Monotangle #12 - Verve

     My schedule is hectic.  Things are changing for me.  I have been on an emotional rollercoaster.  So when I saw Roy's choice for our monotangle this week, I nearly shouted with joy!  Verve is one of those wonderful, relaxing "go to" favorites of mine.  I love this tangle.  And it was exactly what I needed for a few minutes of peace.
     I did the first with some gel pens on a piece of black.  I love the neon effect. 

     For the second tile, I drew a string then filled the two sides with verve.  The large white space in the center bothered me. Too much white space.  But to fill it with verve also . . .  well, that would be too much.  And using another tangle was out, because of the need for a monotangle.  What to do?  Aha!  I grabbed a pencil and used it to fill the space with verve, but because of the contrast it didn't overpower the piece.  I liked the "shadow" effect.  It shows up a bit better on the original.

      Maybe now that school is out - as of today - I will be a little more "chilled".  It was a hard day.  Saying goodbye to 20 of the best kids I have ever been fortunate enough to teach and add to that I have had almost all of them for 2 years . . . well, the emotions were on overcharge.  They are permanent part of my heart and will be missed.
     Add to that, my principal has decided to move me to another position . . . whew!  The other position sounds exciting, but I am like a two year old at heart.  I hate change of any sort - even if I like what I am changing to.  My feelings on the change - well, they change about every few hours.  I love it.  I am afraid I won't do a good job.  Why is this happening?  What if I don't like it?  This will be so much fun.  You get the idea.  Put on top of that I must change classrooms.  Eek! Another change!  I hate moving and packing.  I have been in the same room for about 10-12 years and have accumulated a lot - A LOT - of stuff (junk).  Cleaning it all out is a major endeavor. 
    Anyway, that's my rollercoaster ride.  Thanks for dropping by and leaving me some sunshine.  I love hearing from you and I promise by next week this time, I am going to be much more relaxed - I hope. 

Challenge #120

     When I first started tangling I used "bales" a lot.  It was a major go-to tangle.  Then I found so many others that I loved better, bales became forgotten.  So this was an interesting challenge to go back to bales and explore other ways to use it.  My string isn't very creative.  I just used bale to make a few ribbons and then added some of my new favorites in the middle of bales.  Nothing spectacular, but it was fun!

Have a great day and thanks for dropping by!

Long Weekend!

      Yahoo!  It is Memorial Day weekend here in the states and I have a wonderful long weekend.  I don't really have any school work to take one of my days.  That is not to say I don't have school work - I do, tons of it.  It is just moving and packing and cleaning.  Which means none of it could be brought home.  Ah, poor me.  Not.
      I loved the template for Bright Owl this week.  I always print all three sizes, but seem to only have time for one or two.  This week, I got to do all three.  The first one reminds me of a dream catcher for some reason. 

Dream Catcher

     Then I did the next one with my browns and sepia pens.  I love those colors and use them a lot.  Actually brown tones are among my favorite colors.  I also experimented using different sizes of pens rather than just grabbing the 01.

     The last one, I am not too sure about.  It is okay.  Again I played with different pen sizes.  I am just not sure the results were what I wanted, but hey, two out of three is not bad.

      I also got to work on the inchie for Every Inchie Monday.   The word of the week was melody.  I started to take a picture of one of my sweeties in my classroom - her name is Melody.  Then I decided that might not work. So I layered some scrapbook paper onto my inch.  There is a really pretty piece of vellum that has musical notes all over it, but it doesn't seem really visible.  Then I took the black gel pen and drew a single note.  Not real fancy, but it does fit the word.  If you want to see some gorgeous works of art within a one inch frame - check out the side bar.  They are always stunning.

    The weather is gorgeous.  The lab is (im)patiently waiting near the back door.  I feel a football game coming on.  I am so glad to be back to being able to "move".  That bronchitis is for the birds!  Hope your weekend is beautiful and filled with sunshine!  Thanks for dropping by and as always, I love your comments! 

Duet

  I suppose if last post was a trio, then it makes sense that this is a duet.  I am very busy with school things so I don't have a lot of time to post - or to visit other sites to comment like I want to.  I miss the inspiration.  This summer I hopefully will be able to stay caught up.  Here a couple of pieces to get me "sort of" caught up.
    

Bright Owl's Dare #58

    For Diva's challenge, we had to think about black and white - ebony and ivory.  The title comes from one of my favorite songs by Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney.  I wasn't really happy with this tile, but in the interest of time, here goes.

Diva's Challenge # 119

  I took a white tile and cut it into an irregular shape, then glued it onto a black tile.  I may have to revisit this challenge later on when paperwork is done.
     Hope you are having a wonderful day.  Thanks for dropping by and leaving me some sunshine.

A Trio

    I feel pretty good.  Now I know that is not a newsbreaking announcement, but considering the last three weeks "pretty good" is enormous to me.  I actually slept all night with no coughing fits.  Yahoo!  I still am coughing some, but the doctor said that may go on for another few weeks.  Either way, I did my happy dance (slow version) around the room this morning after a good night's sleep. 
   I didn't think I would get any challenges or anything posted - I just did not have the energy to draw.  But yesterday, I got busy and here are my entries for the EveryInchieMonday, Diva's challenge and Roy's monotangle adventure.  Check out the sidebar to go and see all the awesome entries.

Every Inchie Monday - Flowers

Monotangle Adventure - Fengle

Diva's Challenge #118 - Kuke Blossoms

     Well, now it is off to grade a massive stack of papers.  I haven't felt like that either so they stacked up.  Hope you all have a great week!  Thank you for dropping by!  As always, I love to read your comments - I plan on getting back into commenting more just as soon as school is out.

Dare #57 and some other fun

      While this post finds me a bit better, it's not the "ready to tackle the world" I was hoping for by Sunday afternoon.  During the day I am pretty good, though I get tired really fast.  It's the night that is awful.  The moment I lay down, I cough.  One day I am going to get a lounge chair so I can sleep sort of elevated.

Dare #57

      If you want to make your own zendalas, head over to Bright Owl's site and enter a contest for some zendala templates by Genevieve Crabbe.  I won them from - somewhere- back over the summer and they are awesome.  This week's template was created with them by Genevieve herself.

      After this one, I decided to do another monotangle challenge from Mindful-Creations (see side bar).  I rarely take the time to do two, but I can draw without talking.  I took Bright Owl's template and filled it with the tangle Hi-Cs.  Was a bit of a challenge but fun!  I never saw this tangle as so versatile until we used it this week in the monotangle.

Every Inchie Monday 

     This week's word was "track".  I used a rubber stamp I have of some tire tracks.  Not really spectacular, but I guess it works.  I hopefully will do better next week.  I have got to get a one inch punch.  I have every other size known, but not one inch.

   Guess I better try to decide what I am going to do tomorrow.  My books are at school and I am here.  Could make for an interesting day.  Just hope I have the energy to get through it.  Thanks for dropping by and visiting.  I love hearing your comments - thanks.

Between Naps

      Sometimes bossy people are the greatest people in the world.  Seriously.  One of my favorite people in the school is Alice, our school receptionist.  I have been fighting this coughing, bronchitis thing for about two weeks.  Dragging through the day with no energy.  I dreaded asking our principal to have a day off.  He's not an ogre or anything, I just hate asking.  And I kept thinking today will be better.  It wasn't.  I got pretty sick at school Wednesday and had more or less decided to take Thursday and Friday, but hadn't worked up the nerve to tell him.  Alice called my room about mid-day and said the sub was arranged for the rest of that day and the other two days.  Bossy lady.  I really love her.
     With two and a half days free, you would think I could get a massive amount of drawing done.  Not really.  I draw for a little bit then head off to try to sleep.   Sometimes I just sit.  It seems all I have energy for.  Fortunately my brother doesn't mind bringing me anything I need so I really don't have to move.

Diva Challenge #117

     Diva asked us to use a new official zentangle this week - schway.  I finished it Monday afternoon, but never had the energy to post it.  I really don't like this one.  Maybe it will be like nzeppel, and one day I will pull it back out and try it and boom!  fall in love with it.  But I rather doubt it.  It is too organized.  Too.  Oh I don't know - just too.  But here is my first and only attempt at schway.

Monotangle #10 - Hi-Cs

     I love this tangle.  It was however rather hard to think of how to make it an original monotangle.  I did just a big tile of this at first.  Nothing special.  Then I had an idea.  I discovered it fits rather nicely into a curvy space.  I hadn't really tried that but I like the effect.

Linework

     Inspired by some of  Cris Letourneau's work.  I just sat played around with lines. Somewhat mindless work, but pleasant.

     I hope you are having a great day and thank you for dropping by and leaving me some sunshine.  I am really hoping to be back to normal by Monday.  There is so much going on this time of year and I hate to miss it.  Also another wonderfully bossy person has told me if I am not well, he - my brother - will drive me to the doctor or the emergency room, but NOT to school.  Bossy.  I am surrounded by these bossy people.  Ain't life grand?

Sunday Afternoon

      The school work is all over the dining room table.  I have it neatly divided into stacks.  All set and ready to go.  Except I just can't get going.  So I thought I would get my challenges and dares posted and then - hopefully - have the energy to move on.  I have fought this nasty cough all week-end.  I do feel better, sort of.  Not very energetic though.  I wish we had a three day week-end.  It has rained a lot, maybe they will call school off simply because it is messy.  Yeah, right.

Every Inchie Monday

     This week's work is "turtle".  I thought about the ninja turtles, some yummy chocolate candy of the same name, but finally decided on just a plain shy little turtle.  Turtles are one of my favorite animals.  I have often thought about getting a turtle, but don't know if I want the hassle of such a specialized set up.  I already have a tree frog that takes a bit of time.

Monotangle #10 - Nzeppel

     Ages ago when I first saw this tangle, I persisted and put it in my notebook, then promptly forgot about it.  It was pretty, but too much trouble.  Then one of Diva's challenges or something made me have to bring it out and use it.  I fell in love with it.  Now it creeps in everywhere!  So I was super delighted when Roy's monotangle was to use nzeppel.  See the side bar for the link to Mindful Creations to view some other ideas on how to use this awesome tangle.

     I was very happy with how this one turned out.   Sort of like a water hose spraying flowers instead of water.  Then it was time for Bright Owl's dare. 

Dare #56

     It was a really good thing I was happy with the previous challenge, because this one did not hit well with me.  Bright Owl asked us to use the template and then "pretend" we had forgotten our pens and just use a pencil.  I really did not enjoy trying that.  Sorry.  I did it.  But the main reason I did not enjoy it was I found it was too easy to pick up the eraser when I got unhappy.  I much prefer having to live with my "mistakes".  I did the first one in pencil as requested.  Then since I always have a cheap red grading pen in my pocket, I did a second one. 

Dare #56 pencil

Dare #56 grading pen

     Well, I have taken as much time as I dare.  I guess I had better get rolling on grading and working on science fair projects.   I hope that tomorrow I feel more like going in than I do now.  I always hate the decision of going in or staying at home.  But with 3 days and 12 science fair projects to get done staying home doesn't look promising.  Maybe they will call it for yucky weather . . . .

Friday - finally!!

   What a disgustingly long week!  I cannot believe it took Friday so long to arrive.  I have felt about 3 steps beyond horrible this week.  I have coughed so hard I have bruised my insides.  Every morning I get up and play the "do I stay at home?" game inside my head.  I never won.  I went in every morning - foolishly I know.   So now that it is finally weekend, I am hoping for some much needed rest and hopefully healing.  This time of year there is so much to do in the classroom. (And what time of year isn't there?)  Besides, (and I know this sounds ridiculous), I have only 20 days left with a group of kids that I totally adore.  I love each and every one of them and hate to give them up.  So to lose a day with them breaks my heart.  In about 20 days, be prepared for a weepy post about saying my goodbyes - you've been warned.
     I promised I would show you some of our delightful art work - tangles, of course.  I had promised my group that after we finished the CRCT, we would do some art.  They requested tangling since we had done some last year and they loved it.  I was again totally blown away by how great a job they did.  I also was amazed by the quiet concentration that filled my classroom.  We tangled every afternoon for a week and here are some of our awesome results.

 

    Each child produced four tiles and we used this display for our county art fair.  I have lots of other photos, but I won't be the "bragging mama" anymore!

Challenge #116

     Diva challenged us this week to make our string (that's the pencil outline we use to get started) with our eyes closed - a "blind" string.  I love this.  I have even done several others.  I find it keeps me from doing the same string over and over or doing too much planning.  I wish I had taken a scan of the string - but you will just have to take my word for the fact I did do it with my eyes closed.

Dare #55

  Bright Owl's template was so pretty - it almost didn't need anything on it!  Seriously.  It was a beautiful template.  I grabbed some brown tones and went to work - of course making sure I used some of my favorite "go to" tangles!

     I would like to invite you to go over to a friend of mine's new blog.  My school secretary has been bitten by the blog bug.  She has started a site devoted to her love of vintage things, most specifically her journey into restoring a little camper.  I can't wait to see the end result because she has such a funky upbeat taste.  Drop by and leave her some sunshine!  Her blog is Just a Lil Freedom to Breathe,  I know she would love to have some visitors! 
     I hope you have a wonderful weekend.  I think now that I have this written, I shall crawl off to bed where I can cough my head off!  Take care and thanks for your sunshine!