Christmas in the Kitchen

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  I had such a great time with my family and friends!  The last few days have been nothing but eating, laughing, shopping ... repeat ... eating, laughing, shopping ... repeat!  I was more than sad to say goodbye to everyone as they headed back to Virginia. :(

Soooo, to take my mind off of missing my family, I kept busy adding a few last touches of Christmas around the house.  I thought I'd share a little bit of my kitchen, decked out for the holidays.  My goal was to keep it fun, festive and filled with whimsy.  Hope I succeeded!

As you enter through our mudroom, you're greeted by this whimsical tree, filled with cookies, candies, cookie cutters and other fun ornaments (click on pic to enlarge if you'd like):

Mr. and Mrs. Claus have fresh, gingerbread cookies all ready for you:

And, for those of you who remember my love for these cute cards from KariCraft during the Fall, I loved adding a few to this tree, as well:

I found these sweet, festive lollipops at Cracker Barrel ... thought they'd be fun tucked in the tree:

My wonderful elves are perched on top ... they are busy stringing gumdrops, which then cascade around the tree.  They are such wonderful helpers:

I filled my kitchen canisters with calorie-filled yummies, except for the middle one, which I filled with fake snow, ivy and ornaments, topped with an elf:

The other counters have festive touches, as well.  A polka dot bowl of *faux* fresh bread:

A Christmas cookbook tempting you to make something yummy:

This little vignette has a tiered tray of *faux* goodies sitting next to the sweetest picture of my little fella taking his first walk with Santa a few years ago:



Lastly, I topped my kitchen cabinets with garland, snowflakes and red and white ornaments.  Annnnd, I added a "Holly Jolly" note to my chalkboard:

The only thing missing from my kitchen is the smell of Christmas cookies baking in the oven, which I hope Jax will help me with this weekend!

Thanks so much for stopping by ... I'm off to see everyone else's touches of Christmas!

Be sure and stop by these truly wonderful blogs to join the fun!

Dittle Dattle for Amaze Me Monday

BTOTP for Metamorphosis Monday

 

Southern Hospitality/Vignette Party


Hugs,

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festive lighting...

Diwali is long gone and it's time for Christmas with reds & greens, cakes & cookies and loads of happiness....

...but festivity can never go out of style, can it?

I received a mail, few weeks back from one of Rang Decor's readers Rama Ananth and she wanted to share some of her Diwali moments with all of us. I loved the way she has used fairy lights and other traditional lamps to bring in festivity.

Here are few captures from her lovely home.

These are truly beautiful Rama, thanks for sharing it with readers of Rang Decor!

(images by Rama Ananth)

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A Hundred Hands...

A Hundred Hands is a nonprofit trust based in Bangalore, India.

Their vision is to create a world that celebrates the pleasure of handmade crafts in our homes and daily lives.

'The Handmade Collective' A showcase and sale of all things handmade is on and I had an opportunity to drop by yesterday and enjoy the beauty of various handcrafted work.

The gracious Mala Dhawan of A Hundred Hands showed me around and here are few lovely products that I captured from a variety of handmade goodies...

Amazing Aepan painting on tealight holder lamps...

Gift boxes...

'Aepan is a unique craft of the Kumaoni folk , where they use finger nails, originally done on walls. Intricate patterns are made using natural dyes as this craft gets a new lease of life decorating homes and office stationery.'

Christmas gift items by Flower Belles Decorators...

I just loved this idea of having fairy lights decorated with recycled egg crates by eCoexhist...

Eco-friendly Ganesha by eCoexist...Beautiful Sanjhi Art...

'Sanjhi is an art of cutting paper on non metallic surfaces with the help of plied scissors and sharp blades. While this craft flourished since its origin in the lands associate with Krishna, in Mathura and Vrindavan, Uttar Pradesh, today only one family claims to be carrying it forward through it's fifth generation of artists.'

Lush green plants for sale...
Beeswax products...
Hase Chitra, a tribal art form from Shimoga and Karwar district of Karnataka. Usually done on special occasions like weddings etc, now trying to bring it into our modern everyday life by painting on canvas and metal...

It was a great to learn about some very interesting art forms of India, that are being revived by 'A Hundred Hands...'

Do drop by at

A Handmade Collective

24th Nov to 28th Nov. 2010

4, Ashley Road, Behind Hotel Ajanta

off Brunton Cross Road

Bangalore

Do check out their Facebook page for other updates.

(images by Arch

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Art by Aarohi...

Nazar Batto Box...

Today, I dropped by at Aarohi Singh's exhibition at Pageturners Bookstore and was completely engulfed into a world of vibrant colours and Indian Kitsch.

Here are few captures of her wonderful work.

Side View of the box...

Horn Ok Please Kettle...

Thayyam Box...

Nimboo Mirchi Series Paintings...

Gorgeous Thalis (psst...that lovely Goddess Saraswati thali will soon be mine;-)

The lovely lady with her stunning work:-)

Aarohi's exhibition is on till 28th November, 2010 at

Pageturners Bookstore,

89 Kannan Building, MG Road, Bangalore

So if you are in Bangalore, do drop by:-)

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Rugs......handmade unbelievable!!

As winters are here and I am looking for everything that keep my family warm and keep them away from cold. So I just wanted to spread lot of rugs here n there in my home .......as my kiddie doesn't like wearing socks or slippers. Thus I just googled and came across a very nice site www.finecraftguild.com where I found handmade rugs and couldn't resist to share all these with my blog readers. Here are some nice rugs. Below is crochet rug.



Image Source: www.finecraftguild.com

This one looks like real grass and is made up of three almost similar color of yarn.

Image Source: www.finecraftguild.com

This rock pool candy rug is just awesome.



Image Source: www.finecraftguild.com

Now this one is again of crochet and kids will going to love it.

Image Source: www.finecraftguild.com

Nice purple crochet rug for bedroom.



Image Source: www.finecraftguild.com
And now this is juat an eye candy its not handmade but can be a gr8 inspiration.

 Image Source : Click here

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Freedom Tree Homestore.

Recently I interacted with someone from Freedom Tree Design. To be honest I hadn't heard of them before, so I did my research and landed on their colourful website and subsequently on their Facebook page.

I was amazed to see Freedom Tree Homestore's contemporary home decor collection of furniture, table ware, linen, accessories all made in India.

Freedom Tree range of ceramics

Poochapalam textile range...

Latika Khosla is the design director of Freedom Tree Design, a color and trend studio based in India.

Freedom Tree Homestore is her latest venture, where the focus is on creating colourful, remarkable design & print and also has designed, curated collection with quirky overtones.

The Independence Collection...

Mombaye, The City range...

Kukkiballi Textile Print...

The Independence Collection...

Aranya range...

ceramics...

Dhurries...

'The spirit is to celebrate modern India and as a vibrant design destination – it is a thumbprint against standardization. Loveable and fun products make everyday living beautiful celebrating a freedom of expression, freedom of thought and freedom of being.'

~Freedom Tree Design

What a lovely thought!

The Freedom Tree Homestore is based in Mumbai. They are also on Facebook.

(images from Freedom Tree Design)

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photography inspires art...

You might have heard many times, "Oh, that photograph looks like a painting!" or "The painting is so real I thought it was a photograph."

One of Rang Decor's lovely readers Pree pointed me towards this blog, CreationS - The Essence Of Arts by Rachana Saurabh.

What a lovely surprise awaited me. Remember the post 'paint your prayers...' where I had shared photographs of little feet painted on pebbles? Well, Rachana a very talented artist has created a lovely painting inspired by that photograph!

My photograph...

Her painting...

It's wonderful to see readers get inspired by the little ideas I share here on Rang Decor and really appreciate it. Thank you!

P.S. If you have been inspired by any post on Rang Decor, do share your photographs on Rang Decor's Facebook page.

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