B'day party planning

Loving the app!! I can write posts on th go.. whenever and wherever I feel like.

Anyways.. Just wanted to update you all that We have now finalised the theme for Our son's bday party. It is going to be Jungle theme. Last saturday we spent 5 hours in the market to get all the stuff. Hats, disposable plates, balloons and other decor items.

I will post the pics of final decor.. Meanwhile, I have been searching on google and Pinterest for all Jungle bday related stuff.

I am not able to save the Pinterest pics..so I have just taken a screenshot. Please note that I have every intention of giving due credit to the pic source.. but am.nkt able to save the pic only.. So the link of the pic source is in that image itself.

Hey all!

OMG!  Which world have I been living in till now.? I didnt know that a Blogger app existed or there wouldn't have been a year long gap in my blog writing. Ever since I joined back work, I have been a little crunched on time, but still I can find few packets of time during office hours. But writing on a laptop in full public view is not something I wanted. Just now I have found this app which lets me write on my cell phone so easily.. and I am loving it. I will try to use this app now and will start with my blogging..

I have gotten so much done in our home in the past year and I have so much to share. The Most recent changes are done in the living room. This month end we are also preparing for our son's bday party. Still not decided for a theme. Keep in touch friends.. what theme do u suggest for a 9 yr. Old boy??

Bathroom Reveal!

Hello Friends,
True to my promise, here I am back to share some time with you. As I had mentioned in my previous post, we got one of our bathrooms renovated a couple of months back. It was a long process. It took us long to finally select the tiles, given that mine and my husband's choices are normally poles apart. So, it takes us longer to arrive at a selection which is liked by both of us.
Since this was the renovation, where everything was getting changed, we had a lot of scope for shopping. Everything from floor tiles, to wall tiles, to bathroom fixtures to choosing a new toilet seat and a sink. End to End change. There were two things that both of us wanted for sure in the beginning – A wall mounted toilet seat and a sink with Vanity. We were referred to the 'Jagatpuri' market in East Delhi by my brother. It was not very far off from our place and boy! We were so glad to go to that market. It is a hub for Kitchen and Bathroom stuff at reasonable prices. That market was a pure delight for us.
Once we finalized the tiles, We started looking for the seat and sink and decided on Roca. For bathroom fixtures, we went with Jaquar except for the rain shower which we got from Hindware. As I am writing all this, it seems an easy task, but we literally went to each and every shop there and looked for options. But well, it was worth it. Because when we finally bought, we were sure that we were buying the best as liked by us. And after almost four months of continuous use, we still stand by our choices.
When we were thinking renovation, we wanted wall mounted toilet seat, and were adamant that we wanted sink with vanity. When we called the plumber, he was not sure if the wall space was enough to have the seat mounted. That was a big blow to our plans. But still, half heartedly, went in with the demolition process. Imagine our delight, when the very first day, the plumber gave us a go ahead on wall mounted seat. We were so glad.
But the same delight we could not get while selecting the sink with vanity. The reasons are multi-fold for this. First and foremost being, there were very few available within our desired dimensions. I was specific about the width – should not be more than 30 inches. Our bathroom size is small – 5’x8’ – which has two doors too. The layout is such that all three major installations – sink , toilet seat and shower need to be on the same wall. So, the maximum space we could afford for sink was 30 inches only. The ones which satisfied the criteria, did not have enough space and I could not imagine how on earth would I ever be able to keep all the things in them for which I have been planning for months and months. There still were two which got my attention, but those were priced at 25-30k , the amount that I was not ready to shell out (as against my hubby). So, instead, we bought the desired dimension sink – 2ft. (from Roca) and I knew whom I would turn to to get the vanity made. I will reveal the vanity in my next post. This post is for the Bathroom reveal.
In the end, All our efforts paid off and we got the desired bathroom done in our style. Yes, it was hard work, and yes, it took longer than expected, but well worth it.
Time for Pictures… Sorry, no before and afters .. These are only the DONE PICTURES.

The pictures I have posted do not do justice to how it actually looks. I will take some pics in the day time and will update this post then. Tell me, What do you think of this renovation? Does this look like a beautiful bathroom?

I was lost!

 

Yes Dear Friends!!! For the last few months, I have been lost. And the reason, I could not find a balance between blogging and work. Yes ! I have joined back work. I feel so relieved just to think about it. But, I do admit, I have not been planning properly and I just could not get back to blogging. Although, I used to think and promise myself again and again that from this weekend, I would start writing. But the weekends would come and go, My promised were never kept.

Anyways, Now, I will try to post at least once a week, so that I do not lose you!. There have been quite a few changes / upgrades in my home – one major being our bathroom renovation. That continued for almost a month. That really took a toll on our daily lives. Living with such dirt in the house, along with two kids, and that too when I had recently joined a new job. That was the time, that intent to blog actually took a backstage.

After bathroom renovation, I got vanities made by the carpenter. I will be blogging about that in my next post. So, stay tuned for that!!

Take care !!

JAVA/OOPS/Fundamentals in Daily Life

Hey All!
Yes, I know it has been too long for me to post! Somehow last few days, I just wanted to relax, and so, that’s what I kept doing! I have been a bit of blog hopper in those days. I did not open up my blog even once, but was going through other thought provoking blogs which talked about the topics that interest me the most.
Anyways, I will not bore you with the details, rather will come back to the post I intend to write today! Ever since I started this blog, I have been meaning to write about this but I could not gather my thoughts properly. So, last week, when I was doing the tit bits at home, I kind of scolded myself as to why I was procrastinating this post? What is the stuff that I want to gather? May be , I should just write what comes to me in one go, and when I get some other idea, I could write an update… Gud Idea right? Oh! Has it been too much of a suspense now? Sorry pals! I am going to mix personal and professional lives here….
Okay, so let me start now! I am applying my jobs fundas at home. Have you ever experienced that you are wearing, washing, ironing the same clothes again and again? What happened to the shirt that you wore three weeks back, that has never surfaced again? Where is it lost? ahhhhmmm… That is deep down in the laundry basket. The reason it happened ??? You practiced LIFO… Rather you should practice FIFO… No, it is not the name of another football league. FIFO stands for – First in, First out. LIFO stands for – Last in, First out.

The clothes that you put first in the laundry basket, should be the ones to be washed first! First cloth in the laundry basket, should be the first one to be out for washing! Simple !!! So, just practice FIFO in laundry and you will never experience the lost clothes in dirty laundry! And well – This has got nothing to do with java, but this is the one example I found that I can relate to the most in applying my work at home.
The maid came, cleaned the house, took out the garbage, but still you find dirty plates, or broken stuff or garbage at home? It does not look clean enough? Hmm…. May be you did not release your resources properly, so the garbage collector did not pick up the items and released the home of unnecessary stuff… This is the exact statement, one would use at work, if the application works slow. In simple language, If you are not using something, then release it and put in the appropriate place, so that when it is time to cleanup, everyone (including u) knows what stuff is to be thrown out. Makes sense????
Another thing, I have talked about earlier is – FTR – First Time Right… That is not java, just a methodology to follow no matter at work or at home. Whatever you do, do it FTR.
The other day, I was looking for something in the fridge, and was appalled to see, 4 different containers with curd, 4 containers with fruits, kneaded dough in 2 containers, used milk in three glasses. Ufff.. I immediately took a bigger container, and put the fruits together. One bigger container, and dough together, another container and mix milk.(Once the milk is cold enough we can mix). This is a day to day example. But I can relate this to normalization of tables, code optimization. Why take a bigger container and put a small dough ball? Why 2 spoons of curd in a big container which can accommodate half kg curd?? (Really, I am not exaggerating.. but that is how someone at my home works… wink wink)… Ha ha, Actually my MIL works this way. No, I am not criticizing, just different people have different ways of working. Why have same sabzi in different containers? Normalize dear Normalize!! Do not keep the same thing in different places otherwise it becomes difficult to manage. Why put the kadhai itself in fridge in which the dough is kneaded ???? No way !!! These little bits of things, I always relate with Code Optimization. Use the optimum sized boxes for related stuff. Similarly, the medicine box, I don’t prefer to keep it in bedrooms. That has commonly used medicines too, and so should be kept at a common place accessible by everyone (except the kiddo). Right????
Enough of fundas for the day!! Did you relate to any of the stuff I mentioned above? Do you apply any fundas related to your work, at home? I would love to know.

Solution to Laziness

 

Hey All!

I have been too lazy these days. For past few days I just did not feel like cleaning up or sorting the laundry. So the clothes were piling up in the room waiting to be put away. So, what do I do to clean up all the mess???/

Well, I resorted back to my old mantra. Earlier, whenever we lacked the will to clean up our house, we would invite our friends over. No, No, No. Not for them to clean up. But inviting them over for lunch or dinner on a weekend, would give us a deadline by which we just HAD TO CLEAN UP. It seems I work best under pressure. So, that invitation was just the right pressure for us to get to working and get the house sparkle clean.

So, this time I did the same. I called over my friend whose son is my son’s classmate and a very good friend. That invitation built up the right pressure and motivated me and I CLEANED UP.

Oh! Please don’t think bad about me! That’s how I work. UNDER PRESSURE!! MEETING THE DEADLINE. Completing the project well in time before the deadline. And well, That solved the purpose !

What is your solution to the laziness? How do you motivate yourself? Please tell me I am not the only one who gets lazy in cleaning… Or Am I ????

Leftover Wood Reuse!

 

Hi Friends!

Today’s post is completely inspired by a post on ‘www.dressyourhome.in’ post. Laksh today talked about the uses of leftover pieces of wood and that reminded me that although I had planned on this post when I started this blog, I actually never did it. Her post today made me come to reality that I am not being organized about writing my posts in the order they should be. Learn girl, Learn!!!

So, coming to the uses of leftover wood, Remember my post on ‘A Store to Store Stuff’. After that store, we had a few pieces of wood planks left over. I actually wanted to throw them right away and something came over me and I saved those pieces. It had been a few months and one day I was going through some Interiors magazine, Don’t remember the name or the article. What I do remember is, that there was some statement like – Stop saying that you don’t have a space in your home for something. Look around, create space. Creating space does not mean breaking walls, it means to look and think outside the box. Look for spaces where you would never think of doing something, and you will find a space which is perfect for your needs. This statement touched the right bells in my head, and I actually started looking around all over my home. And there it hit me….

For past sometime, I was feeling the need to have some showcase in our home where we could display the cute little knick knacks. I did not want to add a showcase on the floor space just for eye candy purpose. So, the place that I found was the purrrrrfect space…

Remember the photo from our first home….

Here are the two spaces that came to my mind :

The upper arrow indicates the space for showcase. And the kitchen entrance marks the space for medicine cabinet. Here is the AFTER picture for both these spaces:

Both these are made up of the leftover wood planks. I had enough mica left from the store to cover up for the showcase. But for medicine cabinet there was no mica left. I did not want to spend Rs. 500 on 8x8 mica sheet just to use 1x1 of it. So instead, I got creative. I had many greeting cards from my college days that were just collecting dust. I took a bright yellow chart paper, and pasted the cute flowers from those greeting cards and covered up the wood planks. For the edges, I bought a few fake sea shells from local market at throwaway prices and covered them. In the end, it looked so lively and beautiful and moreover it served the purpose well. There was no central space in our 2 BHK apartment for medicine storage. This place had a great function. This makeover is 7 years old. Had I been exposed to blog world that time, I would have put the bottles in a box and would have covered it with cute liners like I have done in this new home.

    

Nice memories I have of that home. All thanks to Laksh for making me nostalgic and inspiring this post.

What is your leftover wood planks story??