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Tuesday, April 30, 2024

Mother's Day Gift Guide

I have never done a Mother's day gift guide post before. I have never done any kind of gift guide for that matter. But I always read gift guides by other bloggers and stores and was inspired. To make this gift guide I just drew up a list of a few things I like for Mother's Day. All the jewelry is from JC Penney.
It is impossible to go wrong with classic hoops in gold or rose gold.
I like this anchor locket because my mom had one like this.
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I have never seen enamel with pearl. I think this is enamel. I have seen bangles with enamel in india. I thought both these looks different. It would be a nice addition to your collection.
Pearl dangle drop no brainer.
Emerald hoops.
I really like stacking rings.
Pink pearl earrings with a glow.
This look of wearing more than one chain has been trending for several years now.
This could be a subtle statement ring.
I once heard that we should have lots of hoops.
Yellow Table Cloth from Hobby Lobby. I also liked an orange cardigan from JC Penney and an orange and white midi dress in Old Navy. Around a month ago I was walking down the hall? in the mall and I saw a most adorable dress worn by a mannequin behind the glass in Old Navy. I could not get a picture of that dress online. I hope I find the dress in the store.

Monday, April 29, 2024

Purple Flowers in the Backyard

These purple flowers grow under our kitchen window. One day I was walking around in the backyard and I saw these. The ground was dotted with these small flowers. I was very surprised to see so many of them so near the kitchen. I had blogged about these flowers yesterday.

Sunday, April 28, 2024

Ideas for Reflection based on Bible Verses


Living in the love of God and faith that comes from living in the love of God.

There are many definitions of faith. We can use the term faith synonymously with the term religion. We say things like my Christian faith......or faith based curricula and so on. But in the bible there is another definition of faith. Faith is the same as believing. Some people, myself included, have had faith that something will happen for sure. We can have stubborn faith that it will rain on a particular day.

The focus of this essay/article is not that kind of faith. The focus of this essay is the kind of faith that enables us to live our daily life in a more affirmative way. The way to live in an affirmative way is to live in God. The Bible verse I would like to share is "Those who live in love live in God. And God is love." This Bible verse encourages us to live in God. That may seem mind boggling. How on earth are we supposed to live in God? What does it mean to live in God?

As recently as yesterday I figured out some answers to this conundrum. When we live in God's love we are living immersed in love. This may cause you to ask the question how does it feel like to be immersed in God's love. For this we have to look at the definition of love in 1 Corinthians 13 which tells us the verbs that qualify the noun love. The verbs are patience, kindness, non- competitive, encouraging, forgiving, humble, truthful, honoring unselfish, protective, hopeful, trusting and persevering. (This is paraphrased) God's love is an all encompassing concept that contains within it many qualities. If we do something good God's love tells us how awesome what we did is, and tells us to do that awesome thing more and more--encourages us. What if we are immersed in kindness? If we are immersed in kindness we would have a lot of peace and joy inside our heart. This means that we do things in such a way that reflects the fact that God loves us even if the world does not. God's love is enough to help us feel happy if something goes wrong. If something goes wrong we will not take it to heart. God's love is enough to make us feel courage. Suppose you are going to do a social media post and you are not sure if it will be okay. Then God's love will give you courage to post it. Negative emotions such as envy and pride don't have a place in God's love. Love does not dishonor others. God's love will make us feel honored. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. God's love points us to the truth. God's love grieves at evil. God's love does not participate in evil. God's love always protects us. If we are immersed in God's love we are able to trust God and others. To live in love means God's love will be patient with us if we are not already perfect. God's love has high expectations but God's love accompanies us as we try to become perfect. To live in love means to live in goodness. And in a holy and pure environment. Because God is pure and holy. To live in God means God helps us to have hope. We can have tons of hope. We can have hope for our kids. We can have hope for our future. We can have hope for everything in our lives. God's love helps us hope in big decisions of our life but more importantly it helps us have hope in the little things of our life. God's love helps us persevere in good things. It is easy to forget God's love. Sometimes the problems seem so huge. It seems insurmountable. We feel overwhelmed. This causes us to forget God's love. But if we remember God's love then we can overcome the challenges. Jamie Grace, a contemporary Christian singer said when she was ill as a young girl the disease seemed large. But she reminded herself that God is larger than anything we face in life. That is what it means to live in love and live in God.

God's love causes faith to be a positive force in our life. It is not the kind of stubborn faith that believes that a certain thing will happen. But it is a faith that makes everything positive in our life. This makes us truly live happily in the universe created by God. God's blessings abound in our life. Purple flowers under the kitchen window, pink flowers on the side of the road, a video of innocent children singing and dancing, a sermon by a lady (Jamie Grace) telling us to be uninhibited like children. It is a faith that trusts God and surrenders everything in our life to God.

Saturday, April 27, 2024

Painting of land and sky

I painted this yesterday. Today I added some finishing touches. It is inspired by a painting in Hobby Lobby. Here is the painting:
The land and sky are depicted in this painting. A large portion of the painting is sky. A house nestles in the land. There is very little land.

Friday, April 26, 2024

Charcoal drawing of Evergreen Trees

Yesterday I had set aside some time to paint. Yet I felt very lazy to go downstairs where the sink is located to get water for painting. So I decided to do a charcoal drawing because all the supplies --two charcoal pencils, sharpener and eraser were nearby. My inspiration was this picture I saw in Hobby Lobby. For the foggy look I just rubbed a piece of paper all over the page after I drew the trees.

Thursday, April 25, 2024

Supplies from Hobby Lobby

A few things I bought from Hobby Lobby recently. The painting book is $9.99 each but since it was 40% off I got two for $11.00. I bought an individual tube of green paint, a shade of green I did not have before. I think this green is different from the greens in the two painting sets I have. Two bottles from which I can pour water into the dish for painting. And a hello kitty crew socks. All this came to $19.00 and a few cents.

Wednesday, April 24, 2024

Tree with Dark Pink Flowers

I photographed this tree yesterday. I really like the color of these flowers. Flowering trees are so awesome. This time of the year there are many trees in iowa city with a ton of flowers.

Kuyil

These are pictures of a park I photographed two days or so ago in Iowa City. Just the fact that there are so many trees reminds me of some tranquil yard in a countryside in Kerala, India. My grandparents homes had lots of trees. Here is something I wrote about childhood memories of visiting my grandparents homes. I always noticed my cousins were so much closer to nature than me.
In Udayamperoor on lazy afternoons if we sit and listen we can hear a bird call. The name of the bird is kuyil. We can call back to the bird in a similar way. When we mimic the bird call, the bird responds and makes another call. We can again respond. And the bird will respond too. The frequency and speed of the calls gradually increases. Then suddenly the bird flies away. My cousin rubeena taught me this-- to listen carefully to the kuyil and respond to the kuyil. My cousins who grew up in Udayamperoor and Thyccattussery knew more about the mysteries of nature than me. During my visits they would share this knowledge they had with me. They knew the names of trees, they knew how to make aquariums with glass jars, they knew how to find saplings of cashews, they knew how to make home made henna, they knew how to make home made shampoo with the leaves of hibiscus, they knew how to cure irritation in the eyes with the juice of the parijata flowers, they knew how to feed chickens with rice, they knew to find the eggs laid by the hens somewhere in the backyard, the knew about butterflies and dragon flies. They knew that goats only eat the leaves of jackfruit trees. I was always amazed after interacting with my cousins. Milk from rubber trees collected in coconut shells, different types of shell fish washed ashore on the brims of paddy fields, to listen to the sound of the sea in a seashell shaped like a conch. It was so idyllic.

Tuesday, April 23, 2024

Clouds

I painted these clouds two days ago. I looked at a picture of a kid's drawing of clouds which I found in the internet to paint this. I was trying to paint a picture of a painting in hobby lobby. In that picture the clouds are round and billowy. But I was not able to get that look. So I searched in the internet and found this picture and painted it.
This is the painting I painted which had clouds that were difficult to paint.
This is the inspiration for that painting.