Zentangles

I know I haven't been really consistent in posting.  I really want to be.  I have been working on the Bonnie Hunter Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt.  It is on the long arm.  I was a little over halfway done and I messed up the hopper foot.  Now the machine is a little out of timing since it happened.  I've completed one row of the panto since "the incident"....  It will be slow going and then hopefully I'll be able to get my long arm to the repair shop.

On to happier things.  I've been really interested in the Zentangle books I've seen.  I've just never bought one. I've read about them on Cloth, Paper, Scissor's blogs and saved the ebook that was offered.  Then this weekend I saw all the books that were out there at the Hampton Roads Quilt Show.  There were so many books, I didn't know which one to get.  So I moved on.  This prompted me to Google it when I got home.

That's when I found tanglepatterns.com  This is a pretty cool site. You can subscribe for daily or weekly emails or add to your blog reader for new ideas and new strings. I really wanted to draw this digitally so I could play with it where I was and not to have to worry about having special paper and pens with me.  I always have my kindle or phone with me. I downloaded one of the strings to get my drawing started onto my Kindle. It would also work on an iPad, smart phone or touchscreen laptop too.  I have a Notier stylus for my touch screen.  It has a finer point to draw with than the usual touch screen stylus that are out there. I bought it on Amazon for $15.00.  I then loaded Autodesk's Sketchbook which can be downloaded for free on android, Microsoft, and Apple.  I opened the app and imported my string to get started.  In sketchbook you can use layers, so I selected another layer to put my drawing on. It was so much fun and so relaxing. You can save your finished drawing and you can later find it on your device under the photos. Here is my take on string 146 from tangle patterns.

I think this could be a really good tool to practice your quilting on too!  You can treat it like your free motion quilting (FMQ) and come up with really cool fills, etc.  You can also use Sketchbook without the Zentangle string to practice FMQ ideas.  You could import a picture of your quilt and then use a new layer to practice the possible design options.  There are enough features in the free version to allow you to use it for these purposes.  You don't need to buy the subscription version.  You can also get an account on autodesk for free without having to pay for the subscription.

After playing with all of this, I was catching up on the blogs I read and I came across Quilt Shop Gal's blog post and she has more on it here.  She reviews one of the books that is out there. If this interests you, check it out. It's a nice diversion when you need one!  There was a giveaway, but it is over :(  I should have kept up with my blogs....

Well, I just wanted to share.

Happy Quilting!

Grand Illusions Parts 2 and 3

Happy tenth day of Christmas!  I've been busy since yesterday sewing, sewing, sewing!!!  I'm trying to catch up.  Things happened in December that interfered with my quilting wishes!  But I've made up for it!

The ninth day of Christmas I stayed up all night to start and almost finish Part 2 of  Bonnie Hunter's Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt.  This was after I finished up a wall hanging before I made dinner!

The diamonds in part 2 weren't that bad.  I did the first method where you print out the pattern and attach it to the easy angle ruler.  Very quick and easy. Nice!  I did a couple at a time to see how they went together. Then I realized I could chain them all while doing the pinks first and then adding the black triangles.

Ironing was really easy when I did it like this.

This morning I sat down to trim all those dog ears....

... all 800 of them!  These colors remind me of one of my favorite candies, Good and Plentys!

I then finished up making all 100 of the double diamonds.

I'm storing them in my new basket I got from my friend.

Loving these colors!  Click here for the link up for part 2 on Bonnie's blog.

Meanwhile Trooper is wondering when I'm going to play with him.

On to part 3!

So far it's been going well.  Watching Midsomer Murders as I sew.  At this rate Tom will be retiring!  I'm on season 12 now!

I've got 90 done now, thirty more to go!

I suppose I should hang out with the hubby for a little bit!  Click here for the link up for part 3 on Bonnie's blog.

Happy sewing!