Molly Bee's Attic

Given my last post, this week's Diva Challenge is especially apropos.  It's about the meditative process of Zentangling, more than the design.  This is one of the things I did on Saturday. I drew the piece below purposefully, slowly and mindfully. It took a long time and I enjoyed every single moment of it. It's amazing how much you can clear your mind and relax by just putting pen to paper  and drawing one stroke at a time. I actually did this before the challenge was issued but only by a couple of days. Since it matched the criteria and it has lots of 'Tipple' (the pattern that looks like little bubbles) I decided to submit it. I hope that's not cheating I apologize because I can't remember who recently posted about exploring Maori culture and their tribal symbolism.* I was very intrigued by that and based this design loosely on that idea. It was created on a piece of  12" x 12" scrapbook paper that has a neutral dot pattern on the background...

I've had a string of bad days lately.  Sometimes I forget to take care of ME and get so worn down that I forget that it's my choice to NOT wallow in self-pity and loathing. I can let go of the angst and anxiety, and walk away from the drama of others in my life...and my OWN self-created drama.  I forget that I can CHOOSE to be happy. On Friday I suddenly remembered again and pulled my head out of my butt for the first time in quite a while. I decided to get up extra-early and bake some lemon bread since I haven't baked in forever and I love it. I decided to enjoy my work instead of slogging through it, and I set aside an hour to read in the garden in the evening.  I ate healthily and sipped tea all day. It was glorious! It was a conscious effort and there was a lot of redirecting my monkey-mind, but as the day went on, I started to relax. Saturday, since I was on a roll,  I decided to play hooky all day . I  decided to read,  knit, draw or whatever else...

I'm in one of those phases in my life where I have  some of decisions to make; hard decisions. And I don't like it one bit lemme tell you. In order to settle myself and sort through the pros and cons, I've done a couple of larger doodles lately. I uploaded pics of them from my phone to Facebook. I save them from there and transfer them here. For some reason, when I send from my phone to my email, the picture gets partly eaten on the way. Great! Another hard decision! What new phone to get! Anyway, a dear friend who is like a sister and just moved to Texas, saw them and named them for me: Too High Falootin' To Be A  Lone Star  (Apparently, to move to the Texas, you must memorize the fact that a  Lone Star has EXACTLY 5 points. Not  3 or 4....and definitely not 6 like the abomination above. Then they beat it into you that all stars must be  the State Approved 5-pointed Lone Star. Any doodler who attempt to doodle a star other that the official ...

Just a quick drive by before I turn in for the night. Here is my Diva Challenge entry for this week. The task? To use only one tangle-Dex.  It wasn't a hardship. It's one of my favorites. Especially when I can draw it in space! 'Night All!

We were having a bit of a problem at our house with Cooper climbing the screens to catch his favorite crunchy treat, the Musca Domestica . That's the common house fly for those of us whose palet isn't as cultured as Cooper's. It's all cute-like now that he's only 3 # but will become a problem when he gets bigger. A friend told me to get a squirt gun and squirt him with it whenever he starts climbing. Didn't sound wrong. So I went to Farm and Fleet and bought the only squirt gun they sell, a little hand-held number, felt good in the hand, good grip, good trigger. $3.49 and it was all mine. I got it home, loaded it up and lay in wait for the first signs of screen climbage. As luck would have it, I didn't have to wait long. In my defense, regarding what happened next, when I was a kid (in the before times) there was one kind of squirt gun.  It was a little opaque-colored plastic pistol-usually blue or red. It took approximately 36 hours to get enough water th...

Bid'ness first. Here is my Diva Challenge for this week. The challenge was to use the tangle 'Henna Drum' by Jane MacKugler.  You can see the basic tangle here .  I usually don't like my work while I'm doing it or right after I'm doing it. I will go through old pieces later and think 'Hey, I kinda like that', but that's after my knowledge of the mistakes and things that didn't go like I thought they would have faded. This one I actually liked while I was doing it! I'm not sure why my camera makes my backgrounds have a bluish tint. This design is much more striking on the white paper it's drawn on.  Oh well. Last week was a pretty stressful week, it was nice to sit down with this and relax. Once again. The Diva ROCKS! Exciting news! Tonight I am meeting with some Madison Zentanglers in what I hope will become a regular monthly group. One of the artists will be Diane Knauff from Stone Art Angels , who I was lucky enough to have as ...