Joy and Delight

A home bursting through the roof with happiness, surrounded by gleeful vegetation, and a big sun in a gold sky. Oddly, the metal leaf sky is not quite so over-powering in real life!

"Joy and Delight"
8.5" x 5.5"
Pen and ink on eco-dyed paper, with colored pencil, tiny gems, and metal leaf.

The sky is all metal leaf, which is awkward for photos as it shines so much. I also used metallic inks and sparkle inks. The windows are clear glazed. (I just can't rein myself in sometimes!)
Here are some detail images.

The front door and the windchime/mobile:

The text:

The whole quotation is what's known to Baha'is as a "Pilgrim's note". 

It's attributed to one of the main people but cannot be authenticated
and is therefore not considered sacred text.

"My home is a home of peace.
My home is a home of joy and delight.
My home is a home of laughter and exultation.
Whoso enters through the portals of this home
must go out with gladsome heart."

The happiness explosion:

You can see a few of the small gems I included.

The sun:

9-pointed zendalas

It dawned on me a while ago that Zentangle's new round tiles with 'pre-strung' mandala designs are divided into different numbers of sections. This despite the fact that Zentangle actually mentioned this in some promotional material! Oh my brain!!! While working on this one, I realized that it has nine points, or sections, or petals, or...

Tangles: Circfleur, EarthRising, Flux, Paradox, Phuds

The pre-strung mandala design on this tile reminded me of a beautiful building in India that I would love to visit some day: the lotus temple near Delhi. Here is a photo of it from above and you can really see the mandala-ness of it. The blue-green areas are water pools.

This Baha'i House of Worship is the first in India and was opened to the public at the end of 1986. It now receives more visitors than the Taj Mahal, four million each year. I have difficulty with really big numbers so that translates into about 13,000 every day or 9 every minute. It is a bit of an architectural marvel and has received much attention in professional architectural, fine art, religious, governmental and other circles.

Here's a short video about it from Seven Wonders of India:

I pulled out another tile with the same string on it and drew a zendala inspired by this building. I think the Opus curlicues don't work so I might try it again.

Tangles: Auras, Caviar, Cubine variation, Opus, Tipple, Tri-dots

I've printed the arial photo above in black-and-white and made a mandala template that is of this building. Because of the angle of the photo it's slightly irregular, which will be interesting to work with. It will be 10 or 12 inches across. If it turns out well I'll show you, but it may be a while!

PARTAY!

It's almost the official first day of spring! We've had a number of melty days here in Saskatoon but it could get cold again; you never know with March. In some cultures the spring equinox signals the new year. Somehow, the first day of spring just makes sense for a new year, rather than the middle of winter!

I woke in the night not long ago and had this idea for a tangle, an extremely simple tangle with basically one step! It looks rather festive so I'm calling it Partay. It's in the background of my title tile below.

As Baha'is, my family and I will be celebrating the New Year on March 21... having a PARTAY! We'll be starting the year 168. This is a holy day for Baha'is so family and friends are welcome to join the festivities!

Here in Saskatoon, on Sunday evening we'll have a pot-luck dinner and the organizers have asked people to bring their own dishes and cutlery to avoid the garbage produced by disposable things. Following that there will be musical presentations, a PowerPoint show of events of the past year, dancing and games. It's a family-friendly event with no alcohol and I expect there may be 100 people attending. Should be fun!