sparrow

Here's the small guy with sun shining sun on his back!  We were out at the Wildlife Santuary in Keensberg, CO, so there were many other subjects to take pictures of - but it was like he posed for me.

Sparrow

Sparrow wings and breast.  This guy was sitting near me on a post in the bright sunlight, that brought out the richness of the colors on his back.  Sunlight does wonders for color!  I like the gray breast that forms a heart shape in the mandala.

Duck with a curl

Here's where the blue in the previous mandala came from, the tail end of a mallard.  

blue feathers

This square tile has blue feathers from a mallard duck.  Within the world of feathers there are rough ones, smooth ones, colored ones, dark and light ones and you can see the texture. I want to feel it, too (but can't so just use your imagination!)

real feather

the feather the previous pie slice was taken from.

a feather

This is all feather and a drop of water. I liked the downy filaments and the patterns that they make when they overlap.



The actural bird

Here is the whole hawk lunching on another unfortunate bird. This happened in my front yard here in Aurora.

red tailed hawk

This hawk came to lunch in my front yard. There are all kinds of patterns in feathers (and the birds themselves) - the lines of the shafts, of the individual feathers themselves, etc. So I thought I would explore feathers in the next couple of postings.

Ivy Geranium Mandala

This star shape mandala appealed to me, am not sure why. It has a flower which I love, but I think it is the star shape that makes it stand out.

fall leaves

Journaling about my garden, allows me to look back to other years and see what I planted, what worked and what didn't work. I also use it to press flowers and leaves! and then I can turn the pressed flowers into mandala! It is all connected.

moss cross

Moss Cross and Twigs. Was introduced to definitions of 'the 5 universal shapes'; Circle, Cross, Triangle, Spiral and Square via a blog post comment on a friends site, she is into squares. I'm into circles of which I have many and as above a cross shape which I have also explored. According to the book the Circle symbolizes wholeness, the experience of unity; the Cross symbolizes relationships, integration; the Triangle symbolizes dreams, visions and goals (all the mandala are made up of Triangular ((pie pieces)); the Spiral symbolizes growth and evolution and the Square symbolizes stability, solidity, and security. This according to Angeles Arrien (1992) I have ordered her book to find out more.

Happy New Year

Well it is time to take Christmas down, feel like I'm dragging my feet. It will be cold again this weekend so I have no excuse. Even have to deal with the gingerbread sleigh, snowmen and deer that I made. Picture above is part of the sleigh. It is always a challenge to make and glue together the gingerbread creations from scratch, this year the royal frosting 'glue' was a bit runny so I had to wait several hours between construction sessions. Oh, well, it's fun to do and now un-do.