Decor with dry flowers, pods

Living close to nature has been a boon to us. My morning walk is never complete without observing the minute details of the nature. There are lots of trees near our house which bear beautiful flowers. These flowers make their way to my home, as well as their dried version. Here are some ways in which I have incorporated them into my home decor.

Sandpaper vine is most beautiful while in bloom, but dried version is also glorious. I picked up an entire dried twig. Isn't it looking gorgeous? These flowers in an abstract vase and with yellow background looks good in my home.

The pods of "Pride of India" which are beautiful in their own way. I get different ones each time, half closed, closed and fully open ones. These are brown ones which goes well with any kind of vase either plain ones or designed ones.

These were few dried wild pumpkin that I picked up on our home from a road trip. They were plain and I could not resist the idea of doodling on them. In this vignette you can also see the pods, the ever blooming dried flower famous in Ooty, India and also some pine cones that we purchased in Ooty.

If it's India you are sure to spot the May flower or Gulmohar as they are popularly called.While their flowers are irresistible, their pods are also good item for testing your painting skills. Besides making a simple tea light holder from this, these are popular in my home for the fake sword fighting among my kids.

Some wild grass that I picked up on a day of hot summer. Note that these were already dried due to summer heat and I didn't have to put any effort in drying them.

And finally, my favorite vignette at home on the coffee table. I randomly put some twigs in tinted glass jars.

So next time if you come across something like these, be sure to pick them. Turn them to affordable decor piece.

Dot Art to decorate

A very happy and prosperous new year to all my dear readers. I have been too busy to post anything. According to latest article in prime newspaper of India, Indian women are most stressed out. I think it's so true in most of our cases whether we are employed or homemakers. While sometime when I am awake in middle of the night, I would be thinking what should I do tomorrow, what should I cook, what should I pack for lunch etc.,. I keep reminding myself to take everything slow and love what you do at least once a day.
Coming to my post today, it's simple and I think you need to have a very little artistic talents. It's the dot painting.

Dot painting are part of the Australian Aboriginal art form. They are done using naturally available materials. It's vibrant, interesting, aesthetic, and these arrays of pattern of dots may seem meaning less to us but they do have some meaning to the Aboriginal artists. Each painting tells a story and are hidden sacred meaning, known only to the artist, hidden to the westerners. More about this art read from here

What I have done doesn't have any serious meaning but inspired by Aboriginal art. I created few simple art just to decorate my home walls. I drew the design on a handmade colored sheet roughly and used ear buds to put drops of acrylic paint on the design. If you want smaller dots then do let little paint drip from the ear buds(just a small touch to the paper)and for larger dots drip more paint. Do not add water to the Acrylic Paint, use as it is from the bottle.
My art teacher mentioned about these kind of Painting, and the first one was done in our class. This was done on a green colored fine handmade paper.

My husband had a T-Shirt bought as a souvenir from a recent trip and I loved the elephant face so much that I wanted to try that using dot painting. My second attempt was this.

 

So how did you like my painting? Want to try yourself? Have a wonderful, and happy year ahead.

Styling your Coffee Table

If there is one thing I love to do most with my home then it is decorating my coffee table.
Coffee table is an focal point that is looked upon as soon as someone enters your living room.  There are n number of ways to experiment with it looks and here are few of my favorites approaches.

Creating a vignette

The main idea of creating vignette is to create a mood with the still life objects and color co-coordinating these objects. Its simple, take a large tray and arrange few things of your likes like Buddha, vase, sea shells, boxes, jewelry, green plant, planters, candles etc.,  in it. Coffee table and the vignettes tell you about your tastes, likes and gives the personal touch to the living room. I keep changing these vignettes, some times its all brass wares, vase with fresh flowers, idols or sometimes just some shells and flowers in the pickle jars. I personally like to go for the natural trays like bamboo, or the grass,rattan trays that we get in the craft and handicrafts exhibitions in India.

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Coffee table book

Coffee table is incomplete without the books and you should display books if you have a large table. Many large, heavy books are available exclusively to be displayed on the coffee table. This could show your interests in the books and become a conversational topic among your guests. I sometimes put magazines on the table.

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Table runner

Deck up your table with an elegant table runner that matches the overall décor of the room. Remember it should go well with your sofa upholstery and the color of your walls. There are so many options available both online as well as many home decor shops offline. Fun part is that you can keep changing them according to your vignette and have throws/cushions to match them. If you like to stitch and embroider, put up your hand embroidered, or an applique work on display.

Flower Vases/Small planters

Choose a flower vase depending on the size of the room and the table. Fresh flowers are always welcoming but in case you are short of time to buy fresh flowers, choose artificial ones with best imitation. A short or a flat flower vase if you are keeping with other things.If you have green thumb then choose some succulent in attractive planters.

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Here are two ways in which I have styled my coffee table.

Having said all the above things do not clutter your table. Keep it simple and well arranged.

My small library makeover

With growing kids there is always a need for more room for toys, books, clothes etc. I love arranging, re-arranging things at my home, but arranging my sons books is always frustrating. I keep them in some fashion, after a while they are just thrown here and there. Besides there is constant fight library space, books among my sons.
This was how the kids library looked. It's usually worse than this.

I was looking for cheap and best deals online for bookshelves so that my younger one could easily reach them, take care of it himself.
One option was from Urban Ladder(BOEBERG BOOKSHELF) and another one from PepperFry( McAnna Storage Shelf, MollyCoddle).  I could not go for the Urban Ladder one, not yet since it did not get along with old computer table in the same room and for me to purchase it, first I had to dispose this computer table.
Since the necessity was urgent I bought these storage shelves from PF. They came disassembled in four packs. It was easy to assemble as it comes with instruction and people who have drill gun can easily do it themselves. However the PF carpenters will also do it for you in case you are not comfortable with it. These come in different vibrant colors perfect for Kids room, also you can have many options like closed, open, and different shapes and sizes. I bought four of them, 2 open ones and two with doors. Since they were of the same size I could arrange them in vertical fashion. These are made from MDF and easy on pockets.

By having two separate small libraries, I can entrust them the work of arranging the books for their personal libraries. This reduces my work and headache.

My own cosy corner

It's incredible, the way pop of color bring magic to any corner. This is my reading nook where I relax on few afternoons and catch up with a good book. I got this brass cradle from my mom, lying in the cupboard for long, unused. I decided to bring it down and use it as a small side table to display books, handicraft's and other knick-knacks(which I am never tired of buying). The only investment I made was couple of matching cushion covers. Isn't it a cosy and cheerful corner?

Linking this to Coloursdekor The-weekly-story-wk-10

My library...

It's my home's birthday again although this post is bit late. My Internet connection went kaput for few days thanks to my three month old kitten. My kitten while playing pulled the dongle cord which we usually keep in top for better signal receiving.
I am sharing with you a corner in my house that is very dear to me, a corner where I meet new people, fellow blogger, friends. It also holds books that I have treasured. It's the library and the computer table unit.

We have a huge window which is in sync with the bay window downstairs. We are planning to put bamboo blinds and this plan is still a plan so far...

Happy B'day my home

It's again the time of the year where my sweet home is celebrating her birthday.
It's so true that you build your dream home only once, isn't it? The excitement of seeing your dream come true is wonderful, decorating it is even more wonderful.  Wherever I go, I long to come back to my sweet abode.
Sharing with you another corner of my home where I spend my evening sitting with a cup of chai.  I love to sit here when it rains.

A Window makeover

If there is any place in my home which I dislike that would be our bed room's king sized window. Why?
1. It is high, I can't open/close it without the help of stool.
2. Due to west facing, it lets in lot of sunlight in the afternoon.
Somehow I am not convinced with the idea of putting vertical blinds to this window, so I covered the half of the window with curtains. The other half  i.e. slanting in size lets in lot of afternoon sunlight directly on the bed, making difficult to take nap.

We knew we had to fix this problem by consulting an interior decorator and but we keep on postponing it. 

A recent visit to Mahabalipuram, I had an idea, which would lessen the problem. While shopping, I found these hangings made from the sea chips. So we bargained two of them for Rs 700 and bought them.

I dis-tangled them(didn't have the heart to do it) and made them to linear hangings.

For time being I have just tied them to the window railings. These hangings block the sunlight to some extent.

The best part of the project, like to see the shadow it creates in the evening!

Last week...

Hope you all had super Diwali blast. Whenever I think of Diwali, eating sweets, crackers and cleaning comes into my mind. We all do cleaning everyday but for the festival Diwali it's even more. We got live in Gujarat for about 3 years and I got this habit of cleaning home for Deepavali from Gujaratis. It's is believed that Goddess Lakshmi resides only in clean home.

Sharing here with you is our children's room.
Currently this room is occupied to the fullest by the elder son Pranav. The younger one Prajwal is yet to establish his foot here and his domain is the living room and the dining hall.
I have a special cleaning session of this room on Monday morning after two days of masti by the boys. You can't imagine state of this room at the end of the week -:)
We tried a lot making Pranav to clean his room(especially his table) by bribing, threatening etc., but it works only temporarily.

Before

After...

Curtain hangings

We have got extra space on the curtain rods which protrudes outside the windows. This way, I could hang few light hangings on to them and avoid any drilling in the walls.

Happy B'day my home

Two years ago on this day, we moved to our house 'Greeshma'. Few days after moving here, we lost our pet local dog 'Jimmy', bought a new German Shep 'Barnie', I had my second baby boy 'Prajwal' and lots of ups and down in life.



Sharing with you a corner of my home, two views from where I sit and sip my morning tea. It's the only peaceful time I get for day dreaming, lost in thoughts, thinking about what to do in the day. This also only time of the day at which our home looks livable -:)

Organize!

Trays are good way to keep things together and organized. Here are two pics from my home. Just don't conclude that I am very tidy and neat person. After a week you would find everything out of tray lying around, thanks to my family. Later they go back again in them.

Happy Deepavali

Happy Deepavali to everyone out there.
Deepavali at our home is a simple affair begining with Naraka Chaturdashi. We take bath using oil, cut lemon and turmeric mixture. New clothes are worn and after this lighting Diyas and bursting crackers and finaly consuming few sweets. Its is enjoyable if you have relatives or friends around you.
Deepavali brings back the old memories where we as kids refused to wake up early and take bath. Early here is 4:30 AM, this was because after applying oil we had to wait till the oil got inside our skin -:). Soon after the bath we used to go back to sleep again. Few years when we were in Gujrat we were living in apartment, sweets were exchanged among neighbours. We as sweet deprived kids were sighing why there were so many sweets at a time. By the end of the festival we used to run away from sweets for few days.
Nowadays the celebrations have become so minimal, it is hard to imagine that our children may not have memories like us.
Posting couple of pics

My coffee mugs shelf

I love coffee/tea mugs. Any mug that catches my eye, I would decide to buy. But since rented house didn't have any space to display/keep these mugs I had put hold on my urge to buy any mugs. While mentioning the specifications to our architect, I had made sure something is build to display these mugs. We finally got this made in our house.