Watch out for my guest post on the key bunch : Wrap them up !!

Note (2nd March'10) : I am publishing the full post for those of you who missed it way back in Oct'09. Here it goes :

"I was pleasantly surprised and happy to get an “email id please” request from the very creative Sharon of the Key bunch. And happier, when she asked me write a Guest Post for her awesome blog. Why?? The key bunch is one year old, that is why!!! Congratulations to both Sharon and Rekha for writing such a lovely blog and making us wait eagerly for new posts.

Here’s what I had to say…

I absolutely love this part of the year. Starting with Eid, followed by Dusshera, Diwali, Christmas, New Years…for me it doesn’t end here…there is Lohri and finally Holi. That is officially the end of the festival season for me and the next six months are spent waiting for this part of the year once again. Of course there is décor theme to be planned for each festival; there are menus to be decided, flowers to be bought, family and friends to be invited and finally gifts to be bought for people who matter to me. Thoughtful gifts that they will cherish (not the last minute biscuits and juice hampers…please). As much as I like giving gifts I also like wrapping them up creatively. I love it when they go oooo…aaaahhhhh just looking at the gift wrap. So here I have put together for you loads and loads of very easily done gift wrapping ideas for this BIG celebration season. I hope you enjoy trying out different wraps for a various festivals and surprising your loved ones (Don’t forget to include all the people who help you run your life and home all the year round ;))

This is indeed one of my all time favorites, I am very partial to brown paper…yes the same one that kids use to cover their notebooks. Tie a string around it, a shimmery ribbon, throw in some dried leaves and pinecones and any box would look great. Wrap up some patterned paper on it or simply paste paper cuts outs…the dreary old brown paper suddenly comes to life.

Another idea that helps us go green is to use old newspapers, books that you are planning to discard, glossy magazine sheets that anyways you are going to give away. Tie a bow made up bright ribbon or simply make loads of tiny spirals of the newspaper to give the gift a life. I have to admit out of all these I have a special fondness for the calendar idea where I can wrap up the gift in an old calendar sheet and mark out the special date. Sweet.

What can be better than giving two gifts than one…wrap up the gift with a silk scarf or a cotton napkin. Get some tiny potlis or simply stitch pretty pouches to gift jewellery. Your loved ones will cherish both the gift and the gift wrap for a long time to come.

Embellishments definitely make the plain and boring wraps look special. A nice little brooch, some pretty beads, shells picked up on a holiday…all look so good. I love the one with the bow shaped pasta…really that is pasta…isn’t that super cute!

No festival season can be complete without a sprinkle of gold and silver. I absolutely detest the shiny gold and silver sheets…they remind me so much of mithai shops. But these here I heart! Really classy thick gold and silver paper can add a lot of elegance to a gift. I also like the pretty flowers; one can easily make these at home. Also I think it’s a great idea to paint a silver leaf on to an otherwise plain black box.

I am often ridiculed by my family because I can never make myself throw old biscuit tins, chocolate boxes, empty glass jars…I end up repainting them and using them as gift wraps. So I got really excited when I came across these pics. The old paint tin in its new avatar with all those goodies inside…doesn’t it look divine? And the old tin box…I love-love-love it.

So use whatever you like, whatever you can lay your hands on…leaving you with another awesome idea I came across…twigs, pebbles, leaves...oh so gorgeous.

I’d love to hear from you, if you try out any handmade gift wraps this season, inspired by someone or creations of your own, do drop me a mail with the pics of course, at purplehomes.blogspot@gmail.com so that we can all go ooh-aah seeing them ;)

Loads and loads of good wishes to each one of you. Have a great time celebrating!!!

Images : All from the internet

I am loving these ARTY products

Eggflat

I am loving this piece of art. It is made from industrial wool felt. The Eggflat has been conceived and designed by the designer, Josh Jakus. Sculptural and practical ( it effortlessly folds flat for storage).Won't it look really nice with some fruits, knick knacks or how about little muffins ;)

Norman the Doorman Doorstop

What an awesome take on a common object like a door stopper! By SF MoMA. My doors are begging me to get them this one.

Puzzle Wine Rack

Designed by Gideon Dagan, this futuristic design is definitely going to turn any wine collection into wall art. A single-unit rack holds nine bottles and one can even put together more of these colorful racks to create a larger “puzzle effect”. Too cute!

Images : Metropolitan homes

Potty about Pots : II

Leaving you with a platter that i made. I like it for its many many layers that come together to make the platter and for its different and intricate patterns on each of its layers. I handbuilt it, sponged tenmoku all over and then wiped it off. It was fired at 1200 degrees. Enjoy your long weekend.

Patricia : Five of my favorite things to do on a vacation

Patricia just dropped me a message about Five of her favorite things to do on a vacation.

She says, "Every day of my life… I plan my next vacation. That statement on its own will tell you how much I love travelling.... I absolutely love browsing through holiday packages, checking airfares, hotels, making plans, reading about the destination…. And sorting out everything to do with our holiday. So much so… that I only have to tell my hubby what time he needs to get to the airport, the rest he can be assured of… is all well taken care of!

On a holiday….. I love people watching. I can spend hours at a café on a busy street and just watch people …. Its something I don’t really get the time to do within my busy schedule… One of my favourite places was Champs Elysees in Paris. I’ve spent mornings… and evenings sipping coffee and eating crepes at Champs Elysees watching people rush to work with coffee in their hands, watching tourists getting excited over the Arc De Triumph, watching artists paint, sculpt or simply sketch…. Oh.. the list is endless.."

O...Patricia...what a lovely heartfelt post...and great pics too...how i want to go back to Europe...NOW...i agree Salzburg is the most scenic of them all...n icecreams n gelatos..yes yes must have everywhere...and the walk in Venice...and the supremely talented street artists..O hell i agree with each of your fav five ;) ( Read mine here)

To read what else she has to say, click here.

Coffee, Cookies and Cakes...The three C's of my life

Last evening i had some friends over for coffee. We did what we do best...eat and chat!!

Yes, those are homemade chocolate chip cookies and homemade chocolate mini-cakes ;)

Modesty, Whats that ?? Both turned out yum!!

And of course we had sandwiches and loads of creme coffee

And there you can see my ice bucket, filled with coffee beans and flowers for some instant decor

Guest Post by Parul : Five of my favorite things to do on a vacation

Here is the 2nd Guest post in the "Five of my favorite things to do a vacation" series. Read mine here.

A big hug to Parul for such a lovely post. She says...

"My darling friend Purplehomes decided that she wanted me to describe the things I love doing on vacations. Here goes.

I love travelling almost as much as I love hot aloo ka paranthas with butter melting on top, which if you know me is saying that I love it a lot. The esteemed M has true wanderlust and is the sort of person who has the right nakshatra arrangement in his birth-chart to ensure travels far and wide. That and his innate love of planning mean that I am able to sit back, point at the globe and say, there, that is where I want to go for my next holiday. He pretty much takes care of the rest, scheduling the trip, booking the tickets, figuring out hotels (I help here because I absolutely love browsing through TripAdvisor) and then carting the family to the airport. Well, his supremely efficient secretary helps, of course but even so, it is rather convenient to be married to a planning/control freak. Most of the times, that is. I saunter in every now and then and proclaim - Ah, but there is a wonderful cafe on that street that we must try out, one of my blog friends said so. He normally ignores me when I have such pretensions of being the dreamy, creative sort."

Hop over to Parul's blog for her Five favorite things to do on a vacation

Transform your space

I came across these amazingly gorgeous ideas on creating a feature wall at housetohome. Not only do they look good they are extremely easy to execute too.

A feature wall with stickers...such lovely pastels

A french window feature wall...ah how i wish to have a window of this size

A picture feature wall...yes yes this i have!!!

A stripey feature wall...looks good but not for me

A storage feature wall...perfect for decor and function

A Calendar feature wall...created with my current hot favorite...you guessed it right...CHALKBOARD!!!

All images from housetohome

Fashion i just don't seem to understand !!

What you are seeing in the picture are not gift boxes or flower wraps.

They are CHIC MORNING SICKNESS BAGS !!!! I swear ! I am not making this up. See them here.

Am i the only person who can't relate to this kind of creativity ? Are people really shelling out money to buy these? Whatever may be the answer i just had to share this here, because who said creativity has boundaries!!

Image from their website

Mommy !!! I want this for lunch

I want to know if this isn't art then what is?

These super super super cute sandwiches have been created by the team of FunkyLunch.

“Funky Lunch was born out of the desire to turn an ordinary lunchtime sandwich into something a bit different to encourage children to try and eat a varied and healthy lunch.” And they are also going to be coming out with a book carrying tons and tons of creative ideas to show us how to create these little treasures.

I am not sure if I would be able to eat this piece of art, I would want to open my lunchbox again and again to take a peek !! Imagine a tea party with these, who said these are only for kids, huh!!

All images from their website

Guest Post by Oshean : Five of my favorite things to do on a vacation

I open my mailbox and i get this lovely surprise! I see this awesome post from Oshean who i don't know and who doesn't know me as well. But came across my blog and felt like sharing these wonderful pictures in response to the Five of my favorite things to do on a vacation. I guess thats how blogging helps you meet new people and make new friends.Thank you so much Oshean for a heartfelt post. We'd love to hear from you again. Here's what Oshean's has to say...

"I have recently returned from a holiday so I thought of sharing some of my holiday pictures here. I am not a planner and at times it is only after I’ve sat in my car is when I decide the destination. So, for me each holiday is an adventure. The five favourite things I like on a vacation are all to do with the journey because it is the journey that becomes important in my case and not the destination."

It’s the road to unknown that drives me

The fact that I can be so close to nature and the nature so close to me is what gets me excited

Awesome food makes me greedy

Sitting by a waterbed gets me thinking and smiling

Running after butterflies make me sing

Sipping Soda, anyone?

Do you see this quirky lamp? Can you guess what it is made up of?

Colorful plastic straws!! Yes indeed! This clutch light is by Scott Jarvie.

The straws are meant to model xylem, the trees capillaries, and just so happen to create jewel-esque glow. Wow what a creation!

Images from metropolitan homes

Five of my favorite things to do on a vacation

Sometime back Coco+Kelly carried out a series of posts called “On vacation with”. This post has been inspired by that. I know vacations don’t have anything to do with home décor directly but if you dig deeper that is the time we get to relax and our creative juices flow best, be it relaxing with a book, painting a pot or traveling and getting inspired or simply day dreaming. All of this has often helped me come up with creative stuff upon getting back to home or back to work.

I’d like to share what I LOVE doing on vacations through five pictures and would also like to invite some of my favorite ladies to do the same. I adore their blogs and follow them ardently. Here is my bit on the same.

I love vacations. Who doesn’t! And I also love everything associated with a vacation. Deciding on the place to visit, reading up my favorite “lonely planet” to know more about the place, working out the perfect itinerary, packing, watching a movie or reading a book in the plane, the emotion I experience just after getting out of the aircraft, checking into a hotel and yes finally visiting the place of my dreams. Absorbing it and enjoying it. But it doesn’t end there for me. Coming back home with little goodies for everyone and carrying back metro tickets stubs, pebbles, fallen flowers, boarding passes, road maps et al and putting them together on my vacation board.

Here are five of my favorite things to do on a vacation.

Getting lost in the “oh so scenic” countryside

Walking down quaint islands

Going down to see the homes of my favorite artists and musicians and imagining them creating masterpieces while sitting there

Spending hours and days at museums, art galleries et al

Losing track of all the calories, eating gorgeously divine handcrafted chocolates

I’d like to invite Archana, Aditi, Bhavna, Kanika, Patricia, Parul, Rajee, Rekha and Sharon. Ladies I would R-E-A-L-L-Y love it if you take this up.If and when you do, please drop me a comment so that I can mention it on my blog as well. Thanks and waiting to hear from you!

(Images : All the pictures are from my personal collection)