Zen Doodle Coloring Book

I was notified by F&W Media (North Light Publishing) that they published Zen Doodle Coloring Book this past month and included some of my artwork in it! I do not know which Zen Doodles they included, as I have not yet received my complimentary copy. But it is exciting that my work has been published in another book.

This coloring book is built of lovely Zentangle®-inspired art  and coloring in these inspiring and unique designs will help you relax and relieve stress. You'll clear your mind, you'll have fun, and you might even have a pretty piece of art to frame when you're finished! Find more than 100 Zen Doodle illustrations selected from some of North Light's bestselling titles, including Zen Doodle: Oodles of Doodles, and Zen Doodle: Tons of Tangles. 

If you would like to buy a copy of the book, please order through my blog, so that I receive renumeration. You can click on the link in the right-side column to order your copy.

Also, North Light is offering the book as part of a coloring kit. It includes the Zen Doodle Coloring Book, the Zen Doodle Summer 2015 Workshop (a book that has great ideas, easy techniques, and step-by-step projects for your doodling, as well as techniques for shading, adding drama with dimension, incorporating color, and drawing eye catching patterns), and a 5-pen marker set of Earth Tones Chameleon Color Tones. These color-changing alcohol-based markers will change the way you doodle! You can change the tone of your marker from very light or no tone at all, to a deep vibrant shade. This unique transition enables you to add great depth to your art and is especially suited for Zen Doodling! You'll have the ability to create stunning effects including smooth transitions, highlighting, shading, gradations, and blending, all with one pen. The 5-pack Earth Tones set includes these colors: Spring Meadow, Bark, Seville Orange, Hot Cocoa, and Olive Green.  If you would rather buy the kit, you can click the appropriate link on the right-side column.

Thank you for your support and encouragement!

Keep creating!
Lynnita

April ATC Challenge - Architecture

This month's ATC challenge for Blue Twig Studio was architecture. This was a tough challenge for me. I really struggled with what to do for architecture. Finally, I had to just do it, as the deadline (April 30!) was quickly approaching.

I feel like I chose a couple of easy ideas, but I like how they turned out! For the first one, I created a simple landscape with a 3D house made of cardboard, so it looked as if it had siding and a slate blue stone roof. I tried to create a welcoming house with blue shutters and a warm, yellow glow showing through the windows and front door. The house has a walkway surrounded by stones and flowers. A tree is on one side of the house, and a bush on the other. The sun is shining, while birds soar in the sky.

House, 2 1/2" x 3 1/2", acrylics, gel pens, Souffle
pens, and Sharpie on watercolor paper. Front view.

House. Side view to show 3D effects. 

The 2nd ATC card is designed in a Zentangle-Inspired Art fashion, using ancient Greek architecture enhancements for the tangles. Swirls, feathers, fancy leaves, and geometric shapes were used to embellish the many columns, pillars, archways, porticoes, and other entry ways in ancient Greece.

Ancient Greek Architecture, 2 1/2" x 3 1/2", Bristol
paper, 0.005 and 0.02 black Sakura pens.

May's ATC theme is "Tea Party". Only one card is needed to join! ATC's are only 2 1/2" x 3 1/2", so they are small pieces of artwork. They can be simple or as complex as desired. Lots of fun, they are a good canvas for experimenting with that new technique you wanted to try. They can be done with paper or fabric or a combination of materials. Embellishments can be up stand or dangle off the card.  A winner is drawn at random to win all the cards! (Unless more than 20 cards are turned in, then a 2nd winner will be drawn). See Deb Prewitt's blog for more details and where to send your card.


Keep creating!
Lynnita

January ATC Challenge - Circles

The theme for this month's ATC Challenge from Blue Twig Studio is circles.  I made two cards for this month.

The first one is Zentangle-Inspired-Art or ZIA. I drew 5 circles with a pencil and then started adding various tangles with a 0.005 black Sakura micron pen. I used a 0.05 black Sakura micron pen in the areas filled with black ink. I added shading with a pencil and tortillion. I used fain, flower, dragonair, tipples, and mooka tangle patterns. Zentangles are so very relaxing and fun to create. I never know how the finished piece will turn out until I'm done. It's always a happy surprise. I added this quote to the back:
                 "It's okay to spin around and around in the same place. Just so long as your  
                 singing your heart out. THAT's what life is all about." - Chica Umino

Zen Circles ATC - 2 1/2" x 3 1/2". 0.005 and 0.05 black
Sakura micron pen and pencil on bristol paper.

The second ATC card started with blue watercolor painted in streaks on the bristol paper. Then I added circles of colors in yellow, blue, red, white, green, and purples. With a white paint pen, I added dots and dashes inside a couple of the circles. I embellished three of the circles with flower sequins and a fan-shaped sequin. I added googly eyes and a crystal nose to two of the circles to add whimsy to the whole card. On the back, I added this quote:
               "When in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout." - Laurence J. Peter

Googly Eye Circles ATC - 2 1/2" x 3 1/2" - watercolor on bristol paper.
 Embellished with sequins, googly eyes, and crystals.

This was a fun challenge. I hope you will join us next time!

Keep creating!!
Lynnita

Zen Doodles; Oodles of Doodles book

The book will be in stock and available for purchase soon! Zen Doodle: Oodles of Doodles by North Light Books will be arriving soon!!! The cover page is beautiful!

Zen Doodle: Oodles of Doodles, edited by Tonia Jenny published by North Light Books. 

I can hardly wait to get my advance copy and see my published artwork (see post here) and the the page about me as one of the "spotlight artists" (see post here). This is very exciting, to have my work published in a second book. This book is a followup to the book Zen Doodle: Tons of Tangles that I have work published in (see post here).

I will post all the details for ordering soon! I'm setting up to be an affiliate, so I will get royalties if you purchase either book through my link! So please wait until I can get that set up to order your copy!

Thanks!!


Keep creating!!

Lynnita

Week 15 of 365 Days of Art Challenge

This has been a very busy week. Tax time!! Wasn't sure I was going to get any sketching done as taxes were taking so long to do. My husband has a handyman business, so have to do the self-employment stuff. I knew I had made a mistake someplace on Schedule C. Took me 3 days to track it down!!  Finally, have them done, and actually got them in a couple days early. Yeah!! Sketching time!

I found a couple photos of people and children on Pinterest that I'd been wanting to sketch. Narrowed it down to an elderly lady and a child. I think children's faces are hard to sketch, because if they're not done properly they look like adults, not children. So I decided to start with the elderly lady's face first. I got as far as getting an outline done. Realized it would take me too long to get it done for this week's challenge. Zentangles - a good standby for sketching something quickly that is still fun to do.

Here is the Zentangle I did this week for Week 15 of the 365 Days of Art Challenge:

6" x 6" Zentangle-Inspired Art on mixed-media paper done with
Sakura 0.005, 0.01, 0.03, and 0.08 micron black pens and pencils.

I drew a series of loops for my string.  I used Ennies, Floatfest, Frickle,  Knightsbridge, Linq, Mooka, Pepper, Sparkle, and Zinger tangles.  I'm pleased with the result. Now if I could get the paper to lay flat so I wouldn't get the shadowing on the bottom of the page when I photographed it, I'd really be pleased.

Week 10 of 365 Days of Art Challenge: Zentangles

The 10th week of 365 Days of Art Challenge!! Where is the time going!! Hard to believe it's the middle of March already! I'm still sketching! This week, I drew Zentangles for Create Mixed Media's call for entries for the Zen Doodles: Oodles of Doodles challenge. I thought the deadline was March 7, but turned out it is this Friday, Mar 14. Thank goodness, as it gave me more time to work on my entries.

I do most of my doodling in a 6" x 6" notebook. I had a few that I wanted to submit for the challenge, so I needed to re-draw them onto tiles, as the challenge is only accepting work done on the 3 1/2" x 3 1/2" tiles created for Zentangles - no Zentangle-inspired art (ZIA's) this time.

This is a new Zentangle I created for this challenge.

3 1/2" x 3 1/2" Zentangle on mixed-media illustration paper. Sakura 
black pens in sizes 0.005, 0.01, and 0.03 and pencil. 

I created a tangle pattern I call Woven Bridges, as it reminded me of bridges going over and under each other, like weaving.  I found later that it could be considered a variation on W2 (which can be seen here for step out on how to draw it.  My step-out is below, followed by the monotangle Zentangle I created from this design.

Woven Bridges Step Out.  (Can be considered a variation of W2). 

3 1/2" x 3 1/2" Zentangle on mixed-media illustration paper. Sakura black
pens in sizes 0.005, 0.01, and 0.03. Prismacolor 0.005 pen in sepia.

I wanted to try doodling on black paper. I cut my own circular tiles. I had a hard time finding a white pen, pencil, marker, etc. that would make a sharp mark in a bright white. I tried gel pens, white paint pens, corrector-fluid pens, colored pencils, etc. I finally found my white pen I use for marking fabric to make the best white mark on the black paper. This is the only tile that came out with decent lines.

3 1/2" diameter Zendala on black illustration paper. Fine white
pen by Clover and Prismacolor French white colored pencil.

I enjoy doodling and creating Zentangle-Inspired Art. I find it very relaxing, fun, and helpful to keep my hands and fingers working, instead of being stiff with arthritis.

Keep sketching!

Zentangles from Seashells

I was looking at Michele Beauchamp's tutorial on spirals for Zentangles on the Tangle Pattern website. Spirals reminded me of nautilus shells, so I started making a few sea creature zentangles. The first couple,  a nautilus and a scallop, are shown on July 2, 2013's blog. I've created a couple more sea creatures.

Fish Zentangle. 6"x6" on mixed media paper with a pencil and a Sakura 0.1 micron pen.
I used a new tangle, that I call Barscroll, on the front part of the body. Instructions
will be posted in another blog.

With the beginning of fall, I was thinking back to last year when I went to Ohio during the height of the fall colors. I brought back with me a couple of hedge apples, hoping to use them to dye fabric, after finding out that they can be used for that purpose. However, the hedge apples didn't hold up well enough in Arizona's warmer weather and had to be thrown away. But I had made some sketches of their skin, as the texture intrigued me. They were so rough, similar to an orange (another name for a hedge apple is Osage orange), but with greater dimpling. I created a tangle called HedgeApple. Following are the instructions. I apologized for the writing not being blurry. I'm not sure why the red pen isn't showing much contrast from the black one.  I'll try to get a better photo and re-post it.

HedgeApple tangle instructions. This can be made to fit any shape.

Jellyfish. 6"x6" mixed-media paper using pencil and Sakura 0.1

micron pen.  I used the HedgeApple tangle for the tentacles in the

front and several other tangles for the rest of the tentacles.

The umbrella of the jellyfish is done with the Angle Fish tangle.