Turns Out I'm a Doodler

As a child, I had dreams of becoming an artist.  I'd look at those cheesy ads in my brother's Boys Life magazines that said "Are you an artist?!  Take this simple test! Draw this horse!  Send us your drawing!  We'll tell you how you can make MONEY drawing pictures!"  My mom majored in Art at SFA.  She always rolled her eyes when I ran to show her what a neato deal I'd found.  All of the oohs and ahhs she poured over my coloring book scribbles had led me astray in the "what can I reasonably expect in life" category.

The last time I drew anything on purpose was in junior high science classes when we had to draw an insect and label it's parts.  "Moooo-ooom!  Does this look like a grasshopper's thorax?!"  A well-traced thorax was my highest form of art.

Over the past few years, I've become a doodler.  It's really hard for me to just sit.  I really like for my hands to be busy.

I doodle when I'm on the phone.

I doodle during sermons and lectures.

Thank you, Linda Miller, for letting me "copy your answers" 

during our Beth Moore videos when I get a bit behind.

During a girls' weekend in April (see:  "Falling Down at the Gas Station"), I visited with a  sorority sister who teaches art.  When I told her about my mindless repetitive doodling she asked, "Do you Zendoodle?"  "Whut?!"  I had never heard of anything called Zendoodling.  I went online and checked it out.  Now, I'm hooked.  

I went from the lovely works of "art" above to this...

 and this

 and some of this

 and a little bit of this

now

i. can't. stop. doodling.

I can doodle in a house.  I can doodle with a mouse.  

I can doodle in a box.  I can doodle with a fox.

When I began reading about Zendoodling (AKA Zentangling), I was a bit, ummm...turned off by suggestions of getting my "zen on" by taking "deep cleansing breaths" and giving birth to my doodles "organically."  Uh...no.

You can learn how to do most anything online.  That's where all my "formal" doodling training happens.  Googling is essential to doodling.  There are about one million doodle patterns and each has its own name.  The creators of each doodle are more than happy to share the secret of their doodles step-by-step.  Youtube is full of videos of people doodling with new age music floating in the background.

Tangle purists are also pretty picky about the types of paper, pens and pencils with which they create their organic, cleansed-breath drawings.

I began on computer paper with pencil.  Then, I invested in a little sketchbook at Hobby Lobby and some Sharpies.  The rest is history.  My sketchbook is filling up.

Doodling is so, so, so deeply relaxing.  Some afternoon when you have nothing to do, call me up.  We can get together and polly wolly doodle all the day.  

Yes.  I did that.  I just said "polly wolly doodle all the day."