Eid Mubarik!

Field of Gold

Ramadan Mubarak

Man has reached the moon but the mullahs still can't see it!

Flowers in Water colors

Magnolia

15x22 140 lbs cold press water color paper



White Lilies

15x22 140 lbs cold press water color paper

Re-gifting

Read very interesting posts about re-gifting on Wayfarer's and Aisha's blog. My husband and I spent weeks in getting a gift for someone. We both love to give gifts and I enjoy to wrap them beautifully. We have some friends whom you could call “nashukray”. There are so many stories about this nashukri episode but I will tell you the most recent experience. I bought a very pretty baby dress and a stuffed toy for this friend's new baby girl and bought a baseball practice set for their 4 yr old son so that he does not feel ignored. When that friend opened the gift instead of saying thank you or that she liked the gift, she goes you know my daughter got so many dresses that I don’t have space for them in the closet. And she kept saying the same thing again and again in different ways. I could feel my cheeks go red and smoke coming out my ears. To annoy me more she says to her son who was opening his gift ..."Oh! Please don’t open it you might hurt someone…keep it for Pakistan." (keep it we will gift it to someone in Pakistan) They were to leave for Pakistan in 2 weeks time. I just sat there looking at her thinking why the hell I wasted so much money and time on them.

Last Week...

Practicing glass and light effect in water colors




Snow Scene in Water Colors

Land Scape in Water colors

Still life in acrylics

Still Life in water colors

Art Classes

I joined painting classes here at the Brazos Valley Arts Center and had my first class yesterday. I am absoloutely thrilled to start working again finally and to learn new and different techiques. I am going to post all of the work that I do in the class and at home. Here are the first two peices.


"The Red Dragonfly"
Water Colors
11"X 15"
90lb. cold press water color paper





Water Colors
yupo paper
10"X 13"

This is the work from my first class. The instructor, who is a practicing local artist (Barb Starner), showed different effects of water colors on different materials like the water color canvas, clay board, yupo paper and cold press water color paper. This one is done on yupo paper which is kind of glossy and it is very difficult to control the spread of colors. I had to be very bold while doing this one especially as I painted directly on paper...I mean no pencil drawing. It turned out good but I feel that I can still do a few final touches.

Constructive criticism is welcome.

My Hand

17 years ago!

college chawkidar-Rehmat


A class fellow


A still Life


Another still life


Life drawing


Still life

Mango Treat...

Mehndi

The first wedding invitation since we came to the US.




We went to a mehndi yesterday. The time was 6:30 and we reached there around 6:40, thinking we were late, as it happens we were the first to be there - by first I mean even before the hosts! I guess when going to a pakistani function we should observe the time difference between pakistan and here, for desis time doesn't matter they go by the date instead!

Margalla Hills

I am back...

Greetings from Islamabad!

Sunset

The River

hmmm yummy mangoes...

It’s been a while since I wrote anything on my blog. I guess I am too excited to write anything. The reason for this excitement is that I am going home soon. I just can’t wait to roam on the roads of good old Isloo (Islamabad). I can’t wait to eat the yummy mangoes and very sweet grapes and of course all the delicious veggies. I just hate the taste of the veggies here.

some new pictures

San Antonio TX

Fire

We didn't start the fire
It was always burning since the world's been turning
We didn't start the fire
No, we didn't light it
But we tried to fight it

"We Didn't Start the Fire" by Bily Joel

Spring Fling and the Princess

It was the Spring Fling at my daughters’ school today. The girls enjoyed a lot but got very tired because after the fling we took them for shopping. My little one, as she was tired and sleepy, gave us tough time while shopping. She wanted to buy a dress and refused to sit in the cart. I gave her the dress she wanted so that she’d sit in the cart properly. I thought I’d leave the dress at the cash counter but you know you can’t fool this clever little girl. She just wouldn’t trust us and kept holding the dress till the end. I kept her away from the cash counter when my husband was paying and she thought that she got her new dress. She slept on the way back and slept for another 30 minutes at home. When she got up her first question was…where is my new princess dress?

She is in 'princess phase' these days i.e. believes she is a princess and that she should wear a glittery, swirlable dress all the time, even when she is sleeping. I hope this phase ends soon as I am fed up of changing her ten times a day. Changing ten times because she wants her dress to swirl when she twirls and not all of her dresses swirl when she twirls (she calls it the princess dance). What is more when she is the princess instead of treating me as a princess mother she thinks of me and everyone else as the princess maid!!!

My elder daughter had a white cotton dress which she wore only once. I liked that dress a lot and kept it safe for Amani to wear. It is size 4 and I thought it should fit her this summer, so I took it out and made the mistake of letting her try it on. She wore it and didn’t want to take it off and spilled some diet Fanta on it. I washed it immediately but the orange color did not go away (I am wondering what this diet Fanta is made up of!). So I washed it again but no luck, then I added some bleach and washed it for the third time, it helped a little. But the very next day she wanted to wear it again. She slept in that dress last night and today when I was getting her dressed for the spring fling she wanted to go in the same white dress which is not white anymore (thanks to punch flavor Gatorade this time! ) and now I will just wash it once and get it dyed :(


At the Spring Fling: enjoying kicking while baji standing at the back too shy to play



We got our hair sprayed baji got all blue and...



...I got red and purple



Treasure Hunt



we both found spider rings in the hunt baji did not want hers so i got both
oh! no, I did not hurt my fingers...I just love to wear bandages


and look who else was enjoying spring fling