Materials Used
Transcript
Hey everyone! I’ve got something a little different for you today. I’m doing the Swirls Zentangle tutorial from week two of Tangle with Tracy Ann.
If you’re a regular around here, you know that for a while now with my Tangled Talk Zentangle videos I’ve been going through the alphabet — just picking a tangle for each letter and trying to learn a new pattern. And I will get back to that, but Wednesday morning I watched the a new video from Tracy Anne’s channel, and I was like – I have to try to make that!
By the way if this is your first time to one of my Tangled Talk videos here’s what you need to know: links for stuff I talk about will be posted in the description, comments are open but don’t be surprised if you disagree with something I say and I disagree right back. If you don’t want to listen to me talk but still want to enjoy the video, mute all my yapping and play some of your favorite music. And stick around to the end if you’re a fan of my cat Izzy.
So, Tracy Anne is a CZT, and she recently posted week two of a series of Zentangle tutorials–and they’re really great. So if you like what you see here, check out her channel, because she teaches the patterns and then admins a Facebook group for us to share our finished Zentangles. And I’m not paid to say this, and she doesn’t even know I plugging her channel — I just think this a wonderful way to not only learn Zentangle but to connect with other people and be inspired by what they’re creating—and I wanted to share.
I’m really geeked about this, because I’m usually late to the party on stuff like this. Like the Project Packs and stuff. I’m always doing them weeks after everyone else is done. I just never seem to get my ducks in a row to be able to do them at the same time as everyone else. But, lucky me, YouTube dropped these videos in my recommended feed relatively early on in the tutorial series. So I thought I’d share in case you’re like me. I’ve been on the lookout for something informal and flexible that still offers more structure than just you know – Googling and praying I find something helpful.
So, at the beginning you saw me setting up my own Zendala tile here, which Tracy Anne explains how to do in her video. The only official Zendala tile I had on hand this morning was a pre-strung one left from Project Pack 08, and I needed a blank tile. So I just cut my own using a page from one of my sketchbooks – the uh, mixed media sketchbook from Canson. Just a cheapie I got off Amazon I think. I’ll look it up and post a link in the description.
The watercolor pencil you saw me applying in the intro is not part of the original tutorial, so if you don’t have those supplies don’t let that keep you from trying it. I mean, you don’t need anything special to learn Zentangle anyway. But you know, I just needed to see a little color on my own tile because we had gray skies again here in Urbana while I was drawing this. Which, by the way, made shooting this video with good lighting a little extra, uh, strugglesome? Yeah, that’s a word now I guess. I tried to fix the lighting while I was editing though so it wouldn’t be too distracting for you.
So things have been slow going the past week or two as far as posting to my channel. Monday before last was my MRI. Number 18 for those of you keeping track at home. I won’t go into the details of it all here right now – you can always check out my blog for the full scoop – but suffice it to say that after MRI day, it took me a while to find my groove again. Brain MRIs are stressful, and they’re kind of long, and so I always leave the hospital after I’ve completed one feeling like I’ve just been run through the ringer.
That’s why it took me a few days to recover my mojo and pick up a Micron again. And then when I did, there was a lot of struggling with equipment for the video part – at one point my tripod tipped over and my camera smacked my desk pretty hard. Giant ugh. In the end I got the video done, obviously, but even now I’m still just feeling out of sorts and like I’m not quite able to pull all my thoughts together, so this tutorial from Tracy Anne where I just have to follow some instructions and the composition and stuff has already been sorted out — it came at the perfect time for me.
As far as the quarantine slash coronavirus stuff goes, we’re alright. There’s still always some random thing we try to order that ends up not being in stock, but we’ve managed to work around those things without too much extra effort here lately. So I’m glad of that. We did try to do a pick up order at one of those big club stores a while ago, but they were making people stand in line to go inside to check in for curbside even after checking in with their app and thinking about that now I’m still… I’m like…just… why?
As we drove through the parking lot, we saw the line to go inside extended all the way to back of the parking lot – and it was not a tiny lot. And just at a quick glance, like half a dozen people were standing there without masks, and Dan and I both were just like…nope. The way we see it, if someone’s not willing to do something as simple as wear a mask even when everyone’s watching, how do we know they’re not skipping hand washings or, I don’t know, licking door handles or whatever when no one’s looking.
Anyway… we decided we’d rather pay a little extra for delivery from another store. We spend more time than we’d like to seeing doctors and going to hospitals and junk as it is.
Speaking of that, I have my first appointment with a therapist next week. It will be an over-the-phone appointment instead of a face-to-face consultation. Who knows how it will go, but with it being my first ever consult with a therapist, I don’t really have any expectations. I just knew when they called to make sure I’d be OK with the phone thing that I didn’t want to reschedule for later because it took like four months to get in as it is – and that’s having a pretty serious diagnosis already on my chart.
Therapy was recommended by my new primary doctor at the beginning of the year when I was getting established with her, and when she brought it up I was like, “Yeah, there’s a lot going on right now. Refer me.” Because, you know at that time Lincoln Financial Group was still stealing from me, and their doctors were lying about my health, and we couldn’t pay our bills, and I mean. Y’all might not know this I’ve suffered some medical trauma too, and you know living with an inoperable tumor in and of itself takes a huge toll on a person’s mental health…
But now… holy cows, folks. Living through a pandemic to boot where people are openly saying high-risk folks are expendable, save our stock portfolios instead!? I hope the therapist is really good at guiding the conversation, because I honestly don’t even know where to start.
Enough about that for now though. I’m sure I’ll have more to say once that appointment actually happens.
Let’s see, there were programming updates I wanted to mention. Checking my cheat sheet. Oh, yeah…If you’re a Patron of mine, May’s Mystery Perk was posted on the 15th. This month my page-level subscribers get an exclusive coloring video. So check that out if you haven’t already. Or consider becoming a patron if you can. Money from your pledges are how I support my official Zentangle tile habit (they really are my favorite to draw on though) and keep the internet on and stuff.
Plus there are pros for you if you join my Patreon — you can get early access to my videos, meaning you can watch them before they’re available to the public. You can access my webserial memoir Who You Gonna Believe, get a shoutout in a future video, and/or get a snail mail thank you from yours truly.
And, as my final order of business, thanks for watching! Give this post a thumbs up (or down), leave a comment, and subscribe to my channel if you haven’t already. Because your interactions—even the negative ones—help me grow the channel and make it better. By the way, I’m getting really close to 1,000 subscribers and will try and do something special when I cross that threshold. So stay tuned!
Have a great one, I’m going to turn up the music, and I’ll catch you in the next Tangled Talk!
