#2015PCChallenge: Week 24 : Hibiscus cane

Hi !

I am so glad this is the third week ! Every week of this monthly floral challenge is tougher than the last.I expected it to be easier as the month wore on ( as it normally happens with me) , but this was a tough week.

I decided that this week my attention would be turned towards hibiscus flowers.

Hibiscus flowers are commonly known as shoe flowers .I normally call it  Chemparathi , which is the  Malayalam word for it.Until I moved out of Kerala, I never realized how much I missed the dash of color this flower always brings , it just about grows in every garden and quite abundantly in the wild too.There many varieties and colors , mostly due to cross pollination. The most commonly found are the bright red shoe flowers , along with the pastel pinks and yellows.

Chemparathis in my memory are all tangled up with my memories of my Grandma.One thing I remember, she used to always make sherbets out of the red ones which grew in abundant profusion in our house.It was a trick of hers to give them to visitors and when they oohed and aahed oved the taste and finally when asked where to buy them from,she would tell them she made it and everyone would be surprised. Our regular visitors always had some at their home , she was not stingy about giving it away.

She  used to add the flowers to her  hair oil  , and added them for me as well when she would send me some. My grandma had thick , jet black,  beautiful curls  and hardly any grey hair well into her seventies.Now that she is no more, I buy a version from the Ayurvedic shops , but they are no match for my grandmas recipe.Eventually I hope I can make them myself.

Even though this was a tough challenge , it was a nice one as well. I always forget how amazing my grandmothers are , all three of them , and this week as I was working on this , I was pleasantly reminded of it again and again.

I was unable to make any pieces of jewelry this time. So I am submitting two hibiscus canes. These were quite difficult for me to make as I had to visualize the flower and make it. I did see some canes , but they were single colored or dual colored , but I wanted the beauty of the colors to shine through.

I am a novice at cane making , especially floral canes . While I am satisfied with the way they turned out for trial 1 & 2 ,I now know how to improve it. I will probably go back to them and give it a try later.

Primary piece ( cane ) : Red hibiscus.

This was the first hibiscus cane I made. Took me around 5 hours. It was longer than I anticipated , and I didn't get it right. The stamen along with the pollen did not look right at all. Not to mention the green color just looked strange,
So I made the next one.

Secondary piece ( cane ) : Pink & yellow hibiscus

This took me about an hour from start to finish. Even though the other  cane didn't turn out so well , it helped me a lot with what to look out for in this cane.
This cane also has issues , such as the petals look squished and the pink area looks like the background rather than part of the petal itself.On the upside ,I am quite certain how to improve these particular issues , but I am sure the next cane will teach me some more.

Hibiscus flower

I still don't know what to make with these , so I am putting them away for now. Hopefully the tube light would come on soon and when it does , I shall update the post .

Thank you so much for reading. Have a great day :)


Update !

I just saw that the polymer clay group 52 weekly clay projects have some amazing hibiscus canes ! I unfortunately did not see these canes before I attempted mine. I sure feel stupid , because I am infact part of that group on FB.I could have saved oodles of time !
I saw a group pic upload on Pinterest and there is an indentical pink and yellow hibiscus cane right on top ! I dont know who made it ,  I would love to know :)
The canes look quite similar , but I am going to try making those to see where lie the differences.

In the garden : Week 12 #2015PCChallenge

Hi !

Its week three of the jungle challenge and I realized one thing , that  I love my jungle leaf cane. I am almost finished with it though , hope I can make another one just as awesome :)

The plan for this week has kind of turned towards home , towards the garden in our Kochi house. Kochi , like much of Kerala is a humid place , which makes it  very green. I never quite realized what an incredibly green state I lived till I moved onto college. Kerala has a lushness that Ihave never seen anywhere else. Green is certainly the predominant natural color,the various shades of green that pop up during the year are uncountable.

We haven't lived in the Kochi house for years , but I still remember the garden and my parents' constant struggle to keep it weed free. It could have been a house build in the rain-forests , ok probably not, but there was a small pond right next to us, and beside it grew huge towering bamboos , tall cotton trees ( teeming with little orange warrior insects) , wild cashew, wild almonds ,cassava plants and  yam plants with giant leaves.This bounty also meant , varieties of birds and snakes (hanging very picturesquely from the branches of some tree)  came to visit, and mongooses too.It was a tiny spot , but I could have spent the whole day studying it and the designs and patterns it presented to me,
This tendency meant we had a lot of Anthuriums and orchids growing aplenty in our garden. Roses never took too well.

This pendant was meant to be  jungly one , but somewhere along the way it went home :)

That was my primary piece , and here is my companion piece. This is an attempt to make Jhumkas.
Lots to fix in that prototype , but I am happy my idea worked out , so presenting it as my companion piece.

Thanks for reading ! Have a good day !

March theme announcement !

Hi,

I finally settled on the theme for the month. I had a lot of feedback for my jungle flower bangle/cuff combo , and I was asked whether there are any more pieces in this theme.I did not have anything else.   So the theme for this month is JUNGLE.

Hopefully this will give a me a chance to learn some floral and leaf canes and also to progress  in the finish direction as well.

Thanks for reading :) Have a great day !