Diva Challenge 203: Athitzi

Okay, this pattern is SO versatile. Peeking at other peoples' entries, I am amazed at how it can be used.The author of the pattern, Eleanor Holt, has a sample on her blog that is stunning to look at. The simplicity, with just the right shading, is stunning!

The Diva's sample follows Eleanor, but also explores other ways to use Athitzi. And everyone looks to be having a LOT of fun with it!

This challenge comes my way, as I am at the beginning of an exploration of mandalas. Those spirally athitzi's just called my name and became the center of my mandala. I also put some athitzi in zig zag, on another round.                                                                         

 In the original, the eye is drawn around and around by the colored orbs. I shaded the athitzi with gray colored pencil, which is maybe more subtle than I want. A few leaf shapes, with some queen's crown making a sort of doily effect.

After reading a piece on using the good stuff  I made a decision to break out my moleskine notebook, and because I am exploring mandalas right now, that is what the moleskine book will be used for. The cool thing about it is, I can "use my good stuff" every day for a while, or not touch it for a few, if I want. Because the moleskine will be a mandala centric notebook, I will choose other places for other tangle play.

Here is the first mandala I created, after seeing the technique on a video we have posted on our website Intermountain Tanglers  in the "resources" tab, under videos. It is the fourth video down, titled "CZT Marketing retreat" ...in that video CZT Sandhya Manne from India shares a technique for putting concentric circles on a tile, which can then be easily made into a mandala. That inspired me to start exploring mandalas, and this is the first one I created:

Four Corners Mandala

What really made this one pop was adding all the lines and aura'ed circles on the outermost edge. Makes it look radiant and energetic.

It's gonna be fun, doing mandalas and exploring athitzi. That is a very versatile pattern!