Chaos inside outside

My garden initially. Over the years these have grown into small trees.

My garden sometime last year, you see small trees in the background

My husband is a little workaholic and rarely works from home. There were few times when I desperately needed him at home, I request him to work from home , he doesn't citing the disturbances from the children. Often he wished for a separate work space for himself( Also to sleep peacefully on the weekends). So we(read him) decided to utilize the existing terrace space to build a new room, a very small one.  This could be used as home office, small hobby room or may be a study room to our children.
We stay in a residential lay out there very few countable houses. Due to the architectural plan we didn't have a high wall compound. People who built after us have high walled compound. Seeing them, our house is less secure and there were few instances where petty thefts have occurred in our community.

Above reasons made us to slightly renovate the house along with painting of the house both interior and exterior.

To gain something, we have to loose something,  isn't it? The thing we lost was our beautiful garden.
The garden that we cherished for long years is almost gone now. It would take few months to rebuild it back. 

So my dear husband I hope the newly constructed room is worth all the destruction. He says we would set it right in few months time and I am already set to work on the resurrection of the garden. Umm, I have a long way to go before I do this. There are chaos both inside(painting) and outside(construction/renovation).  Hope the dust settles down soon.

Cement and sand everywhere



Few broken pots and all hindrances to construction like trees are cut off

Sakrebail, The Elephant camp

Every time we drive to our native( Udupi, Kundapur) we usually pass through Shimoga. My children regularly complain about not stopping by to see the the Sakrebail elephant camp or the lion safari.

While deciding on what to do in 10 days of Christmas vacation, we decided on Shimoga. It is about 270 KM from Bangalore, Karnataka. There are many places of interest(small comparing the number of tourists visits) near Shimoga apart from the coffee estates and areca nut plantations.

Sakrebail elephant camp is located about 11 kms from Shimoga town and it takes about 15 min drive to reach there. Whenever we mention the word TRIP my children would expect to stay  in a luxury hotel. We stayed at The Royal Orchids hotel in Shimoga. After having royal breakfast we set out to the camp. We were happy to see that only few people had arrived and only one elephant was in the water which is the back water of the Gajanur dam.

The specialty of this place is that they bring elephants from the jungle and you can give them bath, pose with them, talk to them and know all you have to know about the Asian elephants. The whole ritual starts as early as 7:30 AM and if you are late you may miss everything.

 

These elephants are bought from the nearby Shettihalli forest. The camp elephants have a chain tied in the legs, so that the mahouts can trace them and bring into the camp early in the morning. There also days when they do not find their respective elephants. After giving them the bath, they are fed and left back from into the forest for grazing. One mahout was TRAINING an elephant to raise and sit, for the people to ride on him. So people, soon you can expect elephant ride in there.

 

We could take a close picture of the elephant's mouth. The mahout explained that if the teeth are well then the elephant is considered to be healthy and it lives a longer life.

 

This baby elephant was just 1 and half months old and was clinging to its parents. While in water it was just behaving naughty not knowing what to expect outside in the world. My children were just curious about this baby elephant 'Parvathi' and following it's movements very keenly.

 

We saw around 20 elephants in the camp and around 9:30 AM they all had finished bathing and were left under the sun.

Soon after finishing we headed towards the Tyavarekoppa Lion and Tiger Safari. This is again 15 minutes drive on the Sagar road. Here you can expect 3 lions, 6 tigers apart from other animals like sloth bear , cheetahs, jackals. Lions, tigers and few deers were only the animals available in the safari, rest of the animals are caged.

So if you are in the mood of long drive with something to do with animals[And in the state of Karnataka] head to sleepy town of  Shimoga.

Wishing a happy year 2016

Wish all of readers a happy, prosperous and blessed year.. I am just back with couple of short vacations and down with severe cold and fever. What a way to start year!!!
I and my husband like to travel a lot and we make sure that we go and see new places every year. How I love to share my experiences of my visit, but sometimes do not get enough time or too lazy to post it. One of resolution for the year is to pen down my travel experience whether short or long. I am soon going to write about my two short trips which kids will enjoy for sure.

I am looking forward to January, the month where we plan to get the whole house painted.
The color scheme would remain same as present but I was thinking of getting one wall of living room painted in orange. Trying to imagine how it would be but not able to finalize on it.

In the month of February, I am planning on enrolling myself for the art classes. This was something that I always wanted to do but never gave it any serious thought. I am just curious to know whether I can paint or not -:))

While we were away for 10 days during the Christmas holidays, I had kept all my indoor plants outside for watering. My helper just bought few of them in yesterday and kept at one place on the terrace staircase. This make a cute scene, don't you think so?

Once again wishing you all a good year ahead. Hope it brings you lot of joy, your dreams and aspirations be fulfilled.

 

DIY : Semi quilled flowers

Hello friends, what are you up to?
My online window shopping has become so compulsive that my data pack gets over in no time. I am sure there would be many people like me around this world who are into this addiction. I have made a strict resolution of limiting my browsing the e-commerce sites. My attention now is on few saved pins that I thought I should try in my lifetime. This one DIY which is quite easy but bit wearing.Hope you like it and give it a try.

So here I go with the steps.

Things you need.

I chose blue colored strips because it went well with my vase. Since the blue color was monotonous I also made few white colored ones(I did not have the white quilling strips, so I ended us making them but cutting the white colored A4 sheets).

Initially cut a quilling strip into strips each of length 9 cm. You require about 12-25 strips of this size for the base. Keep decreasing the length and the number of strips for each layer.

Fold the strips at the center and using the quilling needle curl the end of the strips slightly.

Start laying each strip over the other gluing at the center with a glue dot.

 Take the floral wire and wrap it with the floral tape.

 

Make a small tight rolled coil of the same colored strip and attach it to the base of the flower.

 



After it has completely dried attach the floral wire to the coil at the base with a bit of glue.

 

Adding this to Welcome Back To Craft Schooling Sunday Jan 09 2016

Indoor Plants : Growing Arrowhead Plants

 

Today I am going to show case a plant which is abundant inside as well outside of my house. This is so because it's very easy to grow, easily adapts to the environment, easy on care. Yes, what I am talking about is the Arrowhead plant( Syngonium podophyllum).

The arrowhead plant is a great container plant for shady balcony gardens and a plant which does better indoors.
Leaves initially are heart shaped and later as they mature, develop into arrowhead shape. They are generally green in color with silvery white or cream variegation. There are many varieties that include variegated leaves of differing shades. Green varieties requires average light and variegated ones requires more light. I have tried growing a sapling picked up from my mothers place which has a different shade initially but when it grows in my house it turns into normal green one. Then I realized that it is due to the light exposure.
Avoid keeping them exposed to direct sunlight as the leaves may have a burnt look. As it grows it tends to climb up with support sticks. You can see tiny aerial roots along the stems. You can also prune the plant to keep the bush like appearance or support it using the moss stick.

It grows well in the moist soil. Keep them well watered in summer and less watered in the winters( I water it once in 3-4 days). You can use potting mixture, always remember to use a well drained container.

Propagation is by stem cuttings, or by division. Cut at a node where there is slight root protrusion. Keep in water for few days till roots develop and then it is ready to be potted. Propagation can also be done by division.

I have also tried them growing in water, changing water for every two weeks. For obvious reasons the number of leaves are less but they do add on to your décor quotient.

 

 

DIY: Pistachio shells tea light holder

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It's days of Diwali celebrations in India and it's a tradition to exchange and gift dry fruits among other gifts. So while you are eating those pistachios, don't toss away those pistachio shells and instead make something beautiful out them. I and my kids made tea light holder from these shells. Here are the easy steps to do these.

 

Things you need corrugated cardboard, glue(fevicol), pistachio shells, tea lights, scissor, pencil.

• Cut out circle of about 4 inch diameter of cardboard. 
• Place the tea light at the center. Draw the rough outline of the tea light.

• Apply glue on the rim of the cardboard. Start sticking the pistachio shells upside down. The base should be inside towards the circle and the pointed end should be pointing out. Wait for at least 15 min to for it to dry.

 

• Start sticking the second round of the shells on the first round of shells.
•  Continue till you reach the penciled circle. And you are done!!

 

We did about four of these. My son insisted on coloring one, but it wasn't  pretty as the natural one.

 

Have a wonderful and happy Deepavali folks..... 

 

Diwali Decor : Crepe Paper Marigolds

Festivals in India are incomplete without Marigolds. These saffron and yellow colored flowers has been one of my all time favorite for their beauty and pungent scent. Today I am sharing with you a tutorial on making the marigold flowers.  Off course they do not match the fresh and real flowers completely but they can be incorporated in your décor. You can use them at the tables, or simple string them to make Toran.
Please note that since these are paper flowers, do not place them near the candles or your wicker lamps.

Gather the items that are required to make the flowers. Please note here that I have taken a thick and strong thread not the regular embroidery floss. I felt that while tying the ends together the regular thread easily slips and you will not be able to form a tight loop.

Using craft scissor with zig-zag shaped blade, cut the crepe paper about 2 and 1/5 inch width.

Taking a thread and a needle, start stringing these strips. Use a running stich along the center of the strip.

When you feel they are of enough volume, tie the two ends of the threads tightly.

For the center part of the flower, create a 1/2 inch wide and three inch length strip. Make fringes. Twist a small piece of crepe paper for a stalk. Glue the fringe to this stalk. Note that the stalk is very small here about two inches but thick enough to get inside the flower.

Insert this into the center of the flower, gluing to the flower.

For the base part, twist the base part of the flower as much as possible, to make it pointed at the bottom. Glue them with a floral tape.