A Pearl and an Oyster

Having been in Cyprus for so many years, the festive spirit of Christmas is so ingrained in us that a Christmas tree is very much a part of our annual to-do list. Last year, we got a DIY Christmas tree kit which required assembling of the individual branches. This year, i got a pre-built one and concentrated more on the decorations adoring it.

A snowman is very common, but why isn’t a snowman accompanied by a snow-woman? So, i made a snow-couple. Of course, they need a house too, with cotton used for the snow on the roof. The guy next to the couple is an elf, the body of which is a pine-cone found all over the Cyprus mountains.
Snowman: The body is an inverted paper cup. The head is a regular white plastic ball. The ball was glued to the bottom ofof the cup. The hat was made out of a small plastic cup. The muffler and the nose have been cut out of felt paper. The base of the hat is a circular piece of chart paper.
Snow-woman: The body is an old ceramic candle stand. The head is a newspaper ball covered with cotton. The highlighted smile is with coloured pieces of thermocol (polystyrene) balls.

i also tried to make a snow-kid, but turned out to look like thumbelina! A piece from an egg carton was used for the skirt. The head is a cotton ball. The strands of hair are regular woollen threads.

A Christmas three isn’t complete without the stars. I decided to go the origami way and use coloured wrapping paper to make stars of different sizes.I followed the simple tutorial given on Artplatter

To decorate other parts of the tree, i added pieces of cotton to resemble loose snow. I used chocolates of different shapes with colored wrappers along with some cute snowman clips.

Yes, Santa is missing. But then, Christmas is still a few days away. More than us, Akshara is eagerly awaiting Santa with the promise of a gift from him!

written by Vidhya

With the Diwali effect still settling down, we had the karthigai festival. In the south, this is actually the festival of lights (much more than Diwali). Lamps are lit all over the house and just outside. I reused all the lamps made during diwali and also made a diya-styled Rangoli.

As always with our festivals, it just isn’t complete without an array of sweets and savouries. But, karthigai has its special kind, the pori urundai (Puffed Rice Balls!!) and the Paal Poli (Milk Poli)

A quick recipe for the Pori urundai that i made:

• Four cups of puffed rice (called pori in Tamil) to be lightly roasted.
• One cup of jaggery to be heated with little water until it starts boiling to a sticky lava-like consistency.
• A quarter cup of sugar is to be heated in a separate pan. As it just liquifies, add it to the boiling jaggery mixture.
• Add dry ginger (Sukku in Tamil), cardamom powder and bits of coconut to the mixture
• Continue boiling it until it thickens a bit and you get the required consistency (a small ball should form when a spoon of this mixture is poured into a bowl of water)
• Once this consistency is reached, take it off heating. Start rolling it into balls and that’s it, the pori urundai is ready.

written by Vidhya

By Rajaram

As part of the diwali week celebrations at work, we had organised a Rangoli event on one of the days. But, as part of the rules, we asked the teams not to use the traditional rangoli colour powders as a) we dont do anything different b) we would get into trouble with the office operations guys for dirtying the place. So, the teams had to make Rangolis out of any other item and on any topic. What resulted was an amazing display of innovation in the items used and the themes chosen.

Above each picture, i have given a link to the higher resolution picture so that you can zoom in and see the exact components of the Rangoli.

A traditional design, made of flower petals and various dals. Higher resolution picture here.

A design, made of flower petals, various coloured dals, cadbury gems and the best part, ladysfingers for the branches of the coconut tree!. Higher resolution picture here.

A simple, yet very innovative idea. Each of the boards carry the message “Happy Diwali” in a different language. Higher resolution picture here.

This was my contribution , the most efficient Rangoli as it took just under 2 minutes to create. These books were from the Mythology Collection of Amar Chitra Katha. Some of the books were placed according to their approximate location within India i.e. Karthikeya/Ayyappan in the south, Ganesha in Maharashtra, Ramayana at Ayodhya and so on. In case you didn’t realise, the books are placed to form the shape of India! Higher resolution picture here.

Yet Another beautiful mix of flowers and many hand crafted items. The four corners of the top rectangle have flower pots, made out of paper plates and colour paper. The origami kites are at the bottom. Higher resolution picture here.

This one was in just for the idea. It shows one of the screens of our product complete with the loading toolbar and other social networking features (enhanced version just for the rangoli event). You can even try a facebook page rangoli fro your home! Higher resolution picture here.

Made entirely of different coloured dals, this looked as good as any real fort, depicting Shivaji’s Shivneri fort. Higher resolution picture here.

This one was cool, a mickey mouse design made almost entirely out of board pins and paper clips with flower petals adding to the face. Higher resolution picture here.

Probably the one with the most colours, this was a very neat design done with so many different kinds of coloured items. Higher resolution picture here.

Made entirely of leaves and flower petals, this rangoli was very elegant in terms of colour choices and the type of arrangement. Easy to assemble, but requires lot of creativity to design! Higher resolution picture here.

written by Vidhya

Diwali is the season of Diyas. Diyas of all colours flood the marketplace. This year, i decided to make my own. So, i got some plain brown ones (the mud ones with no paint on them) and decided to decorate them myself. Any of the shops which sell diyas usually have these plain ones too.

You can use acrylic colours for painting on the plain diyas. Acrylic mettalic colours can used for the shine and glitter glue for pseudo 3d effect. I got my colours from Hobby Ideas.

I got around a dozen of these and tried various colour combinations. I also coloured an old camel diya set which i have used earlier in kholus.

Job well done Indistinguishable from the ones you get from the shop!

written by Vidhya

Kholu is one of those occasions where there is ample opportunity to try all the “art & craft” ideas you have. This year too, it was no different. The evening light gave a golden glow to the idols, of course ensuring that every god got his due.

Traditionally, every kholu is accompanied by a Rangoli. This year, i chose the design of a couple doing the Dandiya, inspired probably by our frequent visits to the Village restaurant. A chariot procession along with a music band was also kept at the side of the main Kholu.

I had also created a setup to resemble a doll/puppet house, where there were handmade dolls displayed on the upper deck with a shadow puppet show at the bottom.

A kholu is just incomplete without a park. I chose to make a village scene trying to get in many aspects of a typical village. the name was Magaram – Magarpatta + Gramam (Tamil for village).

The village has few houses,a railway station, a temple, a school and even a clock-tower. I had sown Ragi seeds all over for the greenery. There is a field next to the school, from where the produce is taken on the road to the market. A sign of modern times, the village also had a “Magaram Eye” – a giant-wheel for tourists to have a bird’s-eye view of the village life.

The paper lanterns which i had kept on the ground last year found a place a little higher this time. An aerial shot of the kholu…

written by Vidhya

A simple paper quilled birthday card for Rajaram’s birthday. My first official attempt at paper quilling…

I also tried to do something similar to the Google Doodles with the number 35.

Akshara wrote the text inside the card, almost took as long as the rest of the card!

written by Vidhya

Vakra-Tunndda Maha-Kaaya Surya-Kotti Samaprabha
Nirvighnam Kuru Me Deva Sarva-Kaaryessu Sarvadaa

The last time i made (rather than purchase) a ganapati idol was back in Cyprus, where there was an abundance of good quality air-drying clay. We do get it here too, but they come in small packets at Hobby Ideas. Last year, we had purchased an clay Ganapati. Finally, a little help from the house maid in getting some mud from the fields made way for a home-made Ganapati this year.

First, the mud from the field had to “cleaned” to remove all the straw and other weeds. Then, the big pieces had to be broken down and the stones removed. Once this was done, water was added to make it a smooth mixture. Then, began the process of “modelling”. Even Akshara was into the act and made a small ganapati idol.

Once the idol was done and had dried a bit, i used some white/red paint to give it it’s features. The flower on the head was a small paper quilling effort

Then, i used small clay balls to make the white garland.

What is a Ganapti without an umbrella? I used an ordinary paper plate, coloured it to get the design and then wrapped the circumference with wrapping paper (with cut edges) to get the frills. Now this umbrella was stuck into a tea candle kept at the opening of a water bottle (kept behind the idol), such that it gives the appearance of being placed on the idol. Then, came the dhoti.

After that , Rajaram did something remotely resembling a Puja and our Ganesh Chaturthi was done!

written by Vidhya

Finally, my very own blog!

written by Vidhya