haydenville Bullky yarn (the gold yarn, 60% superwash merino and 40% acrylic). The superwash and both acrylics were slippery to punch but I was able to make it work.

This is my latest experimental departure from Pearl K. McGown's "Duncan" pattern. First I took the classic pattern, made a tesselated version, and then drew in randomly-located triangles inside each tesselation piece to create something different.

So it's both tesselated and triangled.

Some cursing was involved. But by my standards, not too bad. What is it about cursing that makes things easier? A few choice swear words are good for the soul.

"There ought to be a room in every house to swear in. It's dangerous to have to repress an emotion like that."
--Mark Twain

Video Practice, the Finish.

5/5/2023

Circus Star, a Zentangle®-inspired piece from a video by Romi Marks. Prismacolor pencils, Micron PN in black, white gellyroll on a 4.5" cardstock tile. Tangles are a variation of Bales, Crescent Moon, a variation of Sistar, Arukas, and other linework.

So here it is, with the colors added. This was great fun to do. The URL for the video is in yesterday's post, in case you want to try this yourself.

I'm using colors here I do not normally use--not sure what happened there. I am not a "pink" person in normal circumstances but this is what came out.

Contrast it to yesterday's black & white version.

Video Practice, the Linework

5/4/2023

Tangles are: a Bales variation, Crescent Moon, a Sistar variation, Flux, and Arukas.

This is only the finished linework for a Zentangle®-inspired piece; I will be adding the color for it, hopefully later today or tomorrow.

If you'd like to try this yourself, it's called "Circus Star" and is free on The Tangled Yogi's YouTube channel. She has an especially lovely meditation at the start of this one, using video footage from a morning walk she took near a lake in California.

AND NOW, IN THE "BEGINNER'S MIND" CATEGORY:

Last Tuesday I was lucky enough to take a digital design workshop with Lucy Richard from Wooly Soul Strings, called "Sketchbook for Hookers." (that would be RUG hookers, people, not the other kind.)

I've been wanting to learn digital art for years now but haven't had time, and I could tell that Lucy's workshop on the Sketchbook app (simpler than Procreate) would teach me the basic concepts.

This was a fabulous workshop and very much a lesson in Beginner's Mind. Talk about FLAILING AROUND. It was a humbling and hilarious experience. Fortunately Lucy is the soul of patience--I'm not kidding about this--and guided us through our bouts of flailing to success.

Or, what constitutes "success" for an abject beginner. Here's what i was able to produce. Yes, it is indeed hideous. But it's my hideous, and I'm proud of it. I can only get better. Right?

It helped to use a couple of mantras throughout: "It's ok, I've never done this before," or "I'm just learning."

And so I'll practice. Begin again, begin again, begin again. Just like meditation. I loved this workshop. Thanks, Lucy! The design possibilities are endless.

Occasional Cursing Involved.

Video Practice, the Finish.

Video Practice, the Linework

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