My Book is filling up

I'm nearing the end of this not-a-journal/not-a-sketchbook that I began in the summer of 2018. There are only a few pages left. 

I used the retail sock hanger in which I always see an elephant...

...to do an elephant page.

I had purchased this book at zenAgain 2016 and had stamped the first page with the logo. Recently I added a two-pencil string. I was going to add a tangle to the ribbon, but decided I like it simple. I might change my mind.

I had begun a picture of a table for four viewed from above. I planned to use (for the first time) some interesting colored pencils with three colors in each pencil. What fun! But... I didn't like it. I quit. I did other pages. Much later I came back to it. I had another idea! 😄

The beginning, and the pencils I planned to use.

The result! I'm calling it Al Fresco. And I want those plates.

Tangles: Circfleur, Gingham, Kuke, Sprouts, Within

I've been seeing examples of "map tangling" and it looked like fun. So, I gave it a try on the inside front cover, right-hand page. Next time I'll leave a little more white space.

*********

For previous Book pages, check these posts:

1. How it began
2. Next steps
3. Inserting an eco-dyed paper
4. Back cover, an alphabet, gems and paisley
5. Hexagons
6. Celtic-style tangles, and W2
7. Frontispiece and photos of my grandmother
8. Space junk
9. A sunflower, and the flower of life
10. Knightsbridge and magic squares
11. More space junk
12. For now
13. Mongolian roofs
14. Cubine and Fassett
15. Nautilus
16. Notanical - combining Notan and botanical imagery
17. An 'oops' page
18. Inspired by Project Pack 7
19. Four more pages: twisted striping, and borders
20. Three more pages: leaves, tea, and spirals
21. A month of joy
22. A few more pages in my marvelous book: a dragon, neurographic drawing, and BrixBox/Cantire
23. Five more Book pages: Salt, Morrisseau, found text, flowers, and more

A fan-shaped stencil

A new board game in the house usually means some new stencil template boards for me! After you've pushed out all the game pieces, you're left with a board with some interesting-shaped holes. This new one has fan-shapes.

The stencil shapes reminded me of Shattuck, so I pursued that idea when I did the tangling. I've placed the tile on the stencil to match with the fan shapes I traced.

Next, a Renaissance tile with black and brown inks, and white pencil. I traced the stencil two times, in different directions.

Tangles: Black Pearlz, Pearlz, and a whole lotta stripes.

Back to black on white. Again I traced the stencil in two directions, this time resulting in a string with three rows through the tile.

Tangles: Betweed, Black Pearlz, Chebucto, Elven,
and again, a whole lotta stripes

Aaand, back to a Renaissance tile, with black and pink inks, white and graphite pencils, this time with some random fan shapes.

Tangles: Beadlines, Drupe, Pearlz, Perfs, Printemps,
and a nod to Lotus Pods

I've used board game leftovers before. To read about some similar stencil work, check out this post.

Printemps spirals

Here's another in the series I seem to be doing using a spiral template. I used all spirally tangles here too: Snaylz, Paushalöv, Lamar and Printemps (which I've decided to use as a title). In a few sections there are even spirals on top of spirals!

I adapted this design from a design I found at freetattoos.org. If you'd like to try using the same template I've posted a PDF here. Note that this is my working template, not tidied up at all! The original design wasn't an exact circle so I traced around a zendala tile, extended some lines, and eliminated a wee section. More info is on the template I've posted. (Interesting how the original design uses something akin to Shattuck in the background.)

You can see previous work using this same template here and here.

Sphere look zendalas

I was cleaning out some files the other day (I did throw things out, honest I did!) and discovered two templates for drawing 2D works that look like spheres, especially if the edges of the circle are darker/shaded. The templates fit on a zendala tile although they were a wee bit small. I thought it would be easiest to use square grid tangles and tried a few.

Tangles: Beadlines, Black Pearlz, and mainly Rosé variations

Tangles: Camelia variation

Tangles: Assunta variations and Black Pearlz

I had started one with a currently favorite tangle, Snorr, from Sandy Hunter, CZT (I have yet to figure out all the lovely variations she shows!) but it just didn't seem to have enough variety. I wondered if color would help and opted for the rainbow transition I used earlier. It was improved, but I really didn't like how dark (and messy) the outer edge was. So, I used a compass and drew a smaller circle on the back and cut it out. Here's the before and after:

I didn't know what I was going to do with that little circle until I remembered a piece I'd been working on, off and on. More on that next week.

Go ahead! Try this at home!  

Here is the link to a 2-page PDF with the two templates I used, resized slightly to fit better on a Zendala tile. It takes some brain gymnastics when the squares become less and less square towards the edges. The tangle won't fit well there; just don't tell anybody.  Very large thanks to both Erin and Roy for helping me figure out how to do that link thing! (I learned something. Yay!) 

Have fun! And if you do try this at home, send me a photo and I'll post a selection here.