CZT Seminar XII

Beyond words wonderful!

Once again, language falters in attempts to describe the camaraderie, creativity and outright fun we all enjoy at our Certified Zentangle Teacher training seminars.

So we'll share some of the images and inspiration that took place to give you a little bit of the flavor of what happens.

First, some numbers:

• 3 - Countries getting their first CZT (Germany, Israel, Japan)
• 9 - Countries represented (Australia, Canada, England, Germany, Israel, Japan, Netherlands, Taiwan, United States)
• 7 - Moms who came with their daughters
• 8 - Daughters who came with their moms
• 18 - Total moms and daughters (including Maria, Martha and Molly)

Okay, on to the pictures with occasional commentary!

Here's everyone! We enjoyed wonderful New England fall weather and had our picture taken outside. (Thanks to Marshall Huggins for taking it!)

Moms and Daughters. Daughters and Moms.

Where we ate in the Hotel Providence.

A pumpkin tangled by Martha and her two boys welcomed students.

Everyone got a small pumpkin to tangle.

One student arrived at seminar in her friend's BMW.

Although it wasn't exactly done in a Zentangle manner, it got lots of attention!

Here's part of the Zentangle crew (l-r) Sue, Martha, Molly, MaryLou and Rachel. Jean and Sarah were also here, but missed this picture.

Tables were set out in one end of the store for students to display their Zentangle inspired creations. 

And what a feast it was!

Molly led a session about how to teach tangling on black tiles while Maria demonstrated on an easel.

Some students had a chance to share tangles they deconstructed. These two pictures provide such a great example of what seminar is like. Aimee (first picture) is from Sutton, Massachusetts - just across the town from us. Monica (second picture) is from Taiwan - just across the planet.

One evening, we explored tangling on fabric.

Students still found time to tangle their pumpkins. Notice the shading of meer on the black ATC tile behind the pumpkin in the above picture. Instead of just shading (or, in this case, adding highlight) on one side to give perspective and dimension, this tangler added highlight to the top of one side and shading to the top of the other side. What an easy and dynamic technique that adds a sense of increasing dimension to that tangle!

Here's one workshop's tiles laid out in a mosaic for all to appreciate.

They are held with pins on this fabric covered display without poking through the tiles.

Everyone contributed to a collaborative . . .

. . . which everyone enjoyed and signed.

Lots of sharing and learning from workshops and projects.

Desert was pretty good, too!

We cannot begin to convey how honored and grateful we are to have this opportunity to meet and work with such wonderful people from all over this world.

You can contact these wonderful people at this link as their contact info is added.

If you are interested in attending a 2014 seminar, you can get more information in this newsletter announcing our 2014 schedule and more information about seminar in general at this link.


Click images to enjoy larger views.

Crack!

Maria writes:

Hi there everyone!

We are now just coming down from the high of a fabulous (once again) seminar. A wonderful time was had by all, including us. Rick is getting pictures ready for a newsletter and blog to share some of the fun we all enjoyed.

This serving dish . . .

. . . must be a gazillion years old. Or, if not, at least a hundred years old.

I don't remember where it came from, only that it was my favorite and I used it almost everyday. It is about 15 inches at its widest and has a nice old ivory-color crackled patina. In the back is a cool trademark with an almost too happy looking lion and a unicorn with a questionable look on his face . . . . "Royal Stone China, Wedgwood & Co."

We have an old cast iron stove in the kitchen and the heating part was on the other morning and I heard that (too) familiar "crack" of something not too happy.

Ugh! My beautiful old platter finally died.

A big crack appeared down the middle, but not all the way through. I just could not toss it. It served me too well for too long. So . . . what does one do with an old cracked but in one piece dish that has no value to anyone???

You tangle it, of course!

I added a bit of super glue where the crack was and figured I could just look at it for a while longer. . . at least until it broke in two. I owed it that much at least.

I picked up my trusty IDentiPen® and went to town.

 
So smooth and fun to write on! Much easier than I thought it would be. I started with that big black tangle and added a bunch of springkle, fluxed it on either side then added that flowy version of tripoli. I balanced it all off with garlands of pokeleaf and a few other bits here and there.

I did not use a string, but figured out I could have used the grey Fabrico® marker, had I thought of it. Oh well, next time.

I may throw a coat of urethane on it. Or not. Not sure. I like it. It will have a nice home in the china cabinet in the dining room.

Sigh. . . .

And here is another piece I revived.

It was an old candy dish I think with the plating wearing off to reveal the copper(?) beneath. It was damaged beyond repair in the middle of the bowl so we added some tangles in black and used a white Sakura® Gelly Roll® pen to add some highlights.

Oops . . . Almost forgot! Susan Olsen is the winner of a tile from the last blog, "Bordering on . . . " Its on the way, Susan. Congrats from me and Rick.

We will not be giving this venerable platter away, but I am sure we can find something worthwhile to send out to one of you lovely tanglers. . .

Click images (gently!) for larger views.