Valentine's Day Wishlist

 

Valentine's Day is here! Just a few of my favourite things for Valentine's Day. They're great ideas for your loved ones, something that will make them smile. For all the singles and those away from their loved ones, its just something to pamper yourselves with! Happy Valentine's Day!

Picture #1: The setting and colours are my favourite (pink and turquoise!). Though what I really want is the little bunch of pink peonies sitting pretty on the left of the setting. For more ideas see the decor ideas by Lonnymag.com here. Since it isn't the season for Peonies yet, one can buy faux peonies, which look stunning as well and you can buy them online at Johnlewis.com or at their many stores.

Picture #2: The second item on my wishlist are these yummy and pretty sugar cookies by iambaker, using this recipe. Perfect for a V day morning surprise! There is a tutorial as well and lots of decoration ideas for the sugar cookies!

Picture #3: DIY Valentine stickers by Twig and Thistle! You can download the stickers here and cut out the stickers from the sheet that you just downloaded and stick em on different fruits. Another cutesy morning surprise for your valentine! There are cut-outs for bananas, oranges, apples, pears and even a general one for everything else! My favourite is the sticker for the berries that says, "I love you, Berry Berry much" (I'm a sucker for mushy right now!). I know someone's getting ideas right about now!

Picture #4: Heart cake! More than have someone make it for me, I am dying to try out this cake! This cake is by iambaker as well! The recipe and tutorial (very easy! I couldn't believe it!) is here. A fun cake to try out and surprise your special someone with!

Have a lovely Valentine Monday!

x G

P.S.: I know a promised a Scarf Post for this week but my Camera is acting funny, I need to buy a new mem card. As soon as I do that, I will present to you my scarf related post! 

An Oxon Room

As promised, I present to you, drum roll please...my Room in Oxford! (Thunderous clapping).

If you'd like to see more, you can visit my section on Home Improvement and my Budget Room Makeover.

Background

Even though I am at Oxford only temporarily (one year), it doesn't make much sense to really doll up  my room. But I simply couldn't live without making it my own personal space, which many a people have entered and exclaimed, "So, you like PINK!" Yes. I like pink.

I mooched off a lot from my Mom's old apartment which she left behind before she moved back to India (Thanks Mom!). I must also thank my flatmate Katie Doig for being my inspiration to really transform my room (from what it originally was - pictures have, out of sheer necessity and good for the mankind, been burnt).Well, the real reason is that as I wasn't sure I was going to be putting this up on my relatively recent blog, I did not manage to take 'before' pictures. I do however have the end result which I am more than willing to share.

Bookshelves
Just to explain the shopping bags on the bookshelves - I was desperate to have some color in my room and took these amazing hot pink shopping bags that came with my stuff at House of Fraser and put them up on the shelves to give life to my room and balance out my Duvet cover and bed sheets from Primark. To tone down the pinks I put the navy blue Zara shopping bag and the beige Burberry shopping bag to merge and bring down the starkness of the pink. Its all about balance! You can also notice my guilty pleasures in Pic #7.

On the bookshelves above my desk you can notice my collection of wonderful BOP and non-BOP hats. BoP - Big Open Party, an Oxford tradition. (:P)

Accessories
As I said in my previous post, Budget Room Makeover 2011, I always display accessories which are of sentimental value. The wall of the bottom-most shelf is lined with postcards, magnets, a photo-card and other things of special importance to me which hold some form of memory or sentimental value. The notice board has cards, an Oxford map, my Blog Board for inspiration, the table place-card from my first Graduate Dinner at College, postcards from Black Swan that I saw at this cutesy theatre in Jericho with Nicole and the lovely french ladies, Julie and Laura, the mesh heart (Picture #6) that I bought with Katya at a Christmas Market in Bath, a Birthday card from Mimi, who's blog is just mouthwatering! And a Christmas card from Paolo. The bookshelf above my desk has my parents vintage photo from when they were newly-weds and the various hats lined up in ascending order of size.

Settee
I took the rectangular table provided by the College and took the extra duvet given by the College and turned it into a Settee-cum-shoe shelf. I may not have all that many things to decorate my notice-boards or room but I do have a lot of shoes which require an ample amount of storage.

Retro

Now, regarding the inherent theme my room has, that is, Retro. I was hoping it would be Victorian, oak-woody, etc. Unfortunately, or fortunately (my friends in such Victorian rooms will tell you how cold their rooms/homes are despite the heating!), I have a retro-architecture room since the complex I live in was built in 1991, as mentioned by the ChCh JCR, and described as having a groovy view, makes one think whether or not it was built in the 1970s. The steel wall-lamps provided also give a very groovy-retro feel, which I say the inherent theme of the room is, well, Retro.

All in all, its a pretty room with a 'groovy' view and is bigger than most other rooms I've come across here, which will serve me well when I will need to pace while I study for Finals.

More Later!

Sneak Peak: Scarves!

x G

P.S.: I need a new camera (d-SLR). Would love suggestions!

Budget Room Makeover 2011

It is a bit late in the day for this post. But I am super-excited about my room makeover carried out inch by inch by yours truly. Its not the best room makeover - its as much as I could source out of my shoe-string budget and lack of certain kinds of room pieces in India.

Furniture

My parents had coupons left over from Fabindia and we were able to manage a larger than usual single bed in dark Mango Wood. Later we happened to be in Amar Colony where second hand furniture is sold. I came across a beautiful wood carved chair which was the one piece of a pair and after tactical bargaining with the vendor, my dad and I managed to buy it for Rs. 3000 (approx. $66). Yep!

Curtains and Linen

For the curtains we scrounged around Lajpat Nagar market (famous for cloth shops) to find a deep royal pink (Rani colour in India) silk cloth that I got the tailor to stitch up into a french window curtain (my room entrance is a set of half french-window doors). With the leftover cloth, I asked the tailor to make cushion covers to go with the curtains.

Accessories

Most of the stuff in my room has sentimental value and no matter how cheesy or kiddish it gets, I'll never get rid of it. The book shelf (part of the colonial structure that is my house) was much cleaner and less cluttered before I moved to Oxford to pursue my studies. Now, its got a lot of my mom's stuff which couldn't find place elsewhere in the house!

Lights

The golden bulb lights that I nailed around my mirror were bought in Malaysia. A similar set in pink, white and purple are nailed along the skirting of the wall with the bookshelf. Next to the mirror, there are lanterns hanging from the ceiling. The blue lantern was a gift from my Mom. The purple lantern was bought from a small family run antique store from Jew-Town in Kochi, Kerala. It is now a popular accessory in many cafes and restaurants in urban cities in India.

Closet

Its only a picture of the outside of the closet - the inside was almost empty as most of stuff is here at my College residence. The closet, from the inside, I must say is very well organized. I designed it myself because I've been very disappointed with closet spaces I've had since I was a kid as it didn't conform to my organizational ideas. But, this one I measured and drew on graph paper and researched until I got it perfect! The colour, the size, the shelf sizing, height, depth et al. The only sad part of my story is the Carpenter messed it up a little. If you look closely, its supposed to be a bi-fold closet door which folds and pulls towards yourself (outside). The carpenter made it such that the door bi-folds alright, but folds on top of the other half of the door. Sigh. If only it weren't for the doors my closet would finally be perfect. I am grateful though, its definitely an improvement on the previous ones!

All in all, I love my room. And there is much room for improvement! (pun-intended) But as I said, on a shoestring budget, which does not allow for too many options to pick from, a colonial structure and an amateur designer will only get you as much!

Next time:  Oxford bedroom! Keyword: Retro


More Later!

x G