Flower power

Who doesn't like to have flowers at home? A single bloom can make a great difference to the look of your home. Having flowers at home is the display of your creativity. They add grace, charm, bring good luck, and enhance positive energy in home.
While arranging the flowers, keep in mind that the height of the flowers depends on the type of the vase. Tall vases demand the long stalks while with smaller vases you can put short stalked flowers.Trim them and add some green foliage to break the monotony of the flowers.
The flower arrangement need not be always expensive. Ditch the traditional way and have flowers in small mason jars.  When bunched together in small container, it can create an interesting coffee table setting.

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Otherwise, tie them with twines or wires and hang them onto windows.

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Bring out your vintage copper or brass containers, arrange ordinary flowers in them and see the difference they make.

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Wrap the glass bottle with colorful yarns, dollies and fill them with the contrasting flowers.

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Taking the cue from above I have put few dried flowers in jute wrapped glass bottle.

Wrist band for Independence Day

Hello Amigos!!!

Indian Independence day is on 15th August, I am sure all of us have plans to celebrate it. For me it includes participating in the community flag hoisting, attending my kids school celebrations, decorating home with tri colors.
Every year we buy some or the other thing for the kids to show off their love for the country and they forget about it sooner or later. The next year again we are coaxed to buy, be it the wrist band, brooches or flags. This time we made few tri-color paper wrist bands. They are extremely easy to do, fast, easy on pockets and eco friendly. More over, it's done it themselves feeling for the kids. All it takes is the colored papers and some quality time with kids.

Here is the YouTube tutorial. I took about 2 inch square sided colored sheets and fevicol. All three color bands were made as per the video, I joined all of them with drops of fevicol.

Hope you all have a wonderful independence day. Jai Hind..

Dastkar Nature Bazaar 2015, Bengaluru

Hello there!!!
I had a fabulous time last weekend visiting the much awaited Dastkar Nature Bazaar 2015. I had been waiting for this from a long time and my wait was worth. For us, the people who hardly visit North Bangalore, it was bit difficult to locate Manpho Convention Center Grounds. We faced heavy traffic on our way, I thought my family would backlash me for this but I thank them sincerely for their once in a while devoted patience.
All stalls were colorful, a visual treat for your eyes, I had a hard time in deciding what to buy. At first we had a glance of all stalls to see what is in store.

The patchwork bags, accessories, sling bags, key chains. 

Banana fiber products from Karnataka

Metal crafts from Chattisgarh. I fell in love with the tree, later when I came back for it, it was gone. So sad...

If it is craft exhibition how can we miss the famous Madhubani paintings from Bihar.

The lambani's and their jewelry from Karnataka. Later this woman gave demo of her working. 

Pattachitras from Odisha.

Traditional games

Some miniatures..

 Beautiful baskets

Colorful small pouches, paper wind chimes. I am going to try doing this wind chime at home.

Leather works from Rajasthan.

 Embroidered bags from Gujarat

We bought couple of things which were expensive. After coming home in retrospection, we realized that we should have bought some lesser priced ones. It was bit disappointment compared to the craft melas in other cities like Jaipur, Delhi, Hyderabad. The stalls were less in number but definitely more when compared to other craft fairs in Chitrakala Parishat.
Hope you get to visit this bazaar which is till August 16th.

Indoor plants, beautiful homes

Bringing in the plants indoors is one of best way to liven up any space. With some effort you can turn any corner to green spot, love and enjoy.  Having them not only cleans air but  also beautifies your home. Choose some easy growing, low maintenance indoor plants so that even if you neglect it for a couple of days, they survive. Choose planters which can be easily shifted indoors to outdoors and other way round. I always try to choose bright and colorful pots.

 

Displaying them among the books or in library.

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Look at these shelves. Isn't it cute? This might be more suitable in a balcony garden but I loved these colorful planters.

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Look at this beautiful plant in old tin can. Isn't it awesome?

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 I have so many pots small/big displayed in many nooks and corners of my home which I would soon share in coming post. Most of the people who visit us, would first touch these plants to make sure that they are for real -:)  

Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day – June 2015

It has been drizzling in Bangalore for the past few days, fantastic for the garden.  I love seeing colorful flowers first thing in the morning with a cup of tea.

Varieties of jasmine producing flowers, filling the air with their sweet fragrance.

 

The night flowering jasmine locally known as Harsingar. They are so unique that they fall down seeing the first light of the day.

 

 

New colored Hibiscus that I planted in winter, now producing at least 2 blooms per week.

 

 

I am loving the roses, one or two per plant but I am content with them.

 

 

 

So what's blooming in your garden?

 

See the colorful flowers blooming around the world at Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - June 2015 . Thanks Carol for hosting it.

Fabric covered boxes

Hi friends, how are you all doing?

We all come across the cardboard boxes that comes along with packaging in our daily life. Few of us keep them for storing things instead of throwing them, isn't it? I use them usually to store my kids toys, blocks, receipts and all those petty things lying around.  For the boxes which are visible I wrap them with gift wrapping paper, and store documents, bills etc.,  While browsing through Pinterest I came across couple DIYs which involved fabric and boxes. I had few extra fabric left out from my dress, so I thought to give these boxes a new look. Here is the tutorials for the same. To add that extra charm, I wrapped them with jute twine. I was in that great DIY mood so up-cycled three boxes at a stretch. Hope this inspires you to do something on the world environment day.

Have a great weekend friends!!!

 

A small box to hold shampoos in the bathroom

 

 

A magazine holder

 

A small box to hold my cookbooks.

Jasmines of Udupi..

Today I am sharing with you a flower which is famous for its fragrance, soothing beauty in and around the regions of Udupi, Coastal Karnataka and other places. Shankarapura mallige or jasmine is from the small place called Shankarapura in Udupi district, Karnataka, India. These flowers which recently acquired GI tag from the Horticulture Department of India are quite sought after during the festive, marriage seasons and their prices soar during such times.

These jasmines are plucked in the bud stage , stringed together and sold.
There are two ways to string these jasmine either through thread or by string made of plantain stalk. The latter one looks beautiful with brown plantain string in the middle of flowers.  What I observed was that stringing them through thread is easy, latest trend but with plantain stalk it is difficult as plantain fibre breaks in between. The stringed flowers are first measured as 'chidi' or a handspan. About 70 flowers make one chidi. As many as 800 flowers go into the making of one ‘chendu’(ball of flowers), while four chendus make one ‘atte’.
The attes are collected from farmers by agents and sold to retailers in Udupi, Mangalore and other places.

The humid climate is suitable for growing these flowers. Many people around the area of Udupi have cultivated either in large or in a small space of their garden.
Why I am writing so much about this? My mother is a small scale cultivator of this jasmine. Her daily routine includes plucking these flowers and stringing them together and then taking it to a local flower seller. Its about two to three hours of work daily and she earns reasonable amount of extra income.
All this time while I was at my moms place with my kids, I was helping mother with her jasmine routine and could not be an active blogger for a while.