spa day at home!

I think you're never too young or too old to have a spa part at home, I mean, there's nothing wrong with a 9 year old having a themed birthday party, where the party theme is "a spa day" or a 55 year old lady, who instead of having her friends over for a tea party is rather organizing a spa date at her home, right? Also, a perfect idea of a bridal shower or mothers day!

I searched up on google a while back, when i was planning to have a party at my home hosted by a salon or some people who were professional in this, people who were professional massagers and estheticians. But it the cost for all the arrangement turned out to be kind of way more than what I could afford and I felt bad asking my friends to pitch in, although maybe I should have now that I think of it.

But anyways, that's when I started my search for homemade facials, scrubs or cheap stuff I could buy from stores and turns out that wasn't that bad of an idea! Me and my sisters had alot of fun making all those facials and creams. I mean think of it, you do a shoulder and a neck rub for your friend and then she puts on masks on another friend and she gives you a manicure and so on and so forth, it's actually fun! or if you're too grossed out by the idea you could all do it on yourself! ever heard of "self serve" :P

Anyways, let's move on to the arrangements!
1.  how many people you want there, yes! that does matter!! because if you'll just crowd your place up way too much then well it won't really be relaxing, so invite the much you can handle!

2. Inviting them: if you have spare time, then you could make or print out cards yourself and if not, just a casual call can be just enough :)
 * and don't forget to ask them their skin types! and if they have any kind of allergies* this will help you prepare for the facials and masks.
2. "the soothing environment"

• Candles: buy some relaxing scented candles! dim the lights and just let the candles do the magic! few I like are lavender or vanilla scented! bath and body works have some new signature scents! i like the ice wonderland ones, plus they are on sale too right now!
• Music: You can actually buy relaxing music dvds or just download some! pick jazz or a low keyed songs or even just piano, violen or guitar playing! but get prepare before hand!
• Flowers! bunch of fresh orchids in a vase, need i say more?
• Other: make sure you have empty space for this! have big bright cushions for them to sit or lie on and don't forget the black stones! it'll give them a feel of a real spa salon!

3. Now comes the fun part! arranging all the things that you'd be using for manicures, pedicures, masks, facials, rubs, massages etc!
-  option 1 is you could higher professionals and have them take care of it completely!
- option 2 is you arrange everything yourself ( which is THE fun part actually)
  *I think i'm going to write a saparate blog for young girls' themed "spa party" where I'll mention all the other fun things they can do*

Anyways, first figure out how many activities or work you want? like if you want manis and pedis or just facials and masks and rubs or just massages and remember don't stress about making them really professional! you're just trying to host a fun, soothing and pampering day, so it can be in any form really!

• Manis and pedis: Try giving a call to your local nail salons and see if they are available off hours or have some specialists come over, try and negotiate a cheap rate! they might agree! or you could just get some cuticle and hand creams for hands and warm water with feet scrubs and cream for feet along with your nail colors collection! and tada!!
• Massage: again, it'd be nice to have a pro do what they're best at. This option is not necessary but it's better if you just have the massage therapist do the work! Try to search for a massage therapist school near you and chances are there must be some theapist learning their work and looking for practice!
• Facials and Scrubs: So there are tons of way you can treat yourself with! make a trip to your closest departmental store and see if any facials or scrubs are on sales! I like the ones that come in sachets! so every different kind of skin can be treated the way they deserve!

     - but there are ways you could make facials at home too! you know something that would be fun! provide them with the ingredients and make hand-outs of make it yourself scrubs and facials, it'll be fun to make them yourself and the fact that they'd be using fresh and natural products is pretty amazing too, isn't it?

here are some website that can help you with making your own facials :
http://beauty.about.com/od/skinflaws/a/facemasks.htm
http://www.fatfreekitchen.com/beauty/facial-masks.html

remember not to forget slices of cucumbers and potatoes(which is actually really good for you darks circles)

The most common mask, that I use alot to make my skin more soft is honey and lemon mask.
take 2 spoons of honey and squeeze half a lemon! mix it up, rub it on your face and keep it on for about 10 min!
the honey helps make your face more soft and the lemon helps in brightening and fixing the decoloration of your skin!


I think I wrote way too much as it is. . . so chaos for now!!

Project:Mehndi thaal

Ok so I thought of starting out with one of my past projects. If you don`t know what exactly a mehndi thaal is then have a look at my other blog about mehndi thaal it gives a pretty thorought description of what it is.

  Anyways, I and some friends and family made a mehndi thaal for my uncle`s wedding this summer, it took us about a 2 weeks of endless efforts. Even though we could have opted out for a professional one, but we wanted it to be unique and it was surely worth alot more making it ourselves and was a lot of fun too.

So, what we used:

• A strong 4 x 3 foot strong board. (we used a douple layer of a cover of a refrigrator! the shape really depends, we went a curvy rectangle so more people could be seen) 
• 2 small round boards
• 3 strong plastic pipes with different lengths (different lengths so that the people holding the board could be seen,)
• Golden wrapping paper (got 6 sheets) 
• Diyas(candle lamps)(I think about 2-3 dozens)
• Tealight candles (a 50 pack)
• 5 different sets of died rice (we chose,aqua blue, pink, yellow, green & orange)(altogether it was about 2-3 kg of rice) 
• Broken Mirror for mosaic (I hammered old sheets of mirror into small pieces, however, I would Highly recommend not to try that at home yourself! I had to use extra precautions and still i ended up hurting myself a bit)
• Tons and tons of glue (the most money was spent on glue!)
• Marigold Tongue Flowers(Gaynday ke phool) in orange

Procedure: 

 My grandfather had some professionals cut the boards and the pipes out of us, they joined the layers together and made slots under the boards for the pipes to be attached with. Then, we pasted the golden wrapping paper on the top of the boards, we chose the golden colour because that is the colour usually used on thaals because of it`s brightness and of course for Mehndi thaals it`s all about bright and radiant colors! 

   Then, I drew a light sketch on the boards and started off with glueing the small pieces of mirrors on (IF YOU TRY THIS AT HOME MAKE SURE TO USE SAFETY GLOVES AND TRY TO TAKE AS MUCH PRECAUTIONS AS YOU CAN!) At first it looked pretty weird but soon it started taking it`s shape! As it was mosaic, I had the choice of mix and matching the pieces around which was hard and fun at the same time. 

That`s what it looked like after we had put the pieces of mirrors on. Then, we took the rice to a clothes dier( I think that`s what they`re called) and he just put the rice in cold water and threw in some powdered colors, he didn`t keep the rice in the water for long or otherwise they would have started to turn moist and soft. I chose to get it colored from a professional because it was less messy and he ended up charging me nothing for it as I  had already given him enough orders before. 

 So, I drew a sketch around the whole board with the help of my sisters and cousins and we started to glue on the colored pieces of rice. 

After the designing, we filled it up with the blue colored rice and drew the borders with golden lead. I chose the blue color to be the most prominent as it was the theme for the mehndi night. 

And then I glued the top of the diyas(lamps) and dipped in the rice to have the top look coloured.

And then we decorated it with the diyas, flowers and topped it up with tealight candles!!

AND WALLAA!! 

Mehndi thaal(henna tray)

Mehndi thaal is a decorated Henna tray used in South Asian weddings as a trend to bring the henna into the ceremony day called "Mehndi". It's a day when the friends and family present at the ceremony put little bit of henna on the Groom and the bride and treat them with some sweets, which could sometimes include even more rituals and the close friends and family are usually seen to perform dances for the couple on that day. 

        

       Traditionally, the Groom and Bride used to have their own separate "Mehndi" ceremonies, where the opposite side's family and friends would bring Mehndi, Henna and sweets with them. But now, people are usually seen celebrating the tradition on the same day. 

Mehndi Thaal

        But to be specific, a Mehndi Thaal is a very decorated tray, usually made with candles, diyas(candle holders), Matkas (traditional clay pots), flowers, colored rice, mirrors, sequence, golden laces and everything colourful! People either use a specific color theme or use a bunch of bright colors. Sometimes it's made only out of flowers and sometimes people mix and match. At times people prefer to bring in just one Main thaal, having the closest relatives and friends carrying them and have others carry smaller trays or colourful candle holders or clay pots (diyas and matkas) and at times people go for using several huge thaals which does cost extra money but you have more people involved and feeling special, but it really depends on the mood and decision from people to people. 

Thaal decorated with flowers, matkas and diyas

A thaal with a printed fabric and other accessories

One of the few thaals I really like, it's professionally made with fresh flowers, lamps, candles etc