I decided I needed a blog space to post my craft projects, knitting, zentangles, things I make for my niece Miss V, etc. The name of the blog - "a pinch, a potch, and a kiss" - is something my grandfather used to lovingly say to us grandkids and it brings back fond memories of childhood. He had a particular cadence to the phrase that I can still hear in my head and it always makes me smile.

Monday, November 14, 2011

Digital Me

I just finished updating my yahoo avatar.  It's still kind of boring, but I think it resembles me a little.  For some reason I just can't get into making an avatar that is complete fantasy.  Oh well, it was fun.


Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Scrabble tile pendants for Relay for Life fundraising

The past couple weeks I've been working on making scrabble tile pendants to sell to raise money for the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life.  Once again, I'll be joining my mom's team for the Bakersfield Relay and volunteering at the Survivor's tent.

Most of the pendants I've made are pink, specific to breast cancer awareness and are from artwork created by Ashley Marie Design (found on Etsy).  My mom suggested making one in purple (the main Relay color) and more generic. So here's what I created.



It's amazing that I was able to find everything I needed for this project on Etsy: scrabble tiles, bails, cords, resin bubbles.  I heart Etsy.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Mini Samplers

Earlier this month I participated in a SwapBot swap where we created 5 different "mini samplers" of different zentangle patterns. These are my 5. I provided the name of each pattern on the back of the cards; unfortunately I didn't copy the backs, and I don't feel like looking them up again.  If there's any you have questions about, please feel free to leave a comment and I'll find the info for you.






Monday, October 17, 2011

What's in a name?

In this case, zentangles are in, around, and on a name.  I participated in a Swap-Bot swap that involved zentangling an ATC that includes the first name of your swap partner. Each person had 3 partners, so I had to do 3 names.  My favorite of the 3 is "Joan", but I'm kind of partial to "Maggie" as well (even if it does look like snakes).




Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Boring training, day 2

A few tangly bits from today's training. I particularly like the one I named "drunken huggin". It's basically the pattern Huggin, but skewed to the diagonal.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

A boring, all-day training at work inspires a tangle

And when I say boring, I mean eyes-glazed-over, fighting-to-stay-awake, making-grocery-lists boring.

I don't know if there's already a named or official tangle that loooks like this, but I call it "Floramooka" because it came out of some mooka practice I was doing.

UPDATE 10/17/2011: I just discovered that Geneviève Crabe provided a link to this pattern in her Tangle Harmony 10/14 Weekly Roundup.  Woohoo!

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Some September creations


The Zentangle Inspired Art yahoo group recently had a swap for a fold-up envelope that is sized to hold an artist trading card (ATC, 2.5"x3.5").

ATC envelope back
ATC envelope front





ATC envelope open




I saw these plain, white butterfly masks at the craft store and thought they'd be fun to draw on. The surface is REALLY smooth, so it was a challenge not to smear, but I really like how it turned out. I have 4  more...if you want to give it a try, I'll send you one.


 I love the edging I created on this one; although I think the tangle itself is kind of busy.


There's a new weekly challenge on the ZIA yahoo group: Index Card a Week (ICAW). This week's challenge was to create a monochromatic drawing.