Around the world through 7 continents – Birthday Party

Cake Cutting - North America station

My eldest son Aarav turned 8 this year and I had planned this birthday theme for last year on his 7^th birthday – Travel the 7 continents. You see, 7^th birthday and 7 continents would have been such a wonderful coincidence. But along came Covid in 2020 and it were the initial scary months . I had to scrap off the whole celebration. I had finished a bunch of DIY decorations, ready to print material I created on my PC. I didn’t feel like wasting all that effort.

So, 8^th birthday was “Around the 7 continents”, instead of 8 planets, another favorite topic of Aarav.

To me this theme was so much fun that I decided to share it, for anybody who’d like to use it. I shall link the items I got from Amazon and OrientalTrading.com.

So here goes the whole plan and execution.

7 continents = 7 table stations. Each table would be unique in décor to represent the continent. Each table would have some interactive games or activities and as we leave each station, the kids get a souvenir, just like we do on vacations 😊 Easy!

Passport prep

Before any vacation you’d need a passport, a boarding pass, a suitcase of course to load up the souvenirs and a stamp on your passport indicating you visited!

Placards for each station

First I started with the labels for each station. I used carboard boxes to cut out the large placards for each continent name.  Painted each in an obvious theme color representing the continent (that came to my mind) like ex. Europe is a lovely pink board with letters written in red.

Continent	Décor	Activity	Souvenir
Australia	Koalas, brown table cover	Kangaroo hop race	Boomerangs
Asia	Chinese doll, dragon, elephant, buddha etc	Pick gummy fish with chopsticks in 30 sec	Paper fans
Africa	Pyramid, hieroglyphs chart	Animal bingo	Hieroglyph bookmarks for each kid’s name
Europe	Eifel tower, Pisa tower, valentine décor	Lunch – pizza	Eifel tower painting kit
South America	Multi color décor, skull	Making Maracas	Carnival eye masks
Antarctica	Paper Penguins and whale, white table cover	De-freeze frozen dinosaurs	Arctic animal string bags
North America	Globe, birthday banner, flags streamer	Cake cutting	Flag Pencil and erasers

DIY Pyramid for Egypt

Then I decided the décor and activities for each, that relate to the continent. Luckily, my parents have been touring around the world since couple of years. And I have free souvenirs from them!!! 😄

Africa and Antarctica are where they haven’t visited and those I really had to create something from scratch.

Passport, boarding pass and pretend suitcase

On the event day, I used my Instax camera to click instant photos of each kid and paste them on each passport, that I had ready with their name and other common details in the passport for them to fill later. I had made sure to label pages with each continent name so it would be easy to paste the stamps on the go. I designed and printed boarding passes which were the invite to the party. Stapled those to each passport! 

Boarding pass

I prepared pretend suitcases using brown gift bags,  labelled their names and stamped some pictures for beauty effect!

Australia Station

1st Stop: Australia – Koala show pieces. Kangaroos belong there, so the activity was Kangaroo hop race using pillow covers in the backyard on lawn, so we have no scratches on driveways and kids are safe! Souvenir was plastic boomerangs I got from Oriental trading site. Candies for being a sport! Stamp on passport and move on!

Asia Station

2nd Stop: Asia – I have lots of Indian and Chinese dragon décor. I used my colorful dupattas to decorate the wall and the table! Activity was a game of chopsticks used to fish out “fish gummies” in 30 seconds! Must say kids are good at using chopsticks! Souvenir was handmade paper fans (I made them) because paper was invented in China – Asia! Stamp on passport and move on!

Africa Station

3rd Stop: Africa – no ready décor, so I had to make my own pyramid using 4 ‘Your Pie’ pizza boxes!!! Picked the easiest design on the internet and added the brick details using markers! Done! Activity was animal bingo sheets that I created on my laptop such that everyone is a winner in the end! Basically, same animals shuffled around to make different combinations of sheets! Candies to ALL winners! Africa = Egypt = hieroglyphs. So, I created, printed and laminated personalized bookmarks for each kid using the symbols and setup a poster for all the letter symbols for each kid to identify their name in the form of hieroglyphs! That’s their souvenir! Stamp on passport and move on!

Europe Station

4^th Stop: Europe – This is the land of love. So, I bought some heart shaped doilies a month ago during Valentine’s month! Pasted them on pink sheets and they made wonderful wall décor. I had leaning tower of Pisa and Eifel Tower show pieces. So, décor was done. Italy = Pizza so, Europe was a pit stop to have lunch!!! 

Souvenir was a 5x7 canvas boards with Eifel Tower drawn on them by me, paint, and a heart candy! Stamp on passport and move on!

South America Station

5th Stop: South America – It was colorful shimmery floor-length wall streamers! Just a pottery skull décor my son had made a while ago! Used a colorful dupatta to cover the table! Activity was using the plastic Easter eggs I had, to make maracas. I drew designs on them using permanent markers. Spoons, beads, tape and voilà-  you have maracas ready! Souvenir was carnival eye masks ! Stamp on passport and move on!

6^th Stop: Antarctica – Again no ready décor, so I made simple penguins and drew a cute whale using cereal boxes! Used a white tablecloth. Activity was excavation. I used small sized paper cups and inserted small plastic dinosaurs, poured water, and froze them! The kids had to crack the ice to discover the dinosaurs. Souvenir was these arctic animal string bags! Stamp on passport and move on!

Birthday cake from Walmart - Edible map

7^th Stop: North America –   This was our final party place where we cut the cake because, we are literally in N America! Décor was a globe, a liberty statue craft my son made in the past and the entire party wall décor! Activity was cake cutting and souvenir was flag printed pencils and eraser!

DIY road map banner

Cake cutting décor – I made the birthday banner using simple black poster sheets, pasted the highway road maps on each and then painted each letter of HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Bought the flag streamer and taped Aarav’s world map sheet on the wall!

 

Note: Thru the party, between each continent I sanitized the kid’s hands! They were provided inflight refreshments like chips and juice at different stops!

The kids had a great time. I was nervous if even one kid would get bored, but luckily no one was bored. They were excited for every next continent. It worked out perfectly because it was one of a kind party! No one could guess what to expect next! Kudos to all kids for their full participation and enjoyment! 

DIY souvenirs

Party Invite

It was a whole lot of DIY work for this party, but at the end of the day the kids had so much fun, I am so thankful for that! It was WORTH all the effort put in! 

PS: Anyone here in Savannah/Pooler would like to use any of the posters or placards are welcome to take!

I hope the readers got a fair idea of each detail per continent! Questions are welcome too! Thank you for reading!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home made costumes

Aarav has quite a busy month of March at preschool. With so many events, I end up being busy doing craft projects on his behalf.


Every week they have a "letter of the week", and his teachers mentioned couple of weeks in advance that during the week of W, they'd have a day of wearing "What you want to be when you grow up". 


Personally, I didn't take up this event seriously because at his age of 3, he doesn't understand the question of what you want to be when you grow up. And even if we ask, his answers are so cute..but wild! Some days he'd say "I want to be a Kangaroo", or "Penguin" or "horse" on other days, as he gallops around the house.

My husband insisted to buy a pilot costume, which when I googled came out to about $50!!! So much for a couple of hours! Then as I surfed through the internet, I noticed the commercial pilot costume is easy; white shirt, black pants, shoulder pads, tie and a hat. With so much of crafty things I do, I happened to have all the required things to make his costume except for the white shirt which I bought. Rest all cut out from the art sheets; referred a video for making paper pilot hat and voilà, Pilot costume ready!

And then March 3rd was Dr. Seuss birthday and they had to dress up as one of the characters from the comic. A blue feather garland from dollar store and matched up his red clothes and again, voilà - Thing1 character was ready! 


His teachers loved his costumes at school. We never had these events during our school times, but I enjoy the fun in making these creative things while making memories for my son to look when he grows older!


Now working on his Easter party goodie bags for his friends at school! 

Star of the day - Aarav at school

My almost 3 yr old son has been going to a christian preschool for the past 6 months. After the first 2 days of 3hr separation, he got the idea of school. From day 3 until now, he's always been excited about "going to school"! At home he converses like adults, frankly he has a great memory and he uses my sentences exactly each time in the right context!

I got his FIRST report in Dec, all good but working on skills of crayons, painting and pasting. So over the Christmas vacations I made him complete all the crayon art sheets he gets in school, that are incomplete. He wasn't very interested but I managed to sweet talk him and hold his hand to finish all the incomplete sheets.

For pasting, I had color papers and glue from my art hobby, which I'm not pursuing anymore. So now everyday we sit and do simple pasting projects like a tree, sun and letters!

Art work at home

Over these months at every meeting with his teachers, I have learnt that he's a very sweet kid in class, never throws a tantrum, in fact he's always smiling! I asked them at occasions if he talked to them willingly, because he was in that phase of conversing 3-4months ago. But they said, apart from asking for using the restroom he wasn't much of a talker! Surprising, coz we at home were pretty much like "Shhhh...stop talking for 2 mins".. haha.

Reason for this post is- Yesterday one of his teachers, Ms. Tiffany came to speak to me and she mentioned "I just wanted to let you know that Aarav has been doing so well, he's been talking to us off late, he does all the activities so well, we just wanted to share this with you. He was the best kid in class today!"

I was so happy..I just thanked them. I'm so glad they are getting to see his real side! The way he's so interactive and talking with us at home!

When I checked his bag, I saw the certificate for being the 'Star of the day'.

Proud mama! JJJ

Warli Paintings with a modern twist

An old junior friend from my college has started an initiative introducing traditional Warli paintings with a modern touch. This multi-talented friend along with his wife draws and sells various day-to-day items with Warli paintings on them. Some also carry colored paintings unlike traditional white drawings on brown background. Personally being a drawing and painting enthusiast, I love the variety they are bringing each day and I can't hold back from sharing this information with as many people as I can.

Please join me in seeing these creations and if you'd like, you may buy a piece of art or more!

Adipa – beautiful and easy

Design 1

Now since I have shared out the news – I have bought a house, let’s talk about decorating and furnishingJ. The best and the fun part (ignoring the expense part for now!). I have colleague at work who also recently bought a house too and did furnishing and stuff. So we generally discuss ideas and things that we want to do…places to buy from, brands, models, stores etc.

She shared her Facebook pictures to show me her new house with the final look. I noticed the nameplate she had on her door and I enquired about it. It was a custom made nameplate and she directed me to Landmark store in Forum mall, Bangalore.

I went there today to finish the nameplate task. So the company that makes these is “Adipa”. They have handmade tiles and wooden frames to make any kind of combination you’d like. It’s like a jig-saw puzzle.

I really loved their stuff. We made random 4-5 combinations, but finally didn’t give the order as they didn’t have the frame size we wanted and some of the tiles we wanted ere over. It’s going to take them a month to get the new stockL.

Design 2

So I noted their website www.adipa.com. Though some of the tiles I saw in the store are not displayed on the website, it’s still good to design the nameplate online. So since the last hour I have been trying couple of designs and I have come up with 2. It’s as easy as dragging the tiles you want, select and delete the ones you don’t want. I totally loved this concept and had to share it with all.

Now once I show it to my husband in the morning and he agrees, I think I can make an online order to make sure it comes in time for the house warming ceremony!

Do share your comments and let me know which one looks betterJ. Try them and have fun making cool nameplates!

My very own.... Taj Mahal

In my schooling days, we had a common drawing teacher..specifically sir from 5^th grade till 10^th grade! He was pretty good an artist; there were some master pieces hung up in the school. Lele Sir…if I have any of my school buddies reading my blog would remember. I had many assignments with A+ grade. There is this particular drawing style I remember all through these years that I chose to re-do even today after so many years.  It was as simple as drawing slant lines across the sheet and coloring them with different crayon colors…looking somewhat like a rainbow. Then you paint it with black POSTER color. When it dries off, all you do is scrap of with a blade to draw your idea/scenery/ object.

Back then I think I drew a village, which still looked great! I had this idea in my head for a while and didn’t know exactly what should be the art! So I got the idea of the sand animation videos that we’ve seen before…I got numerous ideas such as the two flamingoes, butterflies, tiger face etc….but this Taj Mahal idea seemed magnificent. Looking through how to draw Taj Mahal, I realized drawing Taj Mahal is so easy! Never thought of drawing a Taj Mahal before!

Here is a snapshot of the final piece! My husband is in total awe at this style of art, so Thank You Lele Sir J

Elephants at sunset

I have drawn similar sunset drawings earlier....last time I had drawn camels in the sand dunes with sunset in the background...its one of the lost pictures now!  L
Lately, it seems my blog is turning into an art blog....but this is what I am doing on weekends now.

Before - The sketch

After - Final paint



Fav sketch

This is my sketch I drew when I lived in Spokane, 2008 . I drew it on a drawing book that was presented by my American neighbor Tracy. She gave it to me seeing my art hobby. I made a colored pencil sketch of it and gave her as a gift. I still preciously use this Christmas gift - drawing book for special drawings.

I drew the sketch just once, but I copied and painted them to gift a few friends..It’s one of my finest pieces. As you see I am not perfect in drawing human figures, what should have been a Japanese woman looks like Aishwarya Rai to my mom J I just love to color her and gift her to as many friends as I can. And now after all these years, this time she is freshly painted to be framed to go in my house!!!

Bird of Paradise

The first time I got to know of this flower was from the movie – From Prada to Nada…a movie referring to Mexican culture and lifestyle. Since then I have been fascinated by this flower. It’s become a part of my routine life now as I see it at my workplace each day. Everyday they bring a smile and awe to me. How pretty can nature be!

So I thought, why not make a painting of it. Couple of hours of dedicated effort and I have it on my book now J

..with a purpose!



Love to draw and paint :)

I have again, started painting. But this time with a purpose! When I used to draw in Spokane, my husband would say, “When we go back to India, I’ll frame all your paintings and sketches and put them on the wall”. Well, when I left US…I left my file full of art at my brother’s place and now I don’t have it anymore…and soon I want to start putting up my art on the walls. So here’s a fresh start again.

Buddha Sketch

Quickly drew my signature Ganesha sketch on a small scale that will be framed and hung above the door bell. Cool idea? In the past I had drawn too many Ganesha sketches. Today I tried drawing a Buddha face. I think it came out pretty well. Now I just need to be able to shade it like the original piece.

My Signature Ganesha sketch!

I want to prepare lots of art pieces and I somewhere feel I am running out of time…no idea why! I have always wanted to learn oil painting and I am yet to do something about it. I actually want to take a small introduction/basics course. I wish I had taken a class, by now I would have had some good oil paintings to display L.



So for now, it will just be pencil colors and water color art pieces!

Hobbies to relax

Sunday rainy evening ...nothing to do going out in the wet weather...got a sudden rush to go back to my hobby of painting...wished to color something quickly than sit and sketch for long....Tulips!!! Quick and beautiful to color! Lots of opportunity to mix and blend colors and give shades! Very satisfying night! J

Tulip festival memories from Seattle :)



Jai Ho FM

I had fun watching some of my friends performing the JAI HO flash mob in Seattle. I wish I was there when they performed this...or that they did this a few months ago! I remember my Micheal Jackson Thriller performances on the streets of Seattle. Nevertheless, still support and love them!

Picasso of India ....dead!

I went to the cafeteria to get some lunch. It is my habit now to pause and watch the latest news being displayed on the big screen TV. Every day, I get my latest updates about the 2G scam, Kanimozhi, Maran, Anna & Ramdev news. From a far distance I had noticed the picture of MF Hussain being displayed on the TV screen and I thought to myself, “yet another controversy the old man must have got into, sigh!”

I waited until I got my lunch packed to go and then stopped close to the TV when I saw the flashing news “Funeral preparation not yet decided for MF Hussain” and it struck me then that the Picasso of India was gone!

All the frustrating news flashes of scams & Ramdev were gone & the news channels were flashing MF Hussain’s news of death.

I personally like to draw and paint. But the work that artists like MF Hussain or Picasso do is obviously out of my understanding; for most of us! It needs extremely high level of imagination to think, understand & then draw such paintings. And paintings are like poems, the interpretation? - to each, its own. I have known this artist only for controversies more than for his paintings. Frankly, I just now took a look at his controversial paintings, where he has drawn naked Indian deities and his own interpretation of the Bombay Blasts in 1993.

Freedom of speech is too relative! As humans, we support everything that is favorable to us. Moreover, religion is always too sensitive a subject! In a country like India, a Muslim artist drawing naked Indian deities HAS to be super controversial. Of course we are supposed to ignore the naked sculptures we have in our Indian temples. I have seen so many of them and frankly, they do raise a question on the list of taboos that we HAVE TO follow which don’t go in sync with the temple sculptures. This is called hypocrisy!

It is always a juicy topic right? A Muslim painter insulting Hindu deities! Even when I looked at the paintings now, I came up with my own interpretation & understanding which probably wouldn’t be the same with another person or Mr. Hussain himself. Like we say, Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder; I think the same for Hussain’s paintings. The interpretation should be left to you. That is what is ART! It’s vague & ambiguous; it’s not a written text with ONE meaning.

I don’t wish to have a controversial message here saying that he is correct in his drawings about Indian deities. To me he is just an artist. An Artist who was famously known for his controversial paintings, his craze for prominent Bollywood beauties like Madhuri and Tabu and his recent citizenship of Qatar. As I mentioned artists are complex, and the movie Meenaxi he made with Tabu; I failed to understand it, miserably!

It was sad to read news flashes saying he always wanted to return to India.

As Indians, I think we should be proud to have an artist, a painter of his caliber in his field.

A link to his painting: http://www.mfhussain.com/paintings/

Rest in peace Maqbool Fida Husain.

The charm of Mehendi



My Artist at work



Mehendi is a very old tradition of decorating palms and legs. We all (girls) love to do that. When you walk on the commercial street - Devraj Urs Road in Mysore, you will see couple of men, sitting on the footpath with stools, mehendi cones and a big album of designs. I have always wanted to stop by one of those guys and get a quick mehendi on my hands. This weekend I finally fulfilled my desireJ.

 

Palm side



This time went I walked past them I spontaneously decided that I wanted one. They charge 50/- ($1) for each hand, front and back. It was too early for me to get it done as I had some other shopping to do. So I came after an hour and his spot had 4 women in line & 4 artists drawing. Pretty busy time! They instantly found another artist for me & I was sitting down on the stool to get my hand decorated J



It took him 15 minutes to finish my hand front & back. The front hand is completed decorated as against the back which was drawn only diagonally. Good enough!

 

Back side



They draw different kinds of mehendi like Rajasthani, Marwadi, Arabic  etc. I had never got Arabic one so I enquired and learnt that the Arabaic mehendi which had silver gold glitters in it, last only for couple of hours. So you get them for an instant evening function. It’s a great business for them, especially in the current marriage season, where they get contracts of the brides & groom’s families. Wedding mehendi’s cost way more than my 50/- quick mehendi on the street. J But it is good enough to feel the joy of the Henna color on the hands and without any effort. Because, they prepare their mehendi with all the ingredients to get out the dark color from the mehendi. And the beautiful aroma of the mehendi almost makes you feel high!



Next Morning - Front





And Back