DIY Ganesha to go green this festival

Every year brings heartwarming efforts on the part of devotees to worship their favourite elephant god by respecting the earth that nurtures us. Every year brings heartbreaks too, when visuals of post-festival idols turn garbage of toxic proportions on our beaches.

The silver-lining - over the years, I see more interest in the effort to stick to unpainted clay Ganeshas, or to innovate with other materials.

Here is a quick round up of this year's efforts, as Navratri grandeur approaches soon.

My friend Hema Sampath, who misses her trips to Lalbaug Raja every year at Mumbai, continued her personal tradition of Ganesha worship this year. She dunked the painted Ganesha idols, for a homemade one.

``I had the clay in my fridge. I had kept it for my craft work. It came in handy for my Ganesha instead,'' says Hema, who loves lord Ganesha.

Creative in a lot of things herself, Hema is a super-busy mom to a beautiful one year old, who still manages to find time for craft ideas.

The deep blue box you see below her altar shelf, is not actually a box. It is a rangoli coaster that she uses to decorate the altar.

Worship has to come from the heart more than outside it, which is why one needs to set aside the conventional love for big size. In Mumbai, it can be a challenge, with the entire city and its outer cities turning the streets into Ganpati party zones, and large idols making the atmosphere euphoric during the nine days.

Still, a friend Sridevi Appari managed to do just that. All she needed was about half a kilogram of turmeric and water.

The result is divine, earthy and attractive at the same time.

Notice how a couple of vases with flowers add to the profusion of colour even more. And how the oleander strings sit comfortably on Ganesha and the kalash.

Sridevi's mom had such a Ganesha too, in a larger size. And needless to say, their steadfastness to stay green inspired TV coverage by a Mumbai TV channel. Here is how her Ganesha looked before the pooja.

Turmeric was what I used too, in my own personal tradition, of not buying the festival idol. I did not indulge in creativity to make the idol - just stuck to making the turmeric cone that is used in other festivals for a token Ganesha pooja, with some besan (chickpea flour).

Notice the little turmeric hill on the beetle leaf in this plate. A packet of flowers and some grass from the garden outside. And I was comfortable to go.

Those yellow circles with kumkum to decorate them, are symbolic of the lord's clothes. The bead-like cotton encircling is to symbolise his sacred thread.

I did manage to make a super quickie umbrella.

This one, is made with the end of a plastic garlic net bag, a bamboo skewer, some dried bamboo plant leaves, and rice in a brass crush bowl. Another flower to top it. The umbrella is integral to many households where people make it using cardboard. As the story goes, after all the war, Ganesha went for a stroll on his mouse, belly full and an umbrella on hand. And the moon laughed at him.

The rice went into our bellies later, while the leaves went back to soil. As for the net, it hangs around home for another use, perhaps in some other craft project.

I do not have a better picture of this, but it looked a lot better during the worship.

A chunk of my extended family still sticks to picking up paint-less Ganeshas a day or two before the festival. My own experience in Mumbai when I lived there, was their complete absence in the sea of painted idols.

An option when you get an idol that is not painted, is to add some decor element to it yourself.

My schoolmate Sujatha Ratnala and her family did just that. They got their idol through an NGO that makes, sells and teaches to make eco-friendly idols - To Make A Difference.

``They charge less than 50 per cent of the market rate. And they deliver it at the doorstep, just to save lakes,'' says Sujatha, who has been picking up these idols from them for the last four years. This year, nine of her neighbours got them too.

As for giving the deity a personal touch, she got her son to paint it a little.

The family used muggu rai - or the chalk used in millions of Indian homes for home rangolis. They dissolved it in water and the boy used a paint brush to decorate the idol.

Other embellishments around home came in handy.

``The crown, we had from earlier festivals. And the cloth too. For the forehead, we used a beaded rakhi,'' says Sujatha. As such, such crowns can be found in many religious shops.

A small piece of white cloth that makes for the dhoti, is a piece of Kerala dhoti tied using a string. She cut the cloth to the size of handkerchief, and tucked the pieces in pleats to the string neatly.

The highest form of worship is when you offer yourself to God, selflessly and in spirit. I remember a beautiful Hindi poem at school, that talked of offering to God, the flowers on trees, as they were, without plucking them, and water from the oceans and rivers, without taking from them.

Being aware of the environmental hazards of toxic paints going into the water bodies, and defying societal frenzy by staying true to your heart are essential to one of our most important festivals.

It is heartening, going by the rising number of hits that the DIY Ganesha posts on this blog get each year, that as a population we have been taking interest in going green for worship. Wish we did that for every festival, every day worship, and every activity.

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Pictures courtesy: respective owners or devotees -- Hema Sampath for the homemade clay Ganesha, Sridevi Appari for the turmeric Ganesha, Radhika M B for the tiny turmeric cone Ganesha, and Sujatha Ratnala for the NGO sell eco-friendly Ganesha.

Pictures have been used with permission from respective owners.

Any further use of the pictures requires permission from Imprints Handmade, and needs to attribute the use of these pictures, to Imprints Handmade. Copyrights for the pictures rest with the owners.

Rangolis on jewelry boxes

During my recent trip to India, I looked around at craft shops in vain for pain wooden boxes that one could paint on. Tough luck. I did find some cute gift boxes made of bamboo possibly, but with no scope of personalizing.

That's a reason I love Dollar Tree and the craft shops out here.

If you are an avid scourer for stocks, you can get desktop wooden boxes that are unpainted for as little as $1.

I love painting rangolis on these boxes, although it is a tedious process. I do not prime the wood with a wood primer before getting started, but I do sand-paper it thoroughly before starting the paint work.

For more instructions about painting wood boxes, you can also refer to my ancient post: Rangoli on a jewel box

A tip or two with those instructions though - things I learnt during the numerous painting sessions.

For the initial lot of boxes, I stuck to glossing them with Mod Podge. But switched to Martha Stewart Crafts High Gloss Finish. I am happier with the results although I don't think it is the perfect one.

• When you sandpaper the inside of the boxes, make sure you scrape more from the surface near the box hinges 
• Do not give extra coats on the surface connecting the lid and base. Doing so could make the paint stick and peel
• Always paint the narrow frame top that connects lid and base in the end, and leave it to dry more than you would possibly dry the rest of painted sides
• For intricate designs like the rangolis, using a zero size paintbrush helps- stock more than one Size Zero paint brush though
• Stick to simple designs for a start and move on to more intricate designs as you progress with a few boxes
• If you wish to spray paint them, try as much as possible, to use the paint outdoors 
• Spray paint may not need more coats the way hand painting would need, but you need to use masking tape extensively for the hinges and latches
• Cut large plastic covers to rectangles and place over newspapers when you spray paint 
• Paint about three boxes simultaneously. It helps save time, because by the time the painted surface of your first box dries up, you are done with the third box
  
  • When you use a brush to gloss the painted boxes, make sure you use single strokes and do not rub the glossy finish 
  • Keep a container of water handy so you can drop the gloss brushes in it quickly
  • Make sure you wash the brushes with soapy water after each session of painting
  • My personal experience with olive green or camp green craft paint over orange surface has not been great
  • Whites over dark surfaces work great for me, but if you have any tidbits you can share, please tell
  
  The yellow box I have painted above is my favourite. These were the colours used on the doorstep of my Ammumma's home in Chennai. The tikka you see on its side, is called Kalyana Bottu in Telugu. It is the design used as bindi on the foreheads of brides and grooms in Telugu marriages.
  
  
  
  
  

 Rangoli patterns can be used on plain cardboard cartons too. Give the experiment a shot and let me know how it goes. After a lot of dilemma, I learnt to use gold coloured paint over a painted surface. I was not so satisfied with the first attempt, but my friend who I gifted the box to, was thrilled. This one is a bright red-gold combo, but I tried a gold over maroon surface and gifted the box to my mom during my India trip. The result was good.

My friend Ashwini Deshpande, of the popular Indulge Ashscorner food blog shared a picture of one of my boxes.

 

These boxes are a sample of what I regularly paint. I did a bunch of them more, to gift away in India. The most unexpected reaction was from my friend's kids.

You would assume that such boxes would be a hit with women, those who are religious and otherwise, to store their jewellery and tiny treasures. I stashed one such painted box for my friend's mom and some kid stuff, all in one tote, when I went to meet them during the India trip. The kids - a six year old and a two-year old, saw the box first, and decided it was the best toy in the world for them.

For the next couple of hours, they took turns in playing with it, smiling at it, opening and closing it a hundred times, watching its corners and carrying all over their home! My protests that the box was meant for their grandma hardly mattered. And we presume that kids take a fancy only to bright coloured plastics!

The next time you paint a wooden box, do not be sure only 20 plus and 30 plus people will like it. My slow discovery -- no age-bar for rangoli box love.

What to do with Mishti Doi earthen pots?

Once upon a time in Indian Railways, a minister introduced earthen cups for chai, which I thought was a superb idea to replace toxic plastic cups and expensive paper cups. The scheme got into a mess and eventually vanished. I am not sure if any trains still have them.

But every time a friend talks of having collected those kulhars or matkas for later use, I feel elated.

My friend Deepa Balakrishnan sent me these pictures recently. They are matkas, but not of the railway kind. They are containers of mishti doi, the all-famous Bengali sweet sold in Indian cities.

Deepa, with her three-year-old son Kabir, preserved these little pots after using up the Mishti Doi and painted them for decor and gifting. 

These are two little such painted earthern pots stacked one over the other. Deepa and her son three year old Kabir worked at this cute little project.

They used about five colours of Fevicryl acrylics. Some tips that Deepa gives, when you engage your kid for such a project is -

• cover the child with an apron as it could get messy
• spread out a few sheets of newspaper on the floor to avoid staining 
• the pots are breakable, so it is better to work on the floor so that there is minimal chance of dropping the pot by accident (from the table for instance)
• it is better to work on two pots at one time, because, once you paint a colour, you need to wait for the paint to dry, at least 30 minutes (the child could get restless)
• use a combination of thick and thin brushes 

So the materials you need would boil down to -

•  earthern pots
• paint brushes of different sizes
• acrylic colours
• newspapers
• apron for the child
• tissue paper, just in case paints spill

While such a project could be the perfect thing to engage your toddler with on a summer afternoon,  you could use it to nudge the child into being patient with colours.

``Before these pot projects, Kabir would just scratch colours over his colouring assignments at the play-school. I would hold his hand to help him paint these pots. These days, he makes sure the colour is within those printed drawings,'' says Deepa.

She says that since he is used to the painting of pots now, he is not as distracted as he was when they began. Like any other excited toddler, Kabir keeps their guests entertained about how he painted each pot.

Between the mother and child and their grandmom, they've painted several pots. Some of them were gifted by Kabir to friends and relatives too.

The design above is a common rangoli design used in front of South-Indian homes. It is pictured above their shelf. She also tried warli designs.

So the next time you binge on Mishti doi, you know what to do with the pots instead of trashing them!

As for the costs involved, she spent Rs 18 each for a bottle on the acrylics or fabric colours. The paints are enough to last many more pots, says Deepa. 

You could try out designs with as little as two colours. Just be patient enough with the drying process. Enjoy your next project:)

Pictures courtesy: Deepa Balakrishnan

For permission to use pictures, write to: radicreative@gmail.com

Rangoli on a jewel box

How do you store your jewellery? For that matter anything precious that's tiny?

``Jewel box, silly!!!'' you'll exclaim.

I love to do that too. But when I travelled from Chennai to Newark, Delaware, it was simply not possible to load heavy jewel boxes into the heavy suitcases. Jewel boxes are the last thing that occupy your mind when all you want to make sure is, if the medicines you need got in. Still, I love those jewel boxes you get in India.

So intricate, earthy and inviting! This picture is only an example of the thousands of richly made jewellery boxes.

Imagine my excitement when I found at Hobby Lobby, that you can do some DIY! On a jewel box! One look at the $ 1 box and I grabbed it. Decoupage. Sequins or chamki work. Fabric wrap. So many ideas raced in my head on the `what to do with it' front!

I settled for painting it. After all, rangolis on bookmarks has been a fancy that I caught on like fish to water!

Now for the choice of colours. Instant memory flash: my mother spreading cow dung with a broom stick over road in front of our house, an rice powder with medium to make beautiful designs.

And why not? Why stick to sequins glory when earthy colours can make your jewel box look just as gorgeous!

In comes the olive green craft paint. And I get started.

Painting it was not as simple as I thought it would be. Dabbing the brush on the wood...I began with the insides as that would prevent smudging my hands. Working from outside to inside would make it look clumsy I decided.

One coat. And two coats. It did not look glossy enough. So I let it dry. Third coat...phew!

This is how the insides looked later on. Once done with at least three coats on all sides, I picked up a super thin brush for the white. When you begin with something so experimental, it is better to stick to simple designs among rangolis. That's what I did. Am pleased with the design yes. But wracking my brains how it could get a glossy look.

I love those folksy footprints designs. Footprints of God, in whatever form we imagine. The border design is basic. It was on the back side of this box that I thought I messed up the rangoli a bit. So I made do with neat outlining of the dotted design, and some mehndi touch to it.

Here it is, the front side. Reminds me of grandma trunks of yore. Still, it looks alright.

Here they are, pictures with the mini-bookmarks. As home (India I mean) gears up for Dasara and Diwali, am dreaming up the festivities as I make this. Painting your own Indian designs can make up for gifts to give to friends in the coming weeks, instead of having to spend a fortune on gift cards.

If you're getting ready instead for Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas, you could think of flowery designs, or some decoupage. Or simply go ahead and gift something like this!


Picture courtesy: Radhika M
Picture of wooden jewel box (second from top): Crafts in India

For permissions to use, mail radicreative@gmail.com

Rangoli on a bookmark

If you are an Indian, rangoli is intrinsic to your growing up.  Although rangolis look simple to the naked eye, those who are good at it know that it takes precision, effort and imagination to make a beautiful rangoli.

Integral to India's visual culture, it transcends religion, so much that it is part of school and college contests.

I remember visiting the Dharmaram Seminary in Bangalore that owned Christ College where I did my Bachelors, not just for Christmas, but Onam too, that was celebrated with gaiety.

Halls and halls rangolis - with huge pookalams (rangolis made using flower petals) - all of them made by wannabe priests of church or Brothers who were still years away from their ordination! In Mumbai, rangolis came alive during Diwali (festival of lights) and assumed modernist design. Some neighbours would make use of a quiet corner between the elevator wall and the wall adjoining their door to create a lovely square rangoli and not disturb the smallish aisle. Others would prefer to empty their living rooms for a huge one!

Back in my childhood years, our mothers and aunts would get up early enough to wash the cement walk-ways in front of homes to draw a rangoli with rice powder or chalk.

I did not make rangolis on a daily basis when in India. In the US of A, it is more difficult to make a rangoli outside your door. Most times, the outside of your door is carpeted. At other times, if you do have a cemented walk-way to your apartment, you are not allowed to make changes like using colours that may alter the floor's look.

Even when I did not manage the daily rangoli outside my homes at Chennai and Mumbai, I moved them to another level. I filled my bookmarks with them. And these pictures keep me going. They inspire me to do more here.

Here are some bookmarks I made when in Chennai.

I used the inside of a cardboard carton and trimmed it for this one. It's one of my beginner pieces.

To make it thick, I sand-papered the glossy side of two pieces of the carton's and stuck them. After that, I pressed the bookmark under a pile of books. Pieces of a saree border that I bought from a crafts store did the job of some design.

Next was to look up an easy rangoli design online and draw it out here. On top of the rangoli, I drew mango leaves- toranam or door-usher design. The grey here reminds me of the cemented floors, although painting the rangoli white did not work out.

Here is a set of tinies - from the inside of a large-sized Mysore Sandal soap.

Satin ribbon borders helped here. These bookmarks are two inches by three inches in size. So they can be alternated as gift tags too.

This one's design did not turn out the way I expected, but wanted to snapshot it anyways. It is again, the trimmed back of a Mysore Sandal soap.

Inspired by the countless rangolis I have seen on cement floors and red-oxide floors, I came up with the following.

Am not so good with brushes, but gave the pieces a try anyways. They are thin pieces and came in handy as gifts to the religious elders in my extended family.

If you see the word `Om' done using the dotted rangoli style, let me tell you I also used this design to make two other bookmarks with the words - `Dream' and `Hope'. My cousin gladly grabbed them.

You could try them too if you wish to. If there are queries, mail me:) radicreative@gmail.com

Pictures: Radhika M B