Zendoodling

Most everybody that knows me, knows that I love all things creative.  I've dabbled in a lot of different things over the years.  Thanks to my momma, who made sure we were exposed to lots of opportunities when we were young.  She had me in music and art classes as far back as I can remember.  I loved my art classes in high school and experimented with all kinds of mediums.  Some of my favorites were pen and ink.  Several years ago I picked up my pen again.  I started drawing some animal characters and filled them in with doodles.  They are kind of cute.  Most of these I used my old mechanical pen with India ink.

Recently, I realized that there is a name for this type of drawing...Zendoodles or Zentangles!  I'm not into the whole "Zen" thing, but I love the designs and the detail of these drawings.  I have to say it's pretty addicting.  The idea is to just doodle without giving it much thought, however, I'm one of those perfectionists so I sketch mine out with pencil before outlining.  Here are the projects I've been working on the past couple weeks. I've started using Sakura Art Markers for outlining and filling in.  They are a lot easier to use than the mechanical pen which is really fine and tends to clog on me all the time.

The next one is filled in with watercolor pencils giving it a soft watercolor look.

This is my first mandala...almost finished with a second larger one that is getting colored in with markers and a blending pen.  Coming soon!