Diva Challenge 240 - Autumn Leaves

I have had a busy week and only now, on Sunday, have I had chance to sit down and draw something for the Diva Challenge this week.
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I lie, of course, as I did the Square One : Purely Zentangle challenge yesterday - but it was a very Zen tile to do and took me only about 15 minutes....which is all I had. But enjoyed doing it very much.

W2, the tocus tangle at the bottom, with Flux, Hamail and Tripoli

Back to the Diva though. I was blown away by the gorgeous 'Tints on Tan' tile that Laura posted this week. Oh my, how I'd love to do something like that. I checked out what else I could find and there was quite a few examples - all stunning - I shall have to contact Jenny or Marty to learn how to produce something so absolutely delicious. Thanks for sharing that, Laura. 

Back to my own challenge. Here in Andalucia, the weather has changed from baking summer to definitely autumn.. We have chilly nights and misty mornings but often, the days are warm and sunny. We don't have a lot of deciduous trees turning from green to red, yellow and golden as I remember in the UK at this time of year and the main difference is that as a result of the much needed rain, we have a touch more green in the fields around us. Autumn is less inspiring here than in other parts of the world. I felt I lacked inspiration.

Then I remembered that we're approaching the olive harvest and realised that the obvious choice was to focus on the ripened olives, the old, gnarled trunks and plentiful little slim leaves for this week's challenge. Pokeroot was perfect for the olives and I used a variation on Wud for the trunk. I couldn't have done the leaves without knowing how Hollibaugh works and the Fescu represents a little extra foliage at the base of the tree.

It might not be a masterpiece but I am so pleased with it, because in my life before Zentangle, I couldn't in a million years have produced something that looked remotely like an olive tree...and now, I really think I can! I have resisted the temptation to colour it and went instead for the addition of some heavy graphite and shading to give it depth. Hope you like it!

Autumn in Andalucia. My inspiration!