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Republic Day Special

This is 25 to 1 straight dots. Celebrating 26th January as Republic Day by all of us Indians hence our tri-colour Flag with Lotuses and a little bit of chain Rangoli. Hope you all like it.

My Greetings to all on the occasion of Republic Day on 26th January. Let us Indians remember our heroes whether freedom fighters or great sons or daughters of our land like, Maha Rana Pratap, Prithviraj Chauhan or Jhansi Lakshmi Bai, Rani Rudrama, Veer Shivaji and so many others -known and unknown -their sacrifices and their devotion towards nation and people and their services. 

My salute to our Armed Forces and Police with out whose continuous services to the nation we would not be enjoying this freedom and peace. 

We also need to put in our efforts in what ever way we can to develop our nation, maintain peace and spread happiness so that the coming generations-our own children can live peacefully and happily. 

You can read about our Indian National Flag here :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_India

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Ratham Or Chariot Rangoli

Here is a chariot or Ratham Rangloi. You can note the dots from the design above. I have drawn it as Navaratna Ratham-the chariot studded with nine types of gems. In the center, I have drawn a chair for the Lord to sit and a lamp too. 

Sorry for posting so late. I was so busy today. 

This is drawn on Kanuma(third day of festival) and also on Mukkanuma(fourth day). On Kanuma(3rd day), the chariot is drawn entering into the house. It has come to pick up the Lord who has visited us during the festival. On the 4th day, the chariot is drawn going out of the house. That is the Lord is seated in the chariot and is leaving us and going off to his place. A string (a line) is drawn from the chariot on to the road as far as possible, as if it being pulled away. Usually it is linked with the chariot drawn by the neighbor. This way chariots of one is linked to the other. 

Hope you like it. Watch out I may post some more tomorrow. 

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Pongal-Sankranti Special 

21- 7 times(in the center) to 7 straight dots. 

Kites, Pongali Pots, sugarcane, Gobbilu (pyramid shaped mounds made of cow dung- decorated with pumpkin flowers, placed in the center of Rangolis), red jujube berries(read more in the link below) and colourful rangolis reflect the festive spirit. Hence I have used all those elements in my Rangoli. 

http://spiceomylife.blogspot.in/2011/11/jujube-crispies.html

Hope you like this Rangoli....watch out for more...

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Pongal-Sankranti Rangoli

This is 23 to 1 straight dots. Pongal(rice dish) pots and kites with chain rangoli reflect the festive spirit of Sankranti or Pongal. Watch out for more....

Wishing you all A very Happy, Prosperous and joyous Makar Sankranti/Pongal/Lohri/Uttarayan/Maghi and known by many names in different parts of India. It is also celebrated by Srilanka, Nepal, Thailand, Cambodia and many other countries.

Tomorrow as Sun enters Capricorn, the period of six months till the Sun enters, Cancer-the Sun moves towards North is considered very auspicious for Hindus. Read more about it here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttarayana

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25 to 1 straight dots. 

As we pray to the Lord Vishnu on Garuda Vahana on this auspicious day of Mukkoti Ekadasi, here is an offering of lotuses and colourful Rangoli to the Lord. Hope you all like it.  

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Umbrellas and Kites 

19 to 1 straight dots. This is an easy one. Hope you like it.

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New Year Resolutions

Guys, first of all I am sorry, I had some problem with my net connection. For the past few days I had no net connection. It got rectified just now. So, I could not post anything leave alone Rangolis. It is really frustrating.

Now coming to New Year resolutions, every year we make so many-weight loss, eating healthy, better time management, keeping in regular touch with near and dear ones, spending more time with our family, taking more care of ourselves...etc..etc... But how far do we achieve? May be a month or for more stubborn ones two-we struggle to keep up with our resolutions. After that, we fall back into our old habits.

Every year I too make many resolutions. After a month or so, or even before that, I realise that some were very impractical, some were very difficult to keep up with, some were very vague-no proper goal setting, no planning, some I left off because of my laziness and so on...All in all the ultimate thing is that, I lacked proper focus, steadfastness and zeal in setting and follow my resolutions. 

Last year one of my resolutions was to blog more frequently. But alas it was far less than what I wanted to do. I had my own reasons for it. Last year, I had some personal problems and some major set backs, health wise and other matters. So I just had to keep myself up and alive-that was my primary concern. 

For the past few months, I was slowly gaining back my health. While doing all that, I did some introspection. Based on that, I realised that biting more than what I can chew is not much helpful. 

So this year, I have set more realistic and achievable targets. Whether, my home front or blog or my work, I now want to enjoy what ever, I do- may be little or may be more. Ultimately, what ever I do, if I am not enjoying it than it becomes more stressful and more of a burden. 

This year, I would like to 

• be more focused, 
• better my time management,
• be more organised, 
• lessen procrastination
• take care of health (fitness, healthy food)

My goal is to be more- healthy, happy, fit and enjoy what ever I do. My motto is be content, be happy and spread peace and happiness, enjoy what ever I do.

It also includes more blogging...:) Let us just hope this year, I am more successful than last year. 

I am sure you all have some resolutions of your own for this year. Hope that this year we will all do much better than last year, improve upon ourselves and achieve more...Happy New Year to all of you once again....

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Punch Craft Greeting Card

I am always looking forward to trying out different crafts, medias and methods for creating something new. Though I have had punch craft materials with me since long, some how I did not have time to try it. The other day(actually on New Years Eve), my niece was bored (as she finished her term exams but her friends were busy preparing for it) and to keep her occupied I pulled out my Punch Craft materials and tried it.

At first it was difficult to use the punches as they were very hard. But after punching a few times, it became easy. My niece was more interested in the papers left out after punches rather than the punched shapes.

Here is what she did with them with a little help from me. she prepared a greeting card:

She cut the edges of a thick paper with craft scissors and stuck the punched out strips of paper on it. Then she added some punched flowers. A little scrap of fabric, was edged with lace and glued on as curtain. Beneath that she wrote her message.

You can see the punched out strips here and the message. 

I was happy that she was occupied for an hour or so and tried her hand creating something new. 

I have the punched flowers and leafs with me. I wanted to create some thing with them. But I don't have time right now, as I am busy with cleaning my house on war footing and and preparing for the on coming festival of Sankranti.

Watch out for more paper crafts.....

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Friends, sorry I could not post these past two three days as I was very busy. Here is one more Rangoli for you:

 21 to 1 straight dots.

Here is a closer look at one section so that you can easily draw it.

Sankranti or Pongal and the one month(Dhanurmaasam) before it is basically a festival related to agriculture. This is a celebration of Harvest- Harvest festival. Sun entering in the Zodiac sign of Sagittarius is thanked this whole month, for, with out his heat and light this harvest would not be possible. So our South Indian villages basically dependent on agriculture celebrate this month long thanks giving to Sun, irrespective of cast or status with great devotion. 

The villages and small towns are where our culture and traditions are zealously followed even today. If one takes a walk early in the morning as the Sun is rising, one can see the front yards of the houses decorated with various Rangolis. The girls and women of the houses draw these Rangolis with great care showcasing their skills and creativity. 

As a child, I along with my cousins would take a walk(braving the chill) in our locality to note any designs we did not know or were new to us. We would note these designs mentally along with the dots, come back and try it on paper and file it for future use. 

All of our family would gather at our Granny's place every year to celebrate this festival.  We would always look forward to this festival as it was lot of fun meeting all of our kith and kin  and friends. New clothes, sweets and snacks, playing with friends, visiting each others houses, bonfires, entire family going to movies -well I miss all that now. 

So remembering those times, I have chosen huts, trees and kites for this Rangoli. No matter where we are our roots are tied to our villages or towns where we were born and brought up. 

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Here is one very easy Rangoli for beginners and kids, very simple easy to draw and quick to complete. But this is a cute looking Rangoli, one of my favorites and I draw it every season.

No dots required for this Rangoli. We use + sign for this. You can see the black + I have used. To draw one unit, we require 4 '+' signs. You can add as many as you want and connect as shown above. You can fill in with colours inside the blocks.

Watch out for more designs in coming posts.....

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