Who says your interior doors have to be neutral in color? Tired of the white/ivory color doors? Bright colors need not be restricted to walls, curtains or furniture. Go bold with these three ideas and style your door differently…
Bright paint can make so much of a difference…
Colorful Door
“dress your home” turns exactly a month young tomorrow. So it was a pleasant surprise for it to be featured among the best 9 Indian interior design blogs. All you folks at blog adda, thanks for the recognition!
Among other news, it’s been a harrowing time here as this site went offline for over 15 hours last evening. Many of you would have been greeted by the much dreaded “404 Page not found error”. There was a hardware crash and the service providers tried their best to restore as much data as they could. I almost lost many of my posts and your valuable comments; I spent the whole morning trying to recover as much as I could. Later in the afternoon, much to my delight, the hosting providers were able to restore the data fully. So it was 4 hours of lost effort but all’s well that ends well. And, I’ve learnt an important lesson - to back up posts and comments. After all those years in IT, I should’ve known better 
I value your comments and thrive on your feedback. What is it that you’d like to be featured here? Got any questions? Over to you all…ask a question / leave a comment.
2 comGot a rack full of old magazines some as old as 5 years? A Feb ‘05 Femina issue with useful kitchen tips or a Woman’s Era magazine from 2006 that carried some mouth-watering recipes for the festive season or some cool tips on how to get dressed for a party after work in a jiffy? Yes? Then you’ve got company…I have saved tons of magazines just because one feature was good, or it had an odd tip on Page 53 on how to keep your coffee decoction fresh (I have this annoying habit of folding pages that I’d like to read again). These magazines lie untouched for years but I don’t feel like giving them away.
After all, there might be a way to put these to good use without letting them occupy useful rack space.
Use it as a stand to keep a vase on the top. Doesn’t it make for a colorful base.
Old magazines stacked to make a colorful stand
If you are a mother and a blogger, then the chances you’ve not heard of the talented Mad Momma are bleak; her home is a visual retreat. Pictures of her home and garden , replete with casual references to recycling and gardening tips, have been a great inspiration for me. Thanks to her, the number of potted plants in my balcony grew from one to ten within a month bringing a lot of cheer, happy memories (watering with my son daily), and greenery into our lives.
I wanted to showcase how everyday objects can be used as planters and I knew MM had creatively used a zillion such things in her backyard. She was kind enough to share pictures of six planters from her indoor garden. Most of the containers have been reused as planters as they were originally intended for something else. I present to you her best picks..
Formerly, a toffee basket
A big coffee cup with saucer
Teapot with broken lid put to good use
Pest Control. Cockroaches. Aarghh..How often have you switched on the kitchen lights in the middle of the night to find the creepy little dirty insects moving about freely? Do you tip-toe into your bathroom like a detective carefully inspecting the corners behind the door before stepping inside? I doubt I would be so scared of any other creature on Earth..cockroaches make me shriek loud enough for the whole building to hear. That makes me take a lot of preventive steps to keep the pest at bay.
If you share my fear for cockroaches, then read on to see how you can get rid of them.
1. One important thing I’ve observed is that dirt attracts cockroaches. The presence of roaches is directly proportional to how unclean your kitchen is. Flowing waste basket, food particles littered on the counter, open grocery bags, smelly shelves, and a dirty under-the-sink area will act as magnets for roaches. So ensure you clean the counter top every night after dinner, empty the waste basket, seal half-open grocery bags, and clean/wipe the racks/shelves regularly (at least once a month).
2. Herbal pest control is one thing I recommend highly, if it is available in the city you live in. It is economical, odorless, non-poisonous and gives good results for at least 6 months at a stretch. It takes about 45 minutes to apply the gel all around the house and costs about Rs.550 - 600 for a 3 BHK house. I used to repeat it once every 5 months so it costs under Rs.1200 annually. The downside is not available in all cities. There were many vendors in Pune but non in Bangalore. Most are safe around children.
3. The other alternative is to go for a branded service like Godrej Hi Care or Pest Control of India. They are comparatively very expensive at Rs. 2700 for an annual maintenance package. I wouldn’t recommend PCIL as the spray’s smell is quite strong and they ask you to empty the kitchen before the treatment. I found it very cumbersome and time-consuming.
4. A stop-gap solution that has been effective in preventing cockroaches is a home-made paste. Take one part of boric acid and two parts of maida. Knead it into a dough with a spoon of sugar and roll them into small balls (slightly bigger than that of a naphthalene ball). Let it dry until it turns hard. Place two to three balls in every rack of your kitchen shelf. This keeps roaches at bay. The process has to be repeated once in 2-3 months for it to be effective.
5. Some other preventive measures you can take are to secure the drain openings in the kitchen and bathrooms every night, keep the under-sink cabinet odor free and place naphthalene balls in the region.
4 comI had a set of 6 wooden coasters that were nearly 5 years old. Dull, faded, and ready to be discarded. But the coasters/place mats are the sturdy kind that I didn’t have the heart to just junk it. So over the weekend I transformed a pair (to begin with) into these bright, colorful coasters.
Colorful Coasters
How to paint:
The steps are similar to how we painted the cane furniture: sanding, priming, painting followed by a coat of varnish. The only difference is I used acrylic paint for this project.
Coaster Painting Steps
Quite an offbeat title for a home decor site, right? Ludo, Snakes and Ladders, and Trade are some of the most commonly found games in any Indian home; the ones we cousins played played on those long afternoons during the summer vacation. I doubt if much has changed now. I stumbled upon the snakes and ladders game in three different settings that were visually stimulating while accentuating the decor.
Aarohi Singh, a Bangalore based artist, creates the age-old game on top of a wooden table. She adds a lot of color to it and what I like about it is its accessibility. One doesn’t need to get the board to start playing; it’s right there on a piece of furniture.
Snakes and Ladders on a wooden table
Continuing with the theme of plants, I present some more flickr finds today.
These stainless steel planters look stylish, modern, and most importantly are resistant to varying weather conditions.
Stainless Steel Planters
Though they are more ideal for a commercial setting, a miniature version of these as outdoor planters has the potential to add to the glam quotient of a house.
If you are thinking of recycling your stainless utensils, then wait a minute! Most stainless steel planters such as these are treated with a special layer inside made of fiber or plastic to make them acid-resistant. In Indian weather conditions, planting in stainless utensils can be harmful to the plants as steel tends to get warm too soon.
I would like to experiment with a small old balti indoors (preferably in the balcony) in a corner that doesn’t get too hot. The balti would need a small hole to drain excess water. And maybe a little acrylic work on the outside would make it a stylish planter.
Image Courtesy:
Flickr : Badec Bros Deco
2 comIf you’d like some cheap thrill, then hop over to Shopper’s Stop and check out their cushion covers range. I liked this one, in particular.
Cushion cover from Shopper's Stop
The richness of color and design of this cover will make it suitable only for a light-colored setting. If you have a cane chair such as this one, then it will be a good fit.
2 comDo you live in an apartment and would love to have a garden but don’t have the time and space? Most of us who fall under that category would at least grow a ivy plant in a bottle. Do you and if yes, how many?
A ivy plant (commonly known as money plant) is one of the first things I get when I move from one city to another. It is at the same priority level as getting a gas connection and a broadband connection (if not in the same order ).
Every time I’ve moved, I’ve lost all my plants. On more than one occasion I’ve seen my ivy grow from a plant-with-one- leaf to one spanning more than two floors. But that hasn’t deterred me from planting a new one again. Now I have over 5 of them, each of a distinct type, in different planters: two in maggi sauce bottles, one in a vase, one in a terracotta plant and one in a pot. The wonderful thing about a ivy plant is it requires little maintenance and grows very quickly with little sunshine and adequate water.
Here are two inspiring pictures to grow your own ivy, if you don’t have one yet.
Ivy Plant
Ivy Plant
A little greenery inside home makes a world of difference.
Image Courtesy:
1. Flickr : ivy style33
2. Flickr: Synaptic Impulse
2 com
