Not quite giving up just yet . . .

. . . but darned close to it. I've been working on this:
which, in case you've forgotten (I sure haven't) is 30" x 30". Here's a close-up of what took me five hours to complete, and that doesn't count the underpainting of the entire canvas (which was actually fairly quick, about 1/2 hour).
Nor does it count the measuring. Either time. I could not find our yardstick anywhere, so I did one of my usual convoluted measurings which always work when I'm sewing. I've been sewing since I was a teenager, which is what - about 33 years now? - so I've gotten pretty good at sloppy-eyeballing-seatofthepantsing. Unfortunately, this doesn't work very well with geometry (a subject I never actually took in high school and just sort of fake my way around). I have been known to use whatever comes to hand, and it seemed at the time that the raggedy little measuring tape ought to be just fine . . . .

Yet after I'd done a lovely crescent moon, silver and lavendar highlights & all, I discovered that it was nowhere near the center of the canvas.

And okay, my estimate of five hours doesn't count the time I spent saying all sorts of bad words, which it was okay for me to say because only C, who is 20 and has heard lots worse from his friends (well, maybe not), was in the room at the time. The girls were elsewhere (not that they haven't heard at least a few of those words from me in other times of stress, alas).

So you see, sometimes making mandalas is not quite as stress-busting as it's cracked up to be.

Anyway, I remeasured, this time using the measuring tape to mark off distance on a rigid wooden rod I'd found in R's lab. I measured FOUR TIMES just to make sure, and came out around the same place each time, so I decided that was close enough. I painted a new moon, and then made dinner.

This morning when I came downstairs, R had very cleverly used two long pieces of string stretched diagonally to show me where the center was . . . about a centimeter away from where I'd measured it. Conveniently, no one else was around, so I chanted a few more choice mantras and then traced the strings as guidelines before removing them. I did not repaint the moon this time; I think I can fudge things enough to make it all come out all right.

I simply remind myself that this is still a learning process. Life itself is a learning process. If I'd wanted this to be geometrically perfect, I'd be learning computer art rather than painting by hand, right?

I should mention that next to the moon, in the center, it will eventually be dark purply-blue with silver stars, but not till the rest of the thing is done, because I have to see the center dot so I can draw the rest of the circles. Why not draw the circles now? Because I am still revising/redesigning as I go. Anyway, I'll show you more as I paint more.

Given the other things I had to do today, and the fact that I still need to feed everyone and leave for class soon, I don't see how I can keep doing mandalas every day. I will either need to count my daily work on this mondo-dala as one of my mandalas, or I'll need to extend the 49-day period. I'd appreciate comments/votes/suggestions, please!!!

Tomorrow morning Z&I are heading over to Cedar Crest College to find out about their art therapy program, so I won't be painting till the afternoon. But maybe I will paint more tonight. This must be finished by next Thurs. night's class. Ack!

~Namaste