Shirley Anne Sherris

Happy New Year to everyone and hears wishing you all a very creative and satisfying year.

We have lots of snow here and as usual this country is not very good at coping with it. It looks very pretty and for me I prefer to look at pictures of the snow rather than endure it. I was brave enough at one point to go out and do some photography but stayed inside my garden. I took this one just outside my front door.

I ventured a little further and found this 'snow tongue' on the mahonia. This bush is in blossom at the moment and the blossoms that were out have suffered with the ice but there are new ones coming out.

I liked the way the snow landed on the conifers looking like a 'snowfall' of snow.

In the back garden the pond was well frozen.

There are lots of frogs down under there. Brrrrr.

My OH has just gone out to the coast to do some photography and as keen as I am on photography I declined to go. I must admit that I am a bit of a fair weather photographer.

Now to the zentangles. I have always been a compulsive doodler and it seems that my grandson has the doodle gene in him too as he loves to doodle and they are very mature considering his age. Doodles are also known as 'Zentangles' and there are web sites dedicated to them. This is a link to one of them Zentangle Gallery.

I have come across a few zentangling/doodling bloggers who are also textilers and quilters too. Here are their links if you are interested - Artopia - Janet ; Finishing Lines and The Quilt Rat .

Back to my zentangle piece. I decided to make a checkerboard quilt with black zentangles on the white and white zentangles on the black but when then the black on white zentangles were complete I felt it was more effective leaving the black squares black.

The photograph isn't as it should be as my usual photo studio in the conservatory - which gives me such good light - has the roof covered in snow and is darker than I like. I always try to use natural light when photographing textiles and still life pieces. This piece was pinned to a board, propped up against my computer monitor with light coming directly at it from the south facing window. I had to use the 20mm lens as I was so close to it so adjustments had to be made. However, it does show the effect of the 'Zentangle Checkerboard Quilt'.

It reminds me of the chess board I made for my daughters wedding present. I made a blackwork board and created blackwork designs using hers and her husbands initials. A for the 8 black square on one side, C for the 8 squares on the other side and a combination of A and C for the 8 centre squares. I remember one square took 8 hours of stitching. I bought them the Lewis chess set to complete the gift. I also drew the designs on paper showing how the letters had created the designs and this was stuck on the back of the board.

I never took a photograph of their board but here is the one I made for myself and my husband using the same criteria.

Not a very good image as it was taken many, many years ago on slide film. I must get around to retaking all the slide photo pieces - when I have the time!!!! Speaking of which - it is lunch time so cheers for now everyone.