ZENSdays....home again!

It's been a wild and crazy two months as Stampendous works out the details of selling our stencils and products, part of the transition was to travel to the UK to help our mutual distributor, Woodware Craft Collection at their annual tradeshow in Birmingham and then ending in Yorkshire teaching two Dreamweaver Stencil Certification workshops. Enjoyed all of it with Fran Seiford of Stampendous, who supported the educational details all the way!

Also we had the joy of meeting Maggie of Maggiebee fame when I visited Yorkshire...we met halfway in Leeds for a couple of hours of fun and sharing! Here is a picture that Fran took of Maggie (in the middle) and her friend Sandra (left) and me (right). (That tiramisu in front of us was good stuff as well.) Since doing Laura Harms challenges I have had a great time reading Maggie's blog...she has such a wonderful sense of humor and I love her tangle work. I never dreamed that we might have time to meet and get to know one another better, I discovered immediately that we were kindred spirits. I happened to notice that she had a needle tucked into her sweater as if she had just finished a quick needlework project before getting on the train to meet us. She showed me a picture of a teddy bear she had just knitted for her grandson. I was amazed....she said it took her less than a day. Wow! She also gave me one of her pieces of Zentangle, so once I get my act together I plan on posting her beautiful work. I discovered that she is just as humorous in person as "in her writing" and I hope we'll have the opportunity to get together again. Also discovered that her friend Sandra is an artist as well...who knows maybe another soon-to-be Zentangle convert as well.

CHALLENGE #207 (UMT) for the diva's site

When I got home I spent nearly a week recovering from a bad cold/flu and now I finally feel well enough to join Laura's challenges again. This is the first challenge of the month at "I am the diva" site and it's UMT (USE my Tangle) challenge #207. The first week of the month Laura randomly chooses from people's submitted tangles (even you could submit a tangle to be used). This month it is Sandy Hunter's tangle called "unbatz". If you want to see her step-outs for how to do her tangle pattern click HERE. Here is my creation...I have to admit that I seem to have a bit of a diagonal fixation lately, guess I need to relax a bit more and draw some more creative strings, ahh well there's always a next time...

While I was gone last week, Pam Hornschu was wonderful (as per usual of course) and posted a couple of beautiful sten-tangle pieces by Jennifer Dove from Arizona...wow! Thanks Jennifer for such lovely work. Also last week the Diva had a challenge to either use materials or tools that you had never used before and although I wasn't well enough to give it a try, Wayne worked on the glossy surface of a ceramic vase using an Identi-pen by Sakura...those pens are great...really indelible on slick surfaces. So if you would like to see his vase click HERE to get to view his Flickr account. Also he has done "unbatz' as well, so HERE is his #207 challenge creation....either click will get you to his site!

Don't forget to come back tomorrow to the "Dream it UP" blog to see who has won the February challenge. Occasionally we have winners and no one comes back to see if they've won.

Would love to have a comment or two, even to let me know what you've been up to while I've been gone.