Balloon bouquet

                 Learnt this art in a workshop and also how to do balloon dogs .                

 

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Canvas paintings

This is my first canvas painting of landscape (size 20" * 15 ") 

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I love this painting a lot. This is a tree as seen from dawn to dusk.. (size 20" * 15 ")

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I had longed to do modern art canvas paintings. I saw the following two modern art in a website and tried.

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 Sponge painting on canvas - done using only sponge and no brush , It was quite easy to paint using sponge than brush.

Art competitions

Soap carving : I was working hard that day in office as we are expecting a new build release and i had to complete the work by evening. My teammates came and told there is a soap carving arranged in office Cafeteria today and why dont you join. Though i want to, i kept quiet fearing the workload and i skipped my coffee as i know if i go there i wil be more tempted. After half an hour it started i went to have coffee. The original reason was to atleast see what contestants were doing. The organisor( known friend of me ) asked why i didnt join. Andddd thats it i could control my nerves "Can i join now" . he was stratled to hear that but accepted me to do . Finished in 45 min time .. I got first prize for this  

Soap carving that got 2nd and 3rd prices are below

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Pot painting competition: This again i joined in office with continuous encouragment from teammates. I gave the name and it was about to start in 10 ten minutes. I hardly could think of any theme at that moment.  With deep thinking i came to have coffee hoping to find some theme. Only the cup got over and nothing came to my mind.. Frustrated i went to throw the paper cup and i stopped suddenly... Eureka... The cup had a design of 'marriage procession'. I decided to choose this theme and i was lucky to get 1st prize.

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New year rangoli: I usually dont join in rangoli as the unusual sitting and bending exercise will make me to take rest for the whole of next week. But that day i didnt had much work and my teammate was very eager to join and she needed a extra person to join the competition. So we started . It was one of the humorous rangolis i have attended. First shock was when we saw all were a team of  4 people instead of 3.. Since we were confident, we thought we can manage with 3. Second was we went 10 minutes late to the competition and we didnt had a reserved place to put rangoli and chose a conjusted place and also many colors were missing which was very much needed to ours as its a thematic rangoli and we cant make others understand if we use randam colors. We had to send one of our valuable teammate to get the color from outside shop in the middle of the competition !!! With reduced confidence we were struggling to sketch the theme we had imagined.. Other contestants has almost done half of it when we have not completed the outline also.

The third tension was the adjacent contestant unknowingly disturbed the completed part of our rangoli with her shawl. My teammate started shouting at them and that girl claimed that our rangoli was overlapping her designated area by 1 foot. We had to leave that overlapping area and decorate with the rest of the place. With pity one of the girl in the spectators offered to help us till the 3rd teammate comes.The other contestants were drawing complicated rangoli with much symmetry . I was sure we have lost it so i convinced teammates to keep calm as anyhow the day was not ours. The third teammate came with the colors and rest of the rangoli we made in such a mentality lets do something and make into shape so that we are not elimated so badly from the competition.  It was all over and there was no crowd even to see our theme, all were busy taking photos of others rangoli. So what ? we all sat near the rangoli and took snaps with it . Meanwhile judge came and we explained the theme how we want new year 2010 to be and what all should be eradicated. We went back to office without waiting for the results as we knew it. But after sometime we were informed we were the 1st price holders... We couldnt believe it ...Looks like they have selected it based on the theme and it was totally different than the normal rangoli. This humorous rangoli ended with a gift of only two tickets to sathyam cinema for 3 of us !! But winning was important than the actual prize and we had a nice experience on how to act under pressure ...

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Theme painting :   This was one painting competition in my office. Theme i have described is "Mugamoodi Samoogam" . A sight of a man thinking and searching for the faces he will wear that day instead of the dresses from the wardrobe(most of the masks were only devilish). Bagged second prize for this

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Independence day competition : It says there is a 'RAM' in every 'RAMZAN' and an 'ALI' in every 'DIWALI' and we should stop the unnecessary shedding of blood.

                                             

Miniatures

I was drawn towards the miniature shops in singapore. Almost all fruits and different type of cakes , and many others were done realistically in much smaller size( 1 to 4 cm). I researched on the materials used for it. It was Japanese light weight clay or mostly polymer clay. Tried doing a cup cake and a burger using the clay i purchased  ..

One day in a share auto ...

Sun was high and it was a hot day. I got into a share auto to my office.

I was sitting alone… In the signal one guy stopped and boarded. His continuous stare made me irritated.  

After few minutes we were stopped by a lady with her kid . It was very obvious she was
a beggar - Her attire , torn clothes and a foul smell.  Might be she travelling to a different place
to beg and couldn’t wak in this hot sun.  I let her to sit in between the guy and me . I preferred sitting near her than the irritating guy. None of us in share auto showed any possible reactions…     we all were sitting so still..

When we were about to get down , I gave my change and was about to get down. 

 The guy turned to the driver and told “please take this 10 rs for this madam and kid “.   she first told no but then he insisted and she bowed her hands to show her gratitude.

I was totally taken aback. He has understood this few minutes ride in share auto was one day earning for her. I really liked the way he addressed her as - MADAM . Such a respect for beggar,  I know not many of us will give,including me . Those words were from his heart and am sure about it. 

 I cannot explain my feelings in that moment exactly..   I felt very happy inside . after few seconds I felt like seeing his face which I haven’t thought of all these time when travelling together. I turned but he was walking on other side and cudnt see him. I told sorry myself for mistaking him at first
sight and proceeded to my office .

 

Tile painting

There are wall hangings done using  glass paints on normal white tile used for house construction 

My cooking

Friends do believe these photos were not taken from net and i really cooked them :)  I didnt had much chance to cook when i had a sweetheart Mom to do everything for me and due to office tensions. Now am all alone the whole day in a different country left with not much options to do at home. My husband always encourages me when i do a new recipe and he does eat it with no complaints .. So I decided to venture into kitchen and try new items. Google has answers for all. When i searched for a recipe i got loads from the net and many good blogs from women for cooking. Since most of the items i tried were taken from net am not going to spend time on posting a detailed recipe... 

Kaju katli - this is one of my favorite sweets and i always have a place for one even when my stomach is very full ..When i saw the recipe in my friends site www.koki.shivhosting.net i instantly tried it out and it came out very well..Do visit her site for many other delicious items... 

Ingredients:  Cashew(1 cup) , sugar (1/2 cup), water 1/4 cup and little milk while making into shape

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Bread bonda - a tasty and easy snacks done in a very less time.

 

Ingredients:

Bread ( 5 slices) dry grind in mixie 

onion - 1 chopped finely 

rava - 2 spoons 

ginger cut pieces and salt 

Mix all with little water to make balls and fry in oil ...

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Veg cutlet : This is my sister's favorite snacks. Got recipe from net and it came out yummy
Ingredients: Cut vegetables , mashed potato, salt, bread crums , maida little

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My husband is very fond pani puri and whenever he orders, just dont stop with one plate.. To reduce the frequent visits of eating out i wanted to try it on my own.. It was a very easy recipe to do ...puri and the pani with stuffing.  when u have the puri's ready you can make variety of chat items ..

Pani puri

Dahi puri

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Creamy milk maid semiya payasam                                       

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                                                Maa laadu - Using Pottu kadalai and sugar

                                                 

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                                                         Gulab jamoon -  soft and sweet using the instant mix

                                              

 

Stone art

 

I got a Ganesh Idol carved from stone as a birthday gift. Every day when i see it i would be thinking how they could have carved this statue so intricately in such a black stone( karungal used for building construction) This was a million dollar question for me for almost 4 years. One day i saw a sandal color Ganesh idol sold in a shop which was exactly the same as the one i have at home. So i confirmed it was not carving on stone ,but has been cleverly pasted and painted together.  I liked this technique and tried with few idols below using gold and silver dust as final touch.

 

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                                Fascinated by a mail forward, tried art on marble stone as below 

Warli painting on stone

Paper creations

 

Glass paintings

One of my friend asked me to paint a MS subhulakshmi photo as a gift. I laughed like anything when i first heard it. Because even in school drawings i would always struggle to draw a face particularly .This happened almost 7 years back... My friend was having so much faith on me and asked me try. But i  totally forgot about it until a day i saw a beautiful cover page of MS subhulakshmi in Mangayar malar. I always have a feel when i wanted to do something it will automatically come my way . I was sure it was not a coincidence so i wanted to paint . I was not bothered about the outcome.. I started painting the portrait on a glass.. This was my second glass painting and i was really happy when i was done with it . I still have a photo copy of this painting framed in my house which will fetch a appreciation  by every new comer to house. Thanks to my friend

 

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Other Glass paintings

  

First glass painting gift for my sister's marriage

    

 Used glass crystals for the tree truck

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Glass painting on OHP sheet