Sunday, March 10, 2024

Only TUSAL

 Hola dear friends

Dropping by to say hello and to share my monthly new moon progress on Project Amma. Not much has happened at my end since my last post other than work work and more work. People are normally most productive in the first half of the year, after returning from their holidays 😄

Looks like I was mistaken on the progress on Amma. I am 75% done and have only 25%!! Ain't that great :). I have only the last 8 pages left now as against the last 16 pages 

This is the 'moving the QSnap' picture. I have goosebumps every time I see Her 

A closer picture of where I am currently and ORTs from the month's stitching

So, till next time.. take care..be happy.. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!! 

Sunday, February 11, 2024

Immersive Experience

 Hola friends! Hope you are doing well and have settled into 2024. I felt Jan was ok, was neither too fast nor too slow.

To update you on some of the interesting happenings from my end, here we go..

I am an art admirer, but only know a handful of artistes, definitely none of the contemporary artistes. When I visited my cousin in New York in 2001, he took me to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which I loved. I was attracted to a certain kind of art and he pointed out that they were all by Van Gogh. That's when I started reading about Van Gogh. Since Last year, the Real Van Gogh immersive experience has been travelling around India and I have been waiting for them to come to Chennai. Guess what, they finally are in Chennai!!

V and I had to go the first week itself for sure. I am totally camouflaged in this picture 😄

This was the view from our corner. We were there for an hour, and did not feel like coming away. It was an absolutely magical experience. We hope to go atleast once more

Baking
I finally got down to baking the 'Christmas' fruit cake! I never ever have baked it in time for Christmas, though I soak the fruits well ahead. This is an eggless, non-alcoholic version and here is the recipe I always use

Stitchy Update
Relatively lesser stitching in Jan due to life happening. I need to plan things better to be able to stitch some more. 

That's it from my end today dear friends. Till next time.. take care.. be happy. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!!!

Sunday, January 14, 2024

Books and some stitching

Hola dear friends! I guess everyone is getting over the holiday hangover and getting into routine. Pace at work is slowly picking up momentum. We have one more festival, Pongal, before we get back into work mode 100%

Every year we have the annual book fair in Chennai during this time of the year and V and I make it a point to visit. It is not necessarily to buy new books, but more to find out what books are trending now, who are the new authors etc. This year too we went last weekend.. 


..and they had some good photo spots for people like me who love to get clicked and drive V mad 😀.

I was looking to buy translations of Tamil classics like Paarthiban Kanavu or Sivagaamiyin Sabadam. I did find both books but did not buy them. Paarthiba Kanavu was a hard bound and too huge and I did not want to hurt my wrist. I felt Sivagaamiyin Sabadam was an abridged translation.

So, here is what we bought this year:
- Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. I had this as a text book in 10th grade and I have been wanting to read it, without the thought of exam and syllabus
- Ram and Sita by Amish. These are the 1st two volumes of a series. Our library has vol 3&4, so bought the first 2
- V bought a book by Murakami. I have never heard of Murakami and am planning to read it once she finishes 

Now for the stitchy update. I have been able to make a decent progress on project Amma thanks to the holidays
That's a pic of the progress and ORTs from all of last month's stitching. I am almost finished with this page

So, dear friends that's the update today from my end. Till next time.. take care.. be happy.. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!! 


Sunday, December 31, 2023

2023 - A ReCap

Is it already time to bid goodbye to 2023??!!  This year has been a mixed bag - slow sometimes and fast sometimes. Overall it has been an average year in all aspects

So, let's see the highlights from 2023

First and foremost, I completed 15 years of blogging!! That's right, isn't that amazing. When I started the blog, I had no clue that I will keep this going for so long. I have made many friends through the blog and learnt so much from this platform. So, here's to more blogging and more crafting

Travels:

We were blessed with 3 trips to Amritapuri this year! 

We had our annual get2gether with the cousins at Pollachi this year. It was a great one, though only for 2 days, as cousins from all over the world were able to come. Some of us were meeting after almost 5 years

Hobbies:

Beading
Some of the necklaces I mad this year. Hope to bead some more jewellery this upcoming year

Bakes
Snapshot of some of the bakes this year. Our favourite are the poornam muffin and the baklava cheesecake

Reading
..aaannd these are the books I read. My favourite was the entire Ponniyin Selvan series, absolutely brilliant

Cross Stitch
This is where I was in the beginning of 2023. I was 5 pages down

..this is where I am now currently. I have completed 11 pages and moving onto the 12th page now. I have about 40% more left. Hoping to finish this the upcoming year

So friends, that is the roundup of 2023 from my end. How has your year been? 

Wishing you and your family a very happy, very joyous and a brilliant year ahead. Wishing that the year brings the best of everything for all of us

Here's signing off for the year.. till next time.. Have a great rest of your holidays.. be happy.. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!!!

Monday, December 18, 2023

About Cyclones, floods and some more

Hola dear friends! It's the last month of the year and time for the final ORTS post of the year!! 

Meanwhile, earlier this month we faced a very bad cyclone, and our city was flooded. There was no power for 4 days and no network too. We were travelling during the 3 days and our return flight was cancelled due to the floods in our city. Finally, we got a flight for a day later. Thankfully, most of the water had drained, but power and network was still patchy. 

Finally, I took the metro to return home from the airport due to poor and flooded roads. Took me back to our Singapore days. Life is now back to normal and we are trying to overcome the trauma and not panic at the slightest mention of rains. We still have some more monsoon left

Moving to stitchy news.. 
..here's a view of the month's ORTs. Lose threads are from the month's stitching and the jar is YTD

..a closer look at the year's ORTs 

..this is the progress on Amma last month. I am loving the progress here

 I am working on a cross stitch journal, trying to capture all the projects I have worked on till date. Hope to make a detailed post on that soon. Till then.. take care friends.. be happy.. keep stitching.. Au Revoir

Saturday, November 18, 2023

Of festivals, sweets & stitching

Hope you all had a great Deepavali dear friends!! Ours was a quiet but a good one this. We had our get-together in the evening and burst some crackers. Crackers have become so expensive now though 

This is me in my new Deepavali saree, which is a hand painted kalamkari in tussar silk

This year I went light on the sweets. Usually I prepare all sweets myself. But this year I ordered sweets and savouries 
The only 'sweet' that I made was this Baklava cheesecake to take to our get-together and everyone just loved it. This was a perfect fusion of baking and ethnic 

Stitching has been slightly slower this month owing to a bout of viral fever 
So, here's the progress from the month of stitching Amma

So, dear friends that's the update from my end today. Till next time.. take care.. be happy. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!!

Monday, October 16, 2023

Of Birthdays and stitching

Hola friends. It's festive season here and we are well into Navratri (which literally means 9 nights) where we worship the divine Goddess for 9 days. This year we have kept the golu and we have loads of golu hopping invites to do, which in turn mean loads of dressing up and loads of yummy food :). Will post pictures from all the festivities in my next post

We celebrated the man's 52nd birthday earlier this month..
..and he chose a coffee flavor cake. We decided to skip the frosting and go for a coffee glaze instead

On the stitchy side, I completed page 11 and into page 12 now
Here's the pic of when I moved the QSnap. Am totally thrilled with how Amma is coming up. 

Here's the ORTS from all of last month's stitching

..and this is where I am right now

So, that's the quick update from me today. Until next time.. take care.. be happy.. keep stitching.. Au Revoir!!