Often times I find a friend that appreciates my mandalas to ask what they see. This time I was pleasantly surprised to find that several of them saw a spinning flower. This mandala started out as something completely different. I wasn’t even sure which direction I wanted to go. With every passing moment, I saw this mandala morph into something magical and full of movement.
What you do you see when you see this mandala? Let me know in the comments below!
I have to start this blog by giving a shout out to all my fans and followers. The inspiration from you alone is enough to keep me going. I’m so blessed to be surrounded by such encouraging people. Thank you. I wanted to take a moment and tell you a little bit about why I do what I do and where I get my ideas from.
When I am relaxed, and feeling fun and carefree, I mostly draw my doodles. Now I think I do a great floral design, so mostly they stem from that, but I am inspired by the world around me. I watch a lot of YouTube videos and I there are several that I have loved being subscribed to, one of which is KC Doodle Art which you can find here. I hope to one day be bold enough to create videos of my progress, but I have yet to even look into the process. Nonetheless, I am inspired by the videos I see from artists just like me.
Another place I draw inspiration from are my children, who are on the notepad I keep at work, pictured above. I have several “children” that frequent my home that have been attached to me by my relationships. My fiance has 3 boys that are all above the age of 16, my ex-husband has a 16 yr old son, whom I took care of since he was 2, I have a soon to be 8-year-old daughter, and two little ones, a 2-year-old daughter and a 1-year-old son. Every single one of these children have blessed my life and helped me see things in a different perspective. I love spending time with them and I love who I am because of them. The child I find myself being most inspired by though is my oldest daughter. She and I draw, write, and see the world artistically. We were recently discussing a book, Complete This Drawing, that I received from Christmas and her ideas of the drawings were just so refreshing. If you don’t know much about the book, there are a lot of squiggles and some a little more detailed that you have to finish. We both laughed about what we saw in the squiggles as we flipped through the pages.
Another place I draw inspiration from is gaming. I am a veteran World of Warcraft player, as I have been playing for over 10 years. I usually shy away from tv as I feel like I need to be doing something at all times. To be honest, 90% of the time, if I stop to watch tv, I fall asleep. So looking at fan art and the vast world that has been created digitally, It inspires me to think outside the box. It inspires me to put things together, that I may not have previously thought of, such as flowers and tentacles, which happen to be my new favorite things to combine!
I say all of this to say this,
“Look at the beauty around you and always try to see something differently than the rest of the world”
Its like when you are looking up at the clouds to try to determine their shapes. It’s that type of creativity and open-mindedness that the world is lacking in today. So be different, see life differently and inspire others to do the same!
This was so much fun to draw! I love how it all came together in the end. I drew this one day over my 45 minute lunch time. This was very easy to complete within that time frame.
Where do I begin with this piece. I knew that I wanted to do something that seemed like it was feathering out, but I took it quite literal with the feathers. I had seen a few ways to do some fun and quick feathering and I went with it. I just like that I completed it in 45 minutes or less.
What is your favorite part of this doodle?
This mandala was completed on a 12×12 sheet of paper. Sometimes I try to bite off a little more than I can chew sometimes. With the amount of grid lines that I drew, this piece became way more detailed than I had originally planned and took over 8 hours to complete.
I do like the way that it finished up. I would love your opinion on this piece, let me know in the comments below!
So, today I just decided to doodle at lunch today. These were done around 45 minutes. They are by far not my best doodles, but I feel like it’s important to show the viewers even the pieces that didn’t take any time to complete.
Using doodling as a relaxation technique has raised my production in the afternoon. I don’t find myself hitting the 3pm wall that I am so used to hitting. Not to mention, I am using my downtime to produce something unique.
What relaxation techniques do you use? Answer in the comments below, I would love to learn new techniques!
This doodle was probably the first piece that I actually planned out ahead of time. My first step was creating a grid. Once I created all my borders, I added in Squares and Circles in the middle so that I wouldn’t bite off more than I could chew for my first full page full of tiny doodles. Here is a close up of the doodles when I first began.
As you may be able to tell, that is a lot of detail wrapped up in the small corner. I had fully expected to turn every circle into a flower, which I would then fill in with other details. The only purpose for the squares in my mind was to break up the space and make me appreciate the detail even more. As I started progressing even further, I had to figure out the best way to tackle this project. So I decided that making the flowers first would be the easiest route.
Oh just look at that sweet, sweet detail! I loved every minute of this. I thought that each time I added an element, the entire garden just sprung to life! In the end, I decided to surround the entire garden with a fence like border around it. I could not be more please with the outcome and I think that it is actually another good picture for a potential coloring book!
Have you ever drawn anything that made you surprise even yourself? Tell me about it in the comments below!
I don’t really have much to say about these except that I tried a few different techniques while drawing them. I don’t have the exact dates when I finished them because it was over the weekend. So I will share them all with you now. The wonderful about each of these designs is that they are completely different and yet started with the same grids. Each of them developed in their own way and in the direction of my mood.
#1 
#2 
#3
Which one is your favorite? Let me know in the comments below.
As I started drawing this, I noticed throughout that it took the shape of a penguin. I tried to disguise the little guy but he kept coming through. Either way it was very fun to draw and even more fun to add all the little designs in there. The most interesting thing I kept thinking was, once you see it, it can’t be unseen. Do you see my silly penguin popping through?
I watch this youtube channel called kcdoodleart, and it gives me so much inspiration. Check it out if you would like to see the amazing work she does. She is the inspiration behind this piece. She always starts with a circle on the page and builds out from it. The simple fact that she can create something so amazing from just a circle just blows me away every time.
Well, I decided for the new year that I was going to be doing random prompts so that it forces me to think outside the box more. So, with the help of my dear friend, Sea Turtle was born. Here is a close up so that you can see some of the details.
One of these days I will be able to take better pictures of my art that is larger than 8.5×11. This one is 11×14. If you have any suggestions on how to take pictures of larger pieces, let me know in the comments below!
I have a dear friend who is in love with teal and blues. She is also an artist friend of mine and I knew that she would appreciate and one of a kind art piece for her home. I had so much fun drawing this and perfecting it. it was worth all the time and energy when I watched her reaction when she opened it.
I am so blessed to have people in my life that not only appreciate my artistic abilities but encourage them as well. This special lady is just one of those mentioned. Here is a close up so you can see the detail and shimmer in the finished product.
So, I did it, I decided that I was going to take the patterns that I use the most and create a sampler page using just those. I started this by just drawing a bunch of circles. After I drew all the circles, I just decided how I was going to split it up based on the designs I wanted to incorporate. The problem is that I don’t know these Zentangle names. So let me know in the comments below!
So far I have these added:
Paradox
Fescue
I drew this mythical bird for a very close friend of mine that has been through a lot, but always seems to emerge from the pile a new person. I am so proud of him for not stopping until he found happiness. I am so blessed to call him my friend.
I outlined this with fineliners and colored it initially with color pencils. After that I decided that the sparkle of the gel pens would make this creature just POP! I think I was right. He loved it and it now hangs in his office!
What do you think about this piece? Let me know in the comments below.
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