Today's Tangle - Raffia

"Raffia" is by Neil Burley and his pattern is posted HERE on his blog. I really like this pretty design but I had no luck drawing it when I had tried it before because I couldn't understand how the pattern was repeated. I gave it another shot and this time I was successful. It's very important to draw this pattern in a pencil grid exactly as Neil shows on the step-out. I also did what he suggests and drew all of the crosses first.

Today's Tangle - Bummel

"Bummel" is by Silke Wagner and you'll find her step-out HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. While I don't always draw this pattern in a grid, I do start with a square that I've drawn in pencil. I also draw a pencil "X" from corner to corner as a guide. I found it too difficult to control my lines when trying to draw it free-form as the step-out suggests.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Today's Tangle - Henna Drum

"Henna Drum" is by Jane MacKugler CZT and I have blogged about it before HERE. Her step-out is posted HERE on her blog. I drew that tile back when I first started tangling and I wanted to try it again. You can't see it in my photo but I coated the flowers with a clear glaze pen. Mimi has a video HERE and I found two other videos HERE and HERE.

Classic Zentangle® - Shattuck

I drew this tile for a prompt in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group. The string was very unusual this time. You can tell where the string is by looking at the edges of the segments that are filled with "Shattuck". We had to draw six jagged sections in pencil after drawing the usual square border.

I blogged about "Shattuck" HERE.

Today's Tangle - Salo

"Salo" is by Damy Teng CZT and you'll find the step-out HERE on her blog. LJ Grove has a video HERE that features "Salo" as one of the tangles that she draws for Week 18.

Today's Tangle - Tessell

"Tessell" is a pattern that I have drawn before but hadn't blogged about it. I was just getting started with tangling the first time I drew it and it was a little bit rough around the edges. Lately I've been revisiting some of the patterns that I tried back in the early days and I can tell that my lines are much smoother now and I feel like I have much more control over my pen. I also have a better understanding of how to draw different kinds of patterns that often seemed confusing to me back then. 

I actually drew today's tile on the back of the original so I can just flip it over to compare them. I have to say that my first drawing really wasn't too bad in spite of having a slightly shaky hand back then. I do have a much better sense of space now so the designs are a lot more consistent on today's tile than on the original. In case you're wondering about the random spots of color on my tile. I used "Stardust" card stock which has multi-colored speckles all over it.

"Tessell" is by Judy Okawa and her step-out is posted HERE at TanglePatterns.com. Melinda Barlow CZT has a YouTube video HERE.

Today's Tangle - Wifi

"Wifi" is by Jane Nichols and her pattern is found HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. Dawn Collins has a video HERE.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Today's Tangle - Kadibra

This whimsical tangle called "Kadibra" is by Ria Matheussen CZT. The pattern is posted HERE at TanglePatterns.com.

I have a difficult time drawing wavy lines. To make it easier, I set up a line grid as in the image below. First I drew a pencil line then I lightly marked it off in small segments. After that I alternated drawing shallow pencil arcs going in and out on either side of the line to form the waves. Using this as a guide, I traced over it in a more fluid manner with my pen. If you try this, it's important that the segments be shorter than you might think they would need to be and the arcs should be drawn quite shallow. Otherwise the Flux-like shapes will come out too stretched out and/or too fat.

Today's Tangle - Golven

"Golven" is by Mariët and the step-out is posted HERE on her blog. Mariët says that "golven" means "waves" in Dutch.

Today's Tangle - Puf

"Puf" is by Carole Ohl and you'll find her step-out HERE on her blog. This is a combination of the official Zentangle patterns "Bales" and "Emingle" but with a magical twist at the end that turns it into puffy pillows. Melinda Barlow CZT has two videos that feature this tangle HERE and HERE.

Classic Zentangle® - Betweed, Echoism, Florz and Tipple

I drew this tile for the same prompt in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group that I blogged about last Saturday. The prompt was to use fragment B3 from the Zentangle Primer as the string. If you don't have a copy of the Primer, you can see what this fragment looks like HERE on the Musterquelle site.

These are the tangles that I used:

Betweed - I blogged about "Betweed" HERE.

Echoism - I blogged about "Echoism" HERE.

Florz - Read about "Florz" in THIS post.

Tipple - I blogged about "Tipple" HERE.

Today's Tangle - AiSi

"AiSi" is by Nani Nanaia and the pattern is HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. It's an interesting design with an ancient look to it. I embellished mine with thin stripes, metallic gold dots and thin borders of "Doo Dah". Adding the "Doo Dah" gave me a good place to add a bit of shading too. You can read about "Doo Dah" in THIS post. 

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Today's Tangle - 8 in the Box

"8 in the Box" is a pattern by Ina Wünschmann and it is posted HERE at Pattern-Collections. I found a video HERE. I added some extra embellishments to my tile. The first one was the result of an oopsie when I was filling in one of the black segments on the edge between two 8s. I fixed it by making a rounded bump and then I rounded all of them to match. I also added stripes and some shading to the 8s to give the tile some dimension.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Classic Zentangle® - Crazy 'Nzeppel, Crescent Moon & Printemps

I drew this tile for one of the weekly prompts in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group. The prompt this time was to use fragment B3 from the Zentangle Primer as the string. If you don't have a copy of the Primer, you can see what this fragment looks like HERE on the Musterquelle site.

These are the tangles that I used:

Crazy 'Nzeppel - I blogged about "'Nzeppel" as well as the "crazy" version HERE.

Crescent Moon - I blogged about "Crescent Moon" in THIS post.

Printemps - Read about "Printemps" in THIS post.

Today's Tangle - Art Deco Flux Variation

Today's pattern doesn't have a name or a step-out. My inspiration was a drawing by Jem Miller that I saw HERE on The Ragged Ray blog.

Today's Tangle - Turkoman

"Turkoman" is by Neil Burley and his step-out is posted HERE on his blog. When I first started tangling, I found many of Neil's patterns to be very complicated and difficult for me but I'm starting to have better luck with them. HERE is a page with links to all of Neil's patterns.

Today's Tangles - Zenbuttons

If you're looking for a fun drawing project, how about giving Zenbuttons a try? They are the creation of Marguerite Samama CZT who has generously made her free tutorial available to everyone. It is posted HERE at TanglePatterns.com. While they've been around for a while, I only just had a chance to try them recently. I drew two of them the first night and another one the next day because they were so enjoyable to draw. The shading is what really makes Zenbuttons special.

Melinda Barlow CZT has a video HERE that shows how to draw Zenbuttons. However, she doesn't do the characteristic shading that you see on most examples. If you search Pinterest and Instagram, you'll find loads of wonderful examples.

The Zenbutton above was my first one and was drawn pretty much as shown in the tutorial. Below you can see my second and third drawings. I haven't listed the individual tangles and fragments that I used because there are so many. Most of them are fragments from the Zentangle® Primer. If you need some fragment ideas, the official Zentangle fragments are also posted HERE on the Musterquelle site.

Classic Zentangle® - Flux, Keeko, Opus, Paradox, Pea-nuckle, Tagh & Tipple

I drew this tile for one of the weekly prompts in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group.

These are the tangles that I used:

Flux - I blogged about "Flux" HERE.

Keeko - I blogged about "Keeko" in THIS post.

Opus - I blogged about "Opus" HERE.

Paradox - Read about "Paradox" HERE.

Pea-nuckle - I blogged about "Pea-nuckle" HERE.

Tagh - You'll find info about "Tagh" in THIS post.

Tipple - I blogged about "Tipple" HERE.

Today's Tangle - 1 + 1

"1 + 1" is by Damy Teng and her pattern is found HERE at TanglePatterns.com. I don't usually fill my tiles to the edge but it seemed like the right thing to do this time. I started with a loopy string and was only going to fill the inside of the loop and the bottom right section. It looked too empty on the left so I filled that section with another color. Just for fun I added some bobbles to the blue designs.

Today's Tangle - Hamsix

"Hamsix" is by Alena Light and you'll find her pattern HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. I found three videos HERE, HERE and HERE.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Today's Tangle - Winging-It

"Winging-It" is by Lindy Clarkson and her pattern is posted HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. Mimi has a video about this pattern HERE. I added extra wings and little diamonds to the brown ribbon.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Classic Zentangle® - Dewd, Doo Dah, Indy-Rella & XYP

I drew this tile for one of the weekly prompts in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group.

These are the tangles that I used:

Dewd - I blogged about "Dewd" HERE.

Doo Dah - "Doo Dah" was featured in the recent Zentangle Project Pack #05 video series. In the Day 7 video, Maria shows how to draw this tangle. A step-out isn't really needed because it's very simple to draw once you've seen Maria draw it HERE. I used it to fill the inside of my "XYP".

Indy-Rella - Read about "Indy-Rella" in THIS post.

XYP - I blogged about "XYP" in THIS post.

Today's Tangle - Bumpeeze

I found "Bumpeeze" HERE on flickr and it's by Emily Perkins. After drawing one bumpy line across my tile, I decided to crisscross them all over in Hollibaugh fashion. Surprisingly, it wasn't too difficult to keep my lines relatively straight as I bumped my way across the tile and I didn't draw any pencil guide lines to follow either.

Today's Tangle - Amalea

"Amalea" is by Chrissie Frampton CZT and her pattern is posted HERE on flickr. I really had to pay close attention to where I was drawing the diagonal lines that form the inner black pinwheels. Chrissie doesn't show any shading on her example but went ahead and added some to mine.

Today's Tangle - Sonnenband

"Sonnenband" is by Simone Bischoff and you'll find her pattern HERE on her blog. I drew mine differently by drawing every other column upside down. I also "pleated" the fans for an interesting look. I found a video by Bunte Galerie HERE which shows another variation of the pattern.

Today's Tangle - Bee Stung

"Bee Stung" is by Kevin Brooke Hudson and the pattern is posted HERE at Pattern-Collections.com. Dawn Collins has a video HERE. I'm not entirely happy with the white ink on this tile but the pattern was fun to draw.

UPDATE: The Pattern-Collections website has shut down. Click HERE to view this pattern.

Today's Tangle - Koaxil

"Koaxil" is by Lizzie Mayne and her pattern is posted HERE on flickr. You can get different effects with this pattern depending on where you put the color and shading.

Classic Zentangle® - Crescent Moon, Echoism, Florz, Flux, Pokeleaf & Tipple

I drew this tile for one of the weekly prompts in the Today's Tangles: Keeping it Classic Facebook group.

These are the tangles that I used:

Crescent Moon - I blogged about "Crescent Moon" HERE.

Echoism - I blogged about "Echoism" HERE.

Florz - You'll find info about "Florz" in THIS post.

Flux - I blogged about "Flux" HERE.

Pokeleaf - I blogged about "Pokeleaf" HERE. The way that I draw this tangle has evolved over time and I think I have finally found a way that I enjoy drawing it.

Tipple - Read about "Tipple" HERE.

Today's Tangle - JJ

"JJ" is by Joy Taylor CZT and her pattern is posted HERE at TanglePatterns.com. I had some issues with my gold gel pen so some of the circles look a little blobby.

Today's Tangle - Dyzzee

"Dyzzee" is by Susan Goetter and you will find her step-out HERE on her blog. I thought that I was going to have some trouble drawing this because you have to eyeball where to start drawing the scalloped lines but I really didn't have any trouble at all. I found it helpful to draw a light pencil dot in the center of each square of the grid to indicate the point where the scallops should meet.

Today's Tangle - Esses

It turns out that there are two tangle patterns called "Esses". This version is by Neil Burley and you'll find his step-out HERE on his blog. The other version looks completely different and is by Cris Letourneau. You can see her version HERE.